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AMERICAN CULTURE STUDIES (L98)  (Dept. Info)Arts & Sciences  (Policies)SP2024
L98 AMCS 261The Cultural Lives of Things: An Introduction to American Material Culture3.0 Units
Description:American culture has often been defined by its obsessive attachment to THINGS--the iPhones, coffee cups, sneakers and countless other material possessions that fill our everyday lives. This course will explore our contradictory relationship to such objects. Some serve practical functions, and give a sense of agency or identity; others seem to possess or control us, dictating the terms on which we live our lives, or even how we understand our world and ourselves. How do things take hold of us? What gives them potency, value, and cultural significance? What psychological, social, economic and political purposes do they serve? And do we as Americans have a distinct relationship--or a dysfunctional attachment--to our possessions? To answer such questions, we will consider objects of all kinds, from the mundane and utilitarian to the strange, rare and often- fetishized. We'll explore their characteristics and origins, their participation in regimes of commodification and power, and their everyday and symbolic functions. The course introduces different strategies for interpreting objects as evidence, drawing upon work from a range of disciplines (anthropology, art history, sociology, archaeology, etc.) as well as from theorists and influencers from Karl Marx to Jean Baudrillard, Andy Warhol to Marie Kondo. Students should expect to do lots of hands-on work, engaging objects in the various places they "live"--from the IKEA showroom to their own living room, the Metropolitan Museum of Art to the thrift store. The course will also spend some time asking what it means for objects to "die," and how looming environmental and economic threats haunt our relationship to things.
Attributes:A&S IQ: HUMArch: HUMArt: HUMBU: ETH, HUMEN: H
Instruction Type:Classroom instruction Grade Options:CPA Fees:
Course Type:HomeSame As:N/AFrequency:None / History
SecDays       TimeBuilding / RoomInstructorFinal ExamSeatsEnrollWaits
01M-W----11:30A-12:50PSeigle / 204 KolkPaper/Project/Take Home23240
Actions:BooksSyllabus
Syllabi are provided to students to support their course planning; refer to the syllabus for constraints on use.
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Home/Ident

A course may be either a “Home” course or an “Ident” course.

A “Home” course is a course that is created, maintained and “owned” by one academic department (aka the “Home” department). The “Home” department is primarily responsible for the decision making and logistical support for the course and instructor.

An “Ident” course is the exact same course as the “Home” (i.e. same instructor, same class time, etc), but is simply being offered to students through another department for purposes of registering under a different department and course number.

Students should, whenever possible, register for their courses under the department number toward which they intend to count the course. For example, an AFAS major should register for the course "Africa: Peoples and Cultures" under its Ident number, L90 306B, whereas an Anthropology major should register for the same course under its Home number, L48 306B.

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