Postgraduate Course: Text and the City (CLLC11098)
Course Outline
| School | Edinburgh College of Art |
College | College of Humanities and Social Science |
| Course type | Standard |
Availability | Available to all students |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Credits | 20 |
| Home subject area | Architecture and Landscape Architecture |
Other subject area | None |
| Course website |
None |
Taught in Gaelic? | No |
| Course description | The course explores the aesthetics and ethics of urban writing, public lettering, and various textual forms that rely upon urban spaces and surfaces: graffiti, commemorative inscriptions, signage, advertising, and text-based public art. It examines the ways in which languages, cultures, spatial ideologies and histories intercede and interplay in the making and re-configuring of urban texts. It looks as well at interpretive strategies and discourses of endorsement and containment of textual experiences and practices. The historical and theoretical reflections are linked to case studies and examples taken from the contemporary art and media, graphic design and street art that explore the relationship of letters, text and language to place, architecture and urban landscape.
The course incorporates trans-disciplinary methodological and theoretical questions crucial for probing urban semiotic landscapes, representations of cities in media texts, spatial and temporal dimensions of multimodal everyday urban texts. Much emphasis will be placed on the multimodality of the forms of presentation of research and on trans-disciplinary methods for investigating texts in specific urban contexts. In their projects, students will creatively engage with urban texts by exploring theories and concepts as well as examining and interpreting textual artifacts, forms of writing, language signs, word-images and related spatial practices, media representations and discourses. |
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
| Additional Costs | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
| Displayed in Visiting Students Prospectus? | Yes |
Course Delivery Information
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| Delivery period: 2012/13 Semester 1, Not available to visiting students (SS1)
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WebCT enabled: Yes |
Quota: None |
| Location |
Activity |
Description |
Weeks |
Monday |
Tuesday |
Wednesday |
Thursday |
Friday |
| Central | Seminar | | 1-11 | | | 11:10 - 13:00 | | |
| First Class |
First class information not currently available |
| No Exam Information |
Summary of Intended Learning Outcomes
At the end of the course students will:
- be able to conduct analysis of the graphic forms of writing in their urban context;
- learn to critically evaluate established theories and methods for the study of the relationship between text and the city;
- learn new theoretical instruments for studying texts and images and analyse their relationship to different cultural and disciplinary traditions;
- be able to research, analyse and interpret complex multimodal material;
- learn to analyse and critically assess specific forms of urban writing (graffiti, advertising,
inscriptions, logos) as well as technologies that implicate or rely upon visible texts;
- develop skills in relating theory to the analysis of the material manifestations of textual practices and graphic and spatial dimensions of textual artefacts;
- learn to examine urban space and interpret the city in relation to its multitude of textual and intertextual forms.
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Assessment Information
| The course is assessed based on an illustrated essay of approximately 4,000 words. Essay topics are developed individually by the students over the course of the semester. Students are encouraged to experiment with the form of the essay to best reflect their topic, argument, and the visual strategy selected. |
Special Arrangements
| None |
Additional Information
| Academic description |
Not entered |
| Syllabus |
Not entered |
| Transferable skills |
Not entered |
| Reading list |
Not entered |
| Study Abroad |
Not entered |
| Study Pattern |
Not entered |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Ella Chmielewska
Tel: (0131 6)51 3736
Email: |
Course secretary | Mr Christopher Miller
Tel: 0131 221 6150
Email: |
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