Osher Online Courses   

August Wilson was the first African American playwright to have a Broadway theater bear his name, a fitting tribute to a dramatist who brought African American culture and lived experience to the stage. In this course, we will read, watch, and examine the first five plays in Wilson’s American Cycle, a ten-play series representing each decade of the African American culture’s 20th century. We will explore Wilson’s life and the influences behind his work while focusing on Gem of the Ocean, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, and Seven Guitars, tracing his powerful interpretation, celebration, and perseveration of African American culture.

YOUR INSTRUCTOR: Ladrica Menson-Furr, PhD, is assistant dean of undergraduate programs and associate professor of African American literature. Menson-Furr is the author of August Wilson’s Fences and August Wilson’s Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, and has published on Zora Neale Hurston and Pearl Cleage. She has led academic programs in African American studies and served as a Provost’s Fellow and a Tennessee Board of Regents’ Maxine Smith Fellow.

An online orientation will be held for all Osher Online courses on September 22 at 2:00 p.m. Additional details will be sent via email after registration closes.

Please note: this is an online class. Enrollment deadline September 13, 2026.

America has provided fertile ground for new and alternative religions to sprout and grow. Some prosper and eventually become accepted as part of the normal religious landscape, some wither away and are forgotten, and some detonate, creating public scandal and, in the worst cases, national tragedy. This course will examine New Religious Movements, popularly known as "cults", within the US context. We will examine these religious movements both from insider perspectives and outsider perceptions. We will analyze the history, practices, and beliefs of these organizations to better understand them and deconstruct misconceptions. This course covers the 18th and 19th centuries.

YOUR INSTRUCTOR: Kathryn Phillips is the Schauffler Chair and Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Defiance College.  She received her PHD in Religious Studies from the University of California, Riverside. Her research is primarily focused on the use of Gender Studies in the historical approach to Christian Late Antiquity. She teaches a wide range of classes and loves teaching students about traditions they might be less familar with. She is also a Fellow in the McMaster School for Advancing Humanity at Defiance College, leading annual student research surrounding refugees to Rome, Italy. 

An online orientation will be held for all Osher Online courses on September 22 at 2:00 p.m. Additional details will be sent via email after registration closes.

Please note: this is an online class. Enrollment deadline September 13, 2026.

Journey into the vibrant world of early 20th century art and witness the birth of abstraction. This transformative period reshaped the cultural landscape, from the bold colors of Fauvism, the fractured forms of Cubism, to the dreamlike realms of Surrealism. Each session focuses on the movements’ leading artists including Matisse, Kandinsky, Picasso, Mondrian, Duchamp, and Dali. We will explore their aesthetic goals and the social and cultural currents that influenced them.

YOUR INSTRUCTOR:  Lauren Weingarden is professor emerita of art history at Florida State University. Her research explores the intersections of literature and visual art in 19th-century culture, with a focus on the American architect Louis Sullivan and French figures such as Charles Baudelaire and Édouard Manet. She has published extensively on these subjects and developed an interdisciplinary, embodied aesthetic model that invites viewers to re-experience artists’ responses to modernity’s fragmentation and the fleeting qualities of nature, a perspective that shapes her teaching on Impressionism.

An online orientation will be held for all Osher Online courses on September 22 at 2:00 p.m. Additional details will be sent via email after registration closes.

Please note: this is an online class. Enrollment deadline September 13, 2026.

This course is a history class with a laugh track. We will analyze the significant periods and players of the 20th and 21st Centuries against their historic context and legacy, using humor as the platform. We will discuss how comedy was shaped by and responsive to American society, and how comedians influenced and shaped American life. We will cover Silent Films, Vaudeville, Radio, Screwball and Romantic Comedies, Comedy Teams, and the Golden Age of Television. We will study how America laughed in each generation, and how the change in American character and persona shaped how they laughed and what (and whom) they laughed at.

YOUR INSTRUCTOR: Eddy Friedfeld is a film and entertainment journalist and historian. Friedfeld co-authored Caesar’s Hours with Sid Caesar, Directed by James Burrows with James Burrows, and worked with Mel Brooks on All About Me. He was senior consultant for the Emmy-nominated Make ’Em Laugh and a consulting producer on Funny You Never Knew. He has produced tributes to major entertainers including George Carlin, Paul Newman, Dick Van Dyke, among others. He teaches at Yale, NYU, and the Tisch School of the Arts.

An online orientation will be held for all Osher Online courses on September 22 at 2:00 p.m. Additional details will be sent via email after registration closes.

Please note: this is an online class. Enrollment deadline September 13, 2026.

From sleek new industrial materials to innovations in housing, mid-20th-century designers faced the challenge of shaping an aesthetic that reflected the ideals of post-World War II America. In this course, we will explore the optimism that defined the relationship between design and lifestyle during this period, particularly through the emergence of open living spaces in architecture. We will examine the influence of the Case Study Program and the work of leading designers, including Charles and Ray Eames, John Lautner, Eero Saarinen, E. Fay Jones, and Donald Wexler, while considering these developments within the broader context of rapid social and cultural change.

YOUR INSTRUCTOR: Eleanor Schrader is an award-winning educator, lecturer, and author. She lectures and leads tours worldwide on art and architectural history. She was named a distinguished instructor at UCLA Extension, where she teaches history of architecture, interior design, furniture, and decorative arts. She completed graduate work in fine and decorative arts at Sotheby’s Institute in London and New York. She served as a design review commissioner for the City of Beverly Hills and serves on the John Lautner Foundation board of directors.

An online orientation will be held for all Osher Online courses on September 22 at 2:00 p.m. Additional details will be sent via email after registration closes.

Please note: this is an online class. Enrollment deadline September 13, 2026.

The American Experiment began with the Declaration of Independence and led to the creation of the federal judiciary, one of the country’s greatest experiments. In this course, we will trace the evolution of the courts from their English roots to their formal establishment in the Constitution. We will explore how the Supreme Court, lacking the power of the purse or military, derives its authority from its ability to connect with the people of the US and protect democracy. We will examine the creation of the federal judiciary and the power of the Marshall Court, the Court’s evolution through the New Deal, the Vinson Court, the Warren Court’s “Rights Revolution,” and the role of today’s US Supreme Court.

YOUR INSTRUCTOR: Lauren Andersen is the director of the Utah Judicial Institute. Andersen practiced appellate law in the state of California and presented arguments to the California Supreme Court and the US Supreme Court. During this time, Andersen closely studied the Roberts Court. She has lectured about the Supreme Court and the death penalty. Her opinions were quoted by The New York Times and the ABA Journal. She was previously the director of the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at the University of Utah.

An online orientation will be held for all Osher Online courses on September 22 at 2:00 p.m. Additional details will be sent via email after registration closes.

Please note: this is an online class. Enrollment deadline September 13, 2026.

The 1960s were a decade wrapped in myth and misunderstanding. In this course, we will cut through that haze by turning to something powerful and concrete: the speeches of the era. The times and the conditions demanded these significant speeches. Together, we will listen to the voices that moved a nation and shaped history. With recordings preserved through television, video, and YouTube, we will discover what these speeches still have to teach us today.

YOUR INSTRUCTOR: Arthur “Buck” Benedict is a former lecturer at Wharton and the Fels Institute of Government at the University of Pennsylvania, where he taught public speaking for 16 years. He also created and taught speechwriting classes. He was awarded the first Excellence in Teaching Award at the Fels Institute and was nominated for the university-wide Provost Award for non-standing faculty.

An online orientation will be held for all Osher Online courses on September 22 at 2:00 p.m. Additional details will be sent via email after registration closes.

Please note: this is an online class. Enrollment deadline September 13, 2026.

We often only notice the global supply chain when it breaks. Yet, for millennia, the movement of goods has been the silent engine of civilization. In this course, we will track the evolution of trade from an executive’s perspective. From the sunken treasures of Bronze Age merchant ships to the high-tech intermodal systems of today, we will explore the vessels that carried the world’s wealth and the complex networks that keep our modern shelves stocked.

YOUR INSTRUCTOR: Scott Jones brings a unique perspective to his lectures, combining 30 years of naval command, diplomatic service, and executive leadership in defense and maritime industries. Jones is a docent at the J. Paul Getty Museum, leading architecture and gallery tours. A retired Navy captain, he commanded three warships and a squadron, with assignments at the Pentagon and State Department. He later served as a senior executive for a defense corporation and a maritime shipping company and ran his own consulting business.

An online orientation will be held for all Osher Online courses on September 22 at 2:00 p.m. Additional details will be sent via email after registration closes

Please note: this is an online class. Enrollment deadline September 13, 2026.

Since the 1890s, when Americans were beginning to develop their own traditions in classical music, composers have recognized the dilemma of creating the American sound. We will explore how classical musicians and Broadway and Hollywood composers, most of them Jewish, followed parallel paths in creating sounds that have been defined as evocative of these lands and their people. Aaron Copland, George Gershwin, William Grant Steel, Florence Price, Alex North, Elmer Bernstein, and others will be the protagonists of this lecture, supported with audiovisuals and anecdotes.

YOUR INSTRUCTOR: Emanuel Abramovits is a mechanical engineer and has been a concert promoter for over two decades. He is involved in events by international artists like Itzhak Perlman, Gustavo Dudamel, Sarah Brightman, Roger Hodgson, ASIA, Journey, and Kenny G. Abramovits has designed and staged original orchestral events, including an Event of the Year winner and several world premieres. He served as the cultural director at Union Israelita De Caracas, releasing books and organizing film cycles, concerts, and art exhibits.

An online orientation will be held for all Osher Online courses on September 22 at 2:00 p.m. Additional details will be sent via email after registration closes.

Please note: this is an online class. Enrollment deadline September 13, 2026