Postgraduate Course: Approaching World Objects (HIAR11113)
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, which is one of three compulsory courses for the MSc Global Premodern Art: History, Heritage and Curation, runs weekly in Semester 1. It introduces you to the arts, histories and theories of cross-cultural exchange circa AD 300 to AD 1700. |
| Course description |
Approaching World Objects takes advantage of one of the largest concentrations of global art historical expertise in the UK coupled with Edinburgh's world-leading collections. The course offers theoretical, historical and hands-on approaches to working with objects, including manuscripts, paintings, sculptures, relics, dress, textiles, maps, prints, and scientific and musical instruments.
The course provides an engaging and practical means of getting to grips with contemporary issues and debates in medieval and early modern art and visual culture (including issues of display, interpretation, conservation and repatriation), as well as scrutinising the institutions that define them. Students work collaboratively with curators, archivists, and academics to handle, research and interpret medieval and early modern artefacts and primary source materials.
Each week students will undertake set readings and preliminary tasks to prepare for classroom seminars and site visits, focussing on the four core themes of the programme:
* Power
* Bodies
* Religion
* Intellectual histories
Weekly timetabled activities will normally include 2 hours of structured seminar discussion per week. There will also be one practical workshop in the semester, to prepare you for formative assessment. Some of the classes will take place in collections and stores external to the University of Edinburgh but easily accessible from the central campus. Tutors will also be available for informal individual discussion and face-to-face formative feedback.
In parallel with the timetabled classes, students will work in small groups to undertake field work, research and design a virtual exhibition, focusing on an object in an Edinburgh collection.
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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 | As numbers are limited, visiting students should contact the Course Secretary directly for admission to this course. |
| 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: 0 |
| Course Start |
Semester 1 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Lecture Hours 20,
Supervised Practical/Workshop/Studio Hours 3,
Feedback/Feedforward Hours 1,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
172 )
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
100% of course mark: Catalogue Entry and Essay (due weeks 9-11). You will each write your own catalogue entry (1000 words) and catalogue essay (3000 words) to support the group exhibition. This will be submitted online (via Learn) and marked as a single unit of assessment according to the CMS. |
| Feedback |
Formative Feedback: Exhibition Proposal and Design (due weeks 5-7). Focusing on a core object from Edinburgh collections, you will work in a group to propose and design an exhibition. Your group will submit online and orally present their exhibition for which they will receive verbal feedback in class afterwards.
Summative Feedback: You will receive written feedback for the summative assignment (Catalogue Entry and Essay).
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| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Assess decisive moments in the history of artistic exchange between Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and Asia before 1750
- Deploy core research skills, such as visual, material and textual analysis to debate historical questions and issues
- Reflect critically on the factors that led to cross-cultural encounters
- Undertake independent and group research using a range of primary materials
- Assemble a range of primary and secondary information sources to support art historical communication.
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Reading List
Catherine Asher and Cynthia Talbot (eds), India before Europe (Cambridge, 2006)
Kim Hall, Things of Darkness: Economies of Race and Gender in Early Modern England (Ithaca and London, 1995)
Diana Newall, Art and its Global Histories: A Reader (Manchester, 2017)
Jeanette Peterson and Dana Leibsohn (eds), Seeing Across Cultures in the Early Modern World (Farnham and Burlington, 2012)
Fabio Rambelli, Buddhist Materiality: A Cultural History of Objects in Japanese Buddhism (Stanford, 2007)
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Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Visual and critical analysis; Clear thinking and the development of an argument; Independent research; Presentation and communication skills; Organisation and planning. |
| Keywords | Medieval,Renaissance,Early Modern,Visual Culture,Material Culture,Bodies,Power,Religion |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Caroline McCaffrey-Howarth
Tel:
Email: |
Course secretary | Miss Chloe Hancock
Tel: (0131 6)50 4124
Email: |
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