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Fine Arts 103x
Christian Room/Sackler Lecture Theater
T Th 11 plus section
Norman Bryson
Dept of Fine Arts
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Jann Matlock
Dept of Romance Languages
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POST-STRUCTURALISM, POSTMODERNISM, AND VISUAL ARTS
The field of speculative analysis we call critical theory has,
in the last two decades, transformed the questions we ask about texts of all kinds.
This course explores the implications of critical theory for the study of visual
representation, beginning with debates in the 1960s and 1970s over the status of the text,
and culminating in current "post-post-structuralist" debates over machines, monuments,
and subjectivity. In five "units" of varying lengths, we will consider authorship and
intentionality; spectatorship and the gaze; masquerade and fabricated bodies; late
capitalism, simulation, and post-modernism; and contemporary debates over the subject.
Students will be asked to read a series of theoretical articles
and to explore critical questions in relation to visual culture of various periods and
cultures, though special emphasis will be placed upon the relationship of critical theory
of the 1980s to contemporary American, European, and Japanese visual practices.
Teaching materials
The course centers on the readings in the Sourcebook,
and it is highly recommended -- frankly, it is essential -- that you have your own copy
(if stuck, two copies are on reserve at the Fine Arts Library).
In addition, a selection of supplementary readings has been
placed on reserve at the Fine Arts Library. Studying these is highly recommended,
though optional.
A number of useful texts has been ordered for the course
at the Coop:
E. Apter, ed., Fetishism as Cultural Discourse
H. Foster, ed., Vision and Visuality
J. Derrida, Mémoires d'aveugle (English version)
M. Alloula, The Colonial Harem
Again, the Coop texts are optional: our main resource is the Sourcebook.
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[Note:
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SB = in the Sourcebook
RES = on reserve at the Fine Arts Library
COOP = ordered at the Coop]
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| Week 1:
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INTRODUCTION TO THE COURSE (9/21)
THE DEATH OF THE AUTHOR (9/23)
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| Reading:
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R. Barthes, 'The Death of the Author' (SB)
M. Foucault, 'What Is an Author?' (SB)
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| Week 2:
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OLD MISTRESSES AND PORTUGUESE NUNS (9/28) |
| Reading:
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L. Nochlin, 'Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?' (SB)
N. Miller, 'I's in Drag'
P. Kamuf, 'Writing Like a Woman'
P. Kamuf, 'Replacing Feminist Criticism'
N. Miller, 'The Text's heroine'
| | Optional:
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Kamuf and Miller, 'Parisian Letters'
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| STEALING THUNDER: APPROPRIATION ART (9/30)
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Reading:
Optional:
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R. Krauss, 'The Originality of the Avant-Garde' (SB)
W. Benjamin, 'The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction' (RES)
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| Week 3:
| SOVEREIGN SUBJECTS: LAS MENINAS (10/5)
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| Reading:
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M. Foucault, from Les mots et les choses (SB)
S. Alpers, 'Interpretation Without Representation'
L. Steinberg, 'Velasquez' Les Meninas'
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| VISUAL PLEASURES AND PERVERSIONS (10/7)
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| Reading:
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L. Mulvey, 'Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema' (SB)
K. Silverman, 'Fassbinder and Lacan' (SB)
J. Lacan, 'The Mirror Stage' (SB)
| | Optional:
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L. Mulvey, 'Afterthoughts' (RES)
J. Lacan, The Four Fundamental Concepts (RES)
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| Week 4:
| ANTI-VISUALITY (10/12)
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| Reading:
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R. Krauss, 'The Im/pulse to See' (SB)
N. Bryson, 'The Gaze in the Expanded Field' (SB)
| | Optional:
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Ed. H. Foster, Vision and Visuality
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| THE VOYEUR AT RISK (10/14)
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| Reading:
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O. Fenichel, 'The Scoptophilic Instinct'
S. Freud, 'Psychogenic Visual Disturbance'
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| Week 5:
| WOMEN WHO LOOK (10/19)
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| Reading:
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T. Modleski, from The Woman Who Knew Too Much
M.A. Doane, 'Film and the Masquerade'
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| THE MASCULINE MASQUERADE: GERICAULT (10/21)
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| Reading:
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L. Eitner, Géricault
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| Week 6:
| FETISHISTS AND CROSS-DRESSERS (10/26)
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| Reading:
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E. Apter, from Feminizing the Fetish
J. Matlock, 'Masquerading Women, Pathologized Men'
S. Freud, "Fetishism' and 'Unpublished Minutes'
R. Nye, from Fetishism as Cultural Discourse
| | Optional:
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Ed. E. Apter, Fetishism as Cultural Discourse (COOP)
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| OUTPLAYING THE FEMININE MASQUERADE (10/28)
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| Reading:
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A. Solomon-Godeau, 'The Legs of the Countess' (SB)
L. Mulvey, 'Cindy Sherman' (SB)
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| Week 7:
| VEILING THE MASQUERADE (11/2)
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| Reading:
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J. Copjec, 'The Sartorial Superego'
M. Alloula, The Colonial Harem
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| ORIENTALISM, OCCIDENTALISM (11/4)
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| Reading:
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L. Nochlin, 'The Imaginary Orient' (SB)
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| Week 9:
| REPLICANTS AND SIMULATIONS (BLADERUNNER) (11/16)
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| Reading:
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G. Bruno, 'Ramble City: Postmodernism and Bladerunner'
J. Baudrillard, 'The Precession of Simulacra' (SB)
| | Optional:
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Viewing Bladerunner
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| LATE CAPITALISM AND SCHIZOPHRENIA (11/18)
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| Reading:
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F. Jameson, 'Postmodernism and Consumer Society'
J. Baudrillard, Political Economy of the Sign (SB, RES)
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| Week 10:
| (No Class 11/23)
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| Week 11:
| DECONSTRUCTION AND VISUAL ART (11/30)
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| Reading:
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N. Bryson, 'Art in Context' (SB)
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| DERRIDA'S BLIND MEN (12/2)
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| Reading:
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J. Derrida, Mémoires d'aveugle (COOP)
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| Week 12:
| WATTEAU I (12/7)
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| Reading:
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Grand Palais Exhibition Catalog
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| Reading:
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T. Crow, from Painters and Public Life
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| Week 13:
| PHANTOMS AND MONUMENTS (12/14)
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| Reading:
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N. Abraham, 'Notes on the Phantom'
M. Sturken, 'The Wall, the Screen, and the Image'
A. Kaplan, 'Reading the Archive'
| | Optional:
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Wu Hung, 'Tiananmen Square'
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| THINKING MACHINES (12/16)
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| Reading:
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A. Huyssen, from After the Great Divide
D. Haraway, 'A Manifesto for Cyborg Feminism'
| | Optional:
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C. Penley, Close Encounters
Viewing Terminator 1 and Terminator 2
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| Week 14:
| CONCLUSION (12/21)
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