Everything about The European Graduate School totally explained
The
European Graduate School (EGS) in
Switzerland is a privately funded graduate school founded by the non-profit European Foundation of Interdisciplinary Studies. Its
German name is
Europäische Universität für Interdisziplinäre Studien ("European University for Interdisciplinary Studies"). It is governed by a presidential board that includes a representative of the
Swiss canton of
Valais. Instruction is in English.
History
EGS was established in
1994 as a
postgraduate degree-granting school with two divisions:
Media and Communications
and
Arts, Health and Society. Founding contributors include thinkers such as
Jacques Derrida and
Jean-François Lyotard. The setting of the campus in the Alps at an altitude of 1,800 m (6,000 ft.), with a magnificient view of some of Switzerland's highest mountains, provides a unique learning atmosphere.
It is a fully accredited school controlled by a school council ("Hochschulrat") in which the Canton of Valais is represented with at least one member. The school is supervised by representatives of the education ministry of the Canton of Valais, the
Graduate School of Music and Theater, Hamburg, the
Appalachian State University in Boone, NC, and the
California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco.
In 1999, Swiss business magazine
CASH(External Link) reported that Schirmacher had misleadingly labeled the school "fully Swiss-state approved" and "fully recognized" at a time when the federal accreditation law was still being passed, and the canton had only approved the Ph.D. and M.A. degrees, but not the school itself. The magazine also claimed that Schirmacher had listed chaos theorist
Mitchell Feigenbaum and artist
Pipilotti Rist among its roster of faculty, even though both denied involvement in and knowledge of the school.
The Arts, Health and Society Division
Offers certificate programs (MAPS and CAGS) and Masters and Doctoral degrees in Expressive Arts Therapy and Expressive Arts Coaching and Consulting, Education, and Social Change. The MA Programs in Expressive Arts are designed to further training and research in the therapeutic, coaching, consultative, educational and social use of the arts. The programs encourage students to take seriously the tradition and disciplines of the arts as they've evolved over the course of human history. In all societies up to the present, the arts have played an essential role in enabling human beings to make sense of their world, to live with suffering when necessary and to be able to celebrate the joy of life. Teaching takes place in the town of Saas Fee in the Swiss Alps (State of Valais, Switzerland) in two sessions each summer from June to August. Students and faculty from all over the world meet to participate in intensive training seminars.
The doctoral program (PhD)in Expressive Arts combines two Summer residential training's at EGS leading to a Certificate of Advanced Post-Graduate Studies (CAGS) with individualized dissertation research in the student's home country. The Summer training is conducted in English; dissertations can be written in English, German or French if suitable advisors can be found. The granting of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy by EGS has been approved by the Ministry of Education, Canton Wallis, Switzerland.
[Facultyhttp://www.egsuniversity.ch/faculty/]:
The format of a Graduate School for Professionals with training exclusively in Intensive Summer Seminars has the advantage that it can commit a faculty of excellent reputation who are internationally engaged leaders or founders in their field. Faculty members come from transdisciplinary practices that cross institutional boundaries. Advocate investigative learning and creative inquiry which embrace the stratified complexity of the concrete problems we face today. They are familiar with thinking that expands the horizon of established frameworks and creates networks between disciplines and institutions in both the private and public sector. Faculty that have joined EGS are enthusiastic about projects that engage the typical adult learner. They appreciate the benefit of the innovative learning that goes on between faculty, students and participants in on-going projects.
Faculty: Media and Communications Division
(Note: the Arts, Health and Society Division comprises a distinct faculty. The following faculty list is applicable to the Media and Communications Division only, with the exception of
Sandy Stone who serves in both faculties).
Wolfgang Schirmacher was the founding Dean of the Media and Communications division (which confers
Masters and
Ph.D. degrees). Professor Schirmacher retired from that post in the Autumn of 2006 and now serves as the Program Director. The current (as of 15 March 2007) Dean of this division is Professor
Friedrich Ulfers (also distinguished faculty at
New York University). Visiting faculty typically come during the 3 week summer seminar to give a 1-6 day course. Visiting faculty have included
Giorgio Agamben,
Chantal Akerman,
Jean Baudrillard,
Christopher Fynsk,
Hans Ulrich Obrist,
Krzysztof Zanussi.
In 2006,
Slavoj Žižek became the Jacques Lacan Professor at EGS, which has helped to further publicize the school regionally and globally.
Teaching Philosophy
Studies involve two years of coursework, including rigorous on-line writing requirements based upon a structured reading list, and two three-week summer seminars in Switzerland, during which students are evaluated for their active participation in approximately nine hours of seminars and lectures each day with visiting professors, philosophers, filmmakers, and artists and spend their final three years writing a thesis or dissertation, followed by a traditional oral defense.
Slavoj Žižek described his involvement in EGS in an interview with Swiss magazine
Die Weltwoche:
There is an international summer school, the European Graduate School. It's for professionals who only have a few weeks per year for their continued education. They go there for two or three seasons, pay and get a speedy certification, a master's or doctor's. What's interesting with this school is the selection of the lecturers – there are well-known philosophers and artists from the whole world, including the filmmakers Peter Greenaway and Volker Schlöndorff, the theorists Donna Haraway and Sandy Stone, and the philosophers Giorgio Agamben, Alain Badiou and I. We three are friends. We meet there each year, are engaged for three weeks. I can bring my wife, do a 90 minute lecture each morning and am free afterwards.
Intercollegiate connections
EGS has established curricular cooperation with:
- Appalachian State University Boone, North Carolina.
- Beit Berl Academic College. Doar Beit Berl, (Israel)
- California Institute of Integral Studies, San Francisco, California.
- Clemson University, College of Architecture, Arts, Humanities. Clemson, South Carolina.
- Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany.
- Instituto de Estudios Críticos. Mexico
- International School of New Media, Lübeck, Germany.
- Internationale Hochschule für künstlerische Therapien und Kreativpädagogik, Calw, Germany.
In addition, EGS is engaging in a collaboration with Resling Publishing House, including the translation of the book “Stupidity” by Prof. Avital Ronell.
Further Information
Get more info on 'European Graduate School'.
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