Course content

In this course, the student will explore the material and the visual as two integrated and creatively significant aspects of the lived human world. The materiality of images, as well as the visuality of material objects, will be examined and problematized. Examples may be taken from the visual arts and other image categories, moving pictures, objects, buildings, cultural and natural environments, and other types of material and visual objects and phenomena.

A central question for the course is that of image agency. Where traditional interpretative models often focus on images as representations, or on questions of intention and meaning, this course will instead emphasize ways in which images in the widest sense may affect and be active in cultural and social situations and events. During the course the student will choose a specific visual and material phenomenon to explore and critically discuss more deeply – preferably one which is part of or related to the topic of their thesis.

Learning outcomes

For a grade pass on the course, students should be able to:

  • understand and reflect on relationships between visuality and materiality as well as how images and other visual phenomena may play active parts in cultural and social situations and processes.
  • account for and critically evaluate research perspectives which in different ways draw attention to relationships between the visual and the material.
  • apply central concepts and perspectives from the course to their own research.

Practical information

The course requires active participation in the course sessions, plus completion of all the assignments, including the written assignments and questions in advance of each course session.

The course is examined through a research-oriented essay of about 3000 words which will be presented and discussed in a final workshop, plus constructive oral criticism of another participant’s essay.

Teaching activities include lectures, seminars and study visits.

Period: Spring semester 2018

Language of instruction: English

Course director: professor Mårten Snickare

Theme coordinator: Alison Klevnäs

Course title in Swedish: Bilders agens: Materialitet och visuell kultur

The course is offered by the Department of Archaeology and Classical Studies in collaboration with the Department of Culture and Aesthetics

The course is part of the theme Människa och materialitet / Materiality and the Human