Visual Culture

COMM 499
Spring 2003
Th 10-1
London Program

Prof. Marita Sturken
sturken@usc.edu/office: 020-7419-4908
Office hours: Room 18, 99 Great Russell St.
Wed. 2-4, after class and by appointment

Course description:
This class will address issues of visual culture: the politics of images; the cross-fertilization of images between various social arenas, such as advertising, popular culture, news images, and art; the role that images play in producing cultural meaning; and forms of visual communication.

Because we will be studying in London, some of the course will focus on using various theories and methodologies to examine the visual aspects of London itself. We will do a few field trips to sites such as the Tate Modern museum, and assignments will involve exploring parts of the city.
We will look at news images, art, photographs, advertisements, television, film, theme parks, and cityscapes. The following topics will be included: the city as visual culture; the visual aspects of modernity; images of the empire; visual culture as consumer culture – advertising, arcades, shopping areas, etc.; family and amateur pictures; the relationship of taste and art; image icons of historical events; image spectacle; visual aspects of tourism, and more.

Course Requirements:
Students are required to attend all classes and to actively participate in class discussion, to do all the readings, and to complete all assignments. Students who miss more than one class without a reasonable excuse will have their grades lowered.

Assignments and grading:
You are responsible for the material covered in lecture, discussion, and in the reading. You will be evaluated on (1) the level of your engagement with the class materials (as evidenced in your written work and class participation, (2) your capacity to explain your ideas and analysis in articulate and well-written forms, (3) and your ability to creatively explore these theories and methodologies.

All of your written work will be graded on two primary evaluative scales (1) how well it demonstrates an understanding of the theories and methodologies of the class (2) how well it structures and articulates its argument.

There are three papers, the last one of which is a substantial paper, and a class presentation. There will also be several small assignments given out in some weeks. Your participation in class will be an important part of your grade. These assignments will be worth the following portion of your grade:

paper 1 20%
paper 2 25%
paper 3 30%
class presentation and participation 25%

Academic Integrity:
When taking this class, you enter into a contract that states that all the work you are turning in has been your own and no one else's, and that you have not turned in any work for which you have received credit in another class. Do not take this policy lightly!

The School of Communication is committed to the highest standards of academic excellence and ethical support. It endorses and acts on the SCampus policies and procedures detailed in the section titled "University Sanction Guidelines." These policies, procedures, and guidelines will be assiduously upheld. They protect your rights, as well as those of the faculty. It is particularly important that you are aware of and avoid plagiarism, cheating on exams, fabricating data for a project, submitting a paper to more than one professor, or submitting a paper authored by anyone but yourself. Violations of this policy will result in a failing grade in the course and be reported to the Office of Student Conduct. If you have doubts about any of these policies, you must confer with the professor.

Reading:
Nicholas Mirzoeff, The Visual Culture Reader (second edition) (VCR)
A mandatory reader will be available at the London office.

Recommended reading: Marita Sturken and Lisa Cartwright, Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture

Week 1: Jan. 16 – Introduction
Reading:
Nicholas Mirzoeff, "The Subject of Visual Culture" (VCR)

Week 2: Jan. 23 – Modernity and the City
Reading:
Anne Friedberg, "The Mobilized and the Virtual Gaze" (VCR)
WJT Mitchell, "Showing Seeing" (VCR)
Ben Singer, "Modernity, Hyperstimulus and the Rise of Popular Sensationalism" (R)

Week 3: Jan. 30 – Reproduction and the Photograph
Reading:
Walter Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" (R)
Susan Sontag, "The Image-World" ( R)
Marita Sturken and Lisa Cartwright, "Reproduction and Visual Technologies" (R)
Roland Barthes, "The Rhetoric of the Image" (VCR)
Paper 1 assigned.

Week 4: Feb. 6 – Images of the Empire
Reading:
Timothy Mitchell, "Orientalism and the Exhibitionary Order" (VCR)
Anne McClintock, "Softsoaping the Empire" (VCR)
Mallek Alloula , "The Colonial Harem" (VCR)
Terry Smith, "Visual Regimes of Colonialization" (VCR)

Week 5: Feb. 13 – History and the Image: The Holocaust
Reading:
Art Spigelman, Maus (handout)
Barbie Zelizer, "On Visualizing the Holocaust" (R)
Marianne Hirsch, "Surviving Images: Holocaust Photographs and the Work of Postmemory" (R)
Ernst van Alphen, "Deadly Historians" (R)
Paper 1 due.

Week 6: Feb. 20 – NO CLASS – TRIP TO PARIS

Week 7: Feb. 27 – Modern/Postmodern Art and the Museum
Reading:
Andrew Ross, "The Great American Un-Numbers Game" (VCR)
James Clifford, "On Collecting Art and Culture" (handout)
Field Trip: Tate Modern
Paper 2 assignment given.

Week 8: March 6 – Cinema and the City: Dana Polan Guest Lecture
Reading:
Walter Benjamin, excerpt from Charles Baudelaire (R)
Mike Davis, excerpt from City of Quartz (R)

March 10-14 Spring Break

Week 9: March 20 – Image Icons and Spectacle
Reading:
Marita Sturken," The Camera Image and National Memory" (R)
WJT Mitchell, "From CNN to JFK" (R)
Guy DeBord, Society of the Spectacle excerpt (R)
Jean Baudrillard, "Simulacra and Simulations" (VCR)
Paper 2 due.

Week 10: March 27 – Gendering the Image
Reading:
Tamar Garb, "The Forbidden Gaze" (VCR)
Anthea Callen, "Ideal Masculinities" (VCR)
Thomas Waugh, "The Third Body" (VCR)
Paper 3 assignment given.

Week 11: April 3 – Tourism and Celebrity
Reading:
Nicholas Mirzoeff, "Diana's Death" (R)
Adrian Kear and Deborah Lynn Steinberg, "Mourning Diana" (R)
Valerie Walkerdine, "The Crowd in the Age of Diana" (R)
William Spurlin, "I'd Rather be the Princess than the Queen" (R)

Week 12: April 10 – Race and Identity
Reading:
Stuart Hall, "The Spectacle of the Other" (R)
Ella Shohat and Robert Stam, "Narrativizing Visual Culture" (VCR)
Franz Fanon, "The Fact of Blackness" (VCR)
Adrian Piper, "Passing for White, Passing for Black" (VCR)

Week 13: April 17 – Taboo Images
Reading:
Anne Higonnet, "Conclusion Based on Observation" (R)
Leon Littwak, "Hellhounds" (R)
Wendy Steiner, "The Perfect Moment" (handout)

Week 14: April 24 – Public Art: Reconfiguring Space
Reading:
Marita Sturken, "The Wall, the Screen, and the Image" (VCR)
Douglas Crimp, AIDS Demo Graphics (R)

Final paper due: April 30