Art and musicking as social action
- Level
- Language
- English
- Credits
- 30 ECTS
- Startmonths
- Start: February
- Locations
- Groningen
How can art help to make societal themes open for discussion? How can co-creative forms of musicking and art-making help to bring people together? In this minor, you collaborate with communities, social organisations, and students from other disciplines on real-world societal challenges.
About this minor
Society is under pressure. Loneliness, inequality, polarisation, and exclusion are no longer abstract concepts, but a daily reality in neighbourhoods and in care and welfare contexts. At the same time, there is a growing need for new forms of connection, agency, and collective imagination.
Art and musicking as social action is a transdisciplinary minor for students who do not want to remain on the sidelines, but who wish to actively and artistically contribute to social change.
In this minor, you collaborate with communities, social organisations, and students from other disciplines on real-world societal challenges. You explore how co-creative forms of musicking and art-making can empower, connect, and bring people together, and how art can help make societal issues visible and open for dialogue. Not therapeutically, not top-down or solution-driven, but relational, participatory, and attentive to ethics and power.
You learn to work in field labs, develop co-creative projects together with participants, conduct practice-based (action) research, and share your work publicly. The focus is not on producing perfect outcomes, but on meaningful processes, collaboration, and impact.
This minor is for you if you:
- see art as a social and societal force.
- want to enrich care and social work through creative, collective practices.
- want to learn how to work with difference and complexity.
- do not only want to learn about change, but also want to initiate it.
Do you want to make a difference? Then this minor offers you a place to explore how you, together with others, can make a difference.
Before you can start
This minor is open to both current Hanze students and students from other institutions. An affinity with art, music and care is a plus; skills are helpful but not required. This minor is only offered in the second semester of the academic year.
Admission & application
Hanze students can apply for this minor through Osiris from May 4th 2026.
Students from other institutions can apply through Kies op Maat from October 16th, 2026.
If there are too many applications, selection will be based on a motivation letter. Motivation letters can be sent by email to Jaap Olthof. [email protected]
Admission & application
Please check with your home university whether there is an agreement set up with the Hanze School that is offering the exchange programme of your choice. To apply for and be admitted for our exchange programme you should take the following steps
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1. Be nominated by your home university
Once you have been nominated, your nomination will be checked by us and confirmed to your home university by email. You will receive your application link during our application period.
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2. Submit your online application
Once you have been nominated by your home university you will receive a personal application link and the application instructions during our application period. The application is fully digital and documents do not have to be send by email or postal mail. Make sure you do not miss our application deadline!
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3. Letter of Acceptance
Once you have submitted your application we will check your documents. If you have to re-submit any documents, we will let you know. We will be sending out Acceptance Letters from the beginning of May when you start in September and from the middle of October when you start in February.
Find out more about our application process and practical matters.
Frequently Asked Questions
Contact
-
dr. Jaap Olthof
Project Leader Art & Music in Healthcare
- 050 5953329
- [email protected]
- Jaap Olthof
-
Meeuwerderweg 1, 9724 EM Groningen
