CLS4270

Cultural theory and visuality

Constantine Verevis

12 points
* 2 hours per week plus 2-hour weekly screening
* Second semester
* Clayton
* Prohibitions: VSA4290, CRT4270

Objectives On successful completion of this course students should have gained an understanding of the principal relationships between the field of cultural and critical theory and the visual field; applied cultural and critical theories to a range of visual works; become familiar with a number of contemporary discourses of visuality; developed the confidence to discuss the historical positions and theoretical constructions of visuality; and accumulated the critical and expressive resources to write clear, concise, accurate and independent essays on topics related to this subject.

Synopsis This subject addresses the relation between cultural and critical theory and the visual field. The range of visual products whose theorisation will be considered includes photography and film, painting, sculpture, architecture, performance, non-Western visual practices, and common objects. Discussion will take place on the historical positions and the theoretical construction of these products with reference to the discourses of modernism and modernity, postmodernism, the body, totalitarianism/post-totalitarianism, museology and institutions, and `the everyday'.

Assessment Essay (3000 words): 30%
* Longer essay (6000 words): 60%
* Seminar participation: 10%

Recommended texts

Buck-Morss S The dialectics of seeing: Walter Benjamin and the arcades project MIT, 1989
Cooke L and Wollen P (eds) Visual display: Culture beyond appearances Bay Press, 1995
Crary J Techniques of the observer: On vision and modernity in the nineteenth century MIT, 1990
Friedberg A Window shopping: Cinema and the postmodern U California P, 1993
Jay M Downcast eyes: The denigration of vision in twentieth century French thought U California P, 1993
Petro P (ed.) Fugitive images: From photography to video Indiana U P, 1995