About CCDN 371
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People’s everyday lives involve multiple encounters with objects and images, and we use these encounters to understand ourselves, each other and the worlds in which we live. Visual culture refers to those aspects of culture and communication that rely on visual images, and material culture refers to the tangible, physical items produced and used by specific people according to particular cultural norms and values. This course will comment on, and enhance students’ understandings of, visual and material culture by situating them within broader discussions of design history and practices of planning, inventing, making and doing.
In her book “On Longing,” Susan Stewart describes objects and images that find their way into museum and gallery exhibitions as things “narrated to animate or realize certain versions of the world.” Indeed, beginning with European Renaissance wunderkammer, or cabinets of curiosities, the formal collection and curation of artefacts has sought to represent the world as experienced or imagined—and in the process has managed to actually create some worlds and not others. Using food as this trimester’s special topic, we will explore the visual and material culture of food production and consumption in order to express and embody multiple ideas about food and culture.
Building on students’ previous studies of discursive, visual and material culture, CCDN 371 will introduce students to core concepts and debates in the collection, curation and creation of culture. The primary aims of this course are 1) enhanced awareness of, and appreciation for, the social and cultural contexts of design; 2) increased proficiency in the creative and critical design of objects, images and text; and 3) improved capacity to effectively communicate the processes and products of design.
