Course Description:
Boundaries of race and ethnicity are intangible biologically yet these differences have been made extremely visible and volatile in social and political spheres, attested to by the genocide that has occurred in several areas of the globe particularly during the 19th and 20th centuries. During the past two decades an increasing number of visual artists have chosen to articulate these compelling memories and histories. What is the urgency of their artistic programs? How do artists represent that which is often ‘unrepresentable?’ Which media do they find most effective and why? How powerful are these artistic voices in shaping contemporary debates about race and ethnicity in the larger public sphere? These are some questions that we will discuss in weekly seminars focused on theoretical writings and on artwork, primarily in the media of photography, installation, film and video.
Course Goals:
Within the university environs we have the luxury and privilege of a relatively buffered environment to debate the issues described on the cover page. In this class I encourage you
Expectations:
Class Participation:
This is a seminar course which means that you will be required to:
Reading Assignments:
Required readings for this course have been collected together in a photocopied Reader that is available for purchase at the UMBC bookstore. Note: Should you decide against purchasing the reader, most of the books from which the readings for this semester are taken have been placed on reserve in the library.
Weekly Written Summaries:
Research Project:
REFERENCES:
Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities. Reflections on the Origins and Spread of Nationalism. New York: Verso, 1993. First published in 1983.
Araeen, Rasheed. The Other Story: Afro-Asian Artists in Post-War Britain. London, 1989.
Bhabha, Homi K. ed. Nation and Narration. New York: Routledge, 1990.
Baker, Houston, A. Jr. Black Studies, Rap, and the Academy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993.
Bearden, Romare. A History of African American Artists from 1792 to the Present. New York: Pantheon Books, 1993.
Bhabha, Homi K. The Location of Culture.
Breckenridge, Carol. ed. Consuming Modernity. Public Culture in a South Asian World. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995.
Clifford, James. The Predicament of Culture: Twentieth Century Ethnography, Literature and Art. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988. GN308.C55
Clifford James and George Marcus. Writing Culture. GN307.7.W75
Coe, Ralph, T. Lost and Found Traditions. Native American Art 1965-1985. University of Washington Press, American Federation of Arts, 1986.
de Certeau, Michel. Heterologies. Discourse on the Other. Translated by Brian Massumi. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1986.
Dirks, Nicholas. ed. Culture/Power/History: A Reader in Contemporary Social Theory. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1994.
Fanon, Frantz. Black Skin, White Masks. New York: Grove Press, 1967.
Ferguson, Russell, Martha Gever, Trinh T. Minh-ha, Cornel West. ed. Out There: Marginalization and Contemporary Cultures. New York: The New Museum of Contemporary Art and MIT Press, 1990. (NX180.S6097)
Gates. Henry Louis. ed. Race, Writing and Difference. PN56.R18R3
Gilroy, Paul. The Black Atlantic. (CB235.G55)
Goldman, Shifra. Dimensions of the Americas. N6501.G64.
Gupta Sunil.ed. Disrupted Borders. An Intervention in Definitions of Boundaries. Concord, MA: Paul and Company, 1993.
hooks, bell. Art on My Mind.
Jan Mohamed, Abdul and David Lloyd.eds The Nature and Context of Minority Discourse. PN491.5.N38
Jordan, Glenn and Chris Weedon. Cultural Politics. Class, Gender, Race and the Postmodern World. Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell, 1995.
Kaplan, Amy and Donald E.Pease. eds Cultures of United States Imperialism. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1993.
Lippard, Lucy. Mixed Blessings. ON RESERVE N6537.5.L5
Maharaj, Sarat. "The Congo is Flooding the Acropolis: Art in Britain of the Immigration." Third Text, 15 (Summer 1991): 77-90.
McClure, John and Aamir Mufti. eds. Social Text. 31/32 Special Double issue on topics of Postcolonialism and Multiculturalism. (articles to be specified)
Mercer, Kobena. Welcome to the Jungle. New Positions in Black Cultural Studies. New York: Routledge, 1994.
Michaels, Eric. Bad Aboriginal Art. Tradition, Media and Technological Horizons. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993.
Oboler, Suzanne. Ethnic labels, Latino Lives: Identity and the Politics of (re)presentation in the United States. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995.
Prakash, Gyan. After Colonialism.( JV 105.A35)
Retamar, Roberto. "Caliban: Notes Towards a Discussion of Culture in Our America." Massachusetts Review, 15 (Winter/Spring 1974): 7-72.
Said, Edward. Culture and Imperialism. New York: Alfred B.Knopf, 1994.
Smith, Edward-Lucie. Race, Sex and Gender in Contemporary Art. New York: H.N. Abrams, 1994.
Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. The Post-Colonial Critic: Interviews, Strategies, Dialogues. edited by Sarah Harasym, Routledge, London, 1991. HN27.S66
Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. In Other Worlds. HM101.S773
Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. Outside in the Teaching Machine. PN98.W64S65
Suleri, Sara. The Rhetoric of English India. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992.
Trinh T. Minh-Ha. When the Moon Waxes Red. Representation, Gender and Cultural Politics. New York: Routledge, 1991.
Taussig, Micheal. Mimesis and Alterity.
Wallace, Michelle. Black Popular Culture.
Williams, Patrick and Laura Chrisman. eds. Colonial Discourse and Post Colonial Theory. A Reader. New York: Columbia University Press, 1994.
Catalogues:
The Decade Show. Frameworks of Identity in the '80's. May-August 1990. New York: A joint publication of the New Museum of Contemporary Art; The Museum of Contemporary Hispanic Art; The Studio Museum in Harlem.
1993 Biennial Exhibition. New York: Published by the Whitney Museum of American Art.
Asia /America. Identities in Contemporary Asian American Art. Co published by the Asia Society Galleries, New York and the New Press, New York, 1994