Ontario College of Art & Design

Course Calendar

COURSE DESCRIPTION

VISA 4B90
Special Topic in Visual Culture: Memory and Monuments
0.50 Credit(s)
Academic Course
Prerequisite: 10.0 credits, including all first-year requirements (5.0 credits) and 1.0 credit of second-year liberal arts & sciences (including 0.5 credit in VISA/VISC/VISD/VISM).
This course will examine monuments and memorials as expressions of collective memory, trauma, and identity. Some of the questions to be addressed will include: How are memories constructed? What are the politics of memorialization? Who decides which events should be commemorated, and how? How do memorials bear witness to history? In addition to addressing relevant theoretical concepts, we will study specific examples from diverse contexts, including the Vietnam Veterans’ Memorial in Washington, Holocaust monuments in Germany and Eastern Europe, memorials to genocide in Cambodia and Rwanda, the World Trade Center Memorial in New York City, and the memorializing of violence against women in Canada and Mexico. Required reading will include texts by theorists (James E. Young, Marita Sturken, Erika Doss, Sharon Rosenberg, etc) and makers (Jochen Gerz, Daniel Liebeskind, Maya Lin, etc) of memorials and monuments.
Notes: A "Special Topic" course provides more advanced analysis of a topic of general interest or relevance. This course fulfills 0.5 credit toward the Liberal Arts & Sciences requirements toward the BFA or B.Des.
Course was last updated May 2, 2012 - 4:58 PM