Postgraduate Course: Historiography of Colonial Latin American Architecture (ARHI11009)
Course Outline
| School | Edinburgh College of Art |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | This course examines the colonial architecture of Latin America as a nexus of global architectural exchange. Using primary sources and postcolonial critique, it explores how models of construction, urban planning, ornament, and architectural expertise moved between cultures of Latin America and Europe, Africa, and Asia in the early modern period. |
| Course description |
This course explores the global architecture of Latin America from the beginnings of contact between Europeans and non-Europeans to the postcolonial era. We will take the cosmopolitan character of pre-Columbian architecture, long defined by interactions between empires, as well as the diversity of Iberian building, with its assimilation of Islamic, African, Italian, Netherlandish, and German forms, as points of departure. Through close reading of primary and secondary sources, we will examine how Spanish, Portuguese, and other European building traditions interacted with the indigenous architectural cultures of present day Central and South America. We will also explore how these encounters shaped the architecture of the Iberian imperial dominions in Asia and Africa up to the 19th century. The goal of this course is to empower students with the critical tools to investigate intercultural exchanges in the growing field of global architectural history.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2023/24, Available to all students (SV1)
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Quota: 10 |
| Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Lecture Hours 22,
Seminar/Tutorial Hours 10,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
164 )
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
Formative Assessment (Presentation):
Each student will present one reading to the entire class (once a semester). The presentation will:
1) review the content of the article and chapter and
2) critically assess the thesis, methods, and conclusions of the text.
The presentation is understood as an early exploration of a theme to be pursued in the research essay (Component 2 of the Summative Assessment). A discussion with the entire class and verbal feedback from lecturer/tutor in a private meeting will follow the presentation. The class discussion and instructor meeting will equip students with ideas about how to develop the content of their presentation into a research paper.
Summative Assessment (Reading Log and Essay)
The assessment is entirely based two components to be submitted in the examination period:
Component 1 (40%): Creation of a log with evaluation of each week's readings and/or seminar discussion. This log will include one section of around 300 words per week/topic. For each entry, the student can choose to respond critically to one of the weekly readings or to develop a line of inquiry covered in the weekly discussion. Students should submit the completed logbook of around 3000 words during the Examination period.
Component 2 (60%): Development and submission of a 3,500-word research essay focusing on one of the themes presented during the course. Students can elect to compose either a literature review of one of the weekly themes or an original research paper on a more specific topic, i.e. individual text(s) or author(s). The student must clear the choice with the tutors by mid-semester. This submission is also due during the Examination period. |
| Feedback |
Students will receive formative feedback through tutorial meetings and on a plan for the essay. |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Integrate knowledge of multiple regional architectural histories of Latin America and multiple traditions of architectural history scholarship on that region
- Understand broad historical theories of global architectural exchange, as well as key trends and discourses within the history of colonial Latin American architecture
- Master at least one area of literature on architectural exchange in colonial Latin America (for instance, research on the Viceroyalties of New Spain or Peru)
- Participate in present debates in the field of premodern global architecture and contribute original research to those discussions
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Reading List
Iñíguez, Diego Angulo. 'Eighteenth-Century Church Fronts in Mexico City.' Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 5 (1945): 27-32.
Kelemen, Pál. 'Earthquake Baroque.' In Baroque and Rococo in Latin America. New York: 1951, 122-136.
Smith, Robert C. 'Colonial Towns of Spanish and Portuguese America.' Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 14, no. 4, Town Planning Issue (December 1955): 3-12.
Kubler, George. The Shape of Time: Remarks on the History of Things, 1962.
Gruzinski, Serge. 'Art History and Iberian Worldwide Diffusion: Westernization / Globalization / Americanization.' In Circulations in the Global History of Art. Edited by Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann, Catherine Dossin, and Béatrice Joyeaux-Prunel, 2015, 1-22.
Escobar, Jesús. 'Field Note: Architecture in the Age of the Spanish Habsburgs.' Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 75, no. 3 (September 2016): 258-262. |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
1. A critical understanding of the principal theories, concepts and principles.
2. A critical review and consolidation of knowledge, skills, practices and thinking in a subject area
3. Demonstration of presentations skills that convey, formally and informally, information about specialised topics to informed audiences.
4. An exercise of autonomy and initiation in professional/equivalent activities. |
| Keywords | architecture,history,latin,america,colonial,global,colonialism |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Elizabeth Petcu
Tel: (0131 6)50 2619
Email: |
Course secretary | Miss Fanny To
Tel: (0131 6)51 5773
Email: |
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