EUR2010

Imagining Europe: representations and images of a continent

David Garrioch, Barbara Caine and others

8 points - Two lectures and one tutorial per week - First semester - Clayton - No prerequisites

Objectives A student who has completed this course should have a knowledge of the way that ideas and representations of Europe have changed across its history; an understanding of the way that apparently natural, even geographical entities are defined culturally, and of the role that visual and literary images play in defining and redefining such categories; a grasp of the principal debates surrounding the concept of Europe, and of the different cultural, national, and ideological positions that underlie them; an awareness of different disciplinary approaches, and of the way that each one provides specific understandings of the way our perceptions of the world are structured; skills of critical reflection and use of evidence; an ability to use material from a range of disciplines and to apply interdisciplinary perspectives; skills of written and verbal communication.

Synopsis EUR2010 is a survey of the different ways that Europe has been thought of and represented. It begins with classical notions of Europa and the medieval idea of Christendom. Through the study of literature, painting, architecture, travellers' tales, cinema and other sources, it traces the development of the idea of Europe as a region defined both geographically and by its culture. This will be placed in the context of Europe's place in the world, since representations and images of Europe defined it as much in terms of an Other, or multiple Others - of what it was not - as in terms of what it was. The course will also trace the idea of multiple Europes: the appearance in the eighteenth century of a concept of a culturally defined 'Eastern Europe'; the idea of regions within Europe, each with its own special character; and after World War Two, the images of Eastern and Western Europe as politically distinct entities. The course will conclude by looking at the re-emergence, since the late 1980s, of the idea of 'Central Europe', and at representations of that concept in literature as well as in political writing.

Assessment A literature survey (500 words): 5% - One visual exercise (1000 words): 20% - One examination (2 hours): 30% - One long essay (2000 words): 40% - Classwork (reading tasks and verbal presentation): 5%

Back to the 1999 Arts Handbook