After a brief analysis of Cultural, Material and Intellectual History, this course of lectures considers the various perspectives from which any body of cultural specificity can be seen as at the same time a oneness and a set of smaller, yet not lateral, cultural components. I focus on the well-documented discussion of ultramundane spaces which feature in various cultures and certainly constitute foundational pieces of Western identity: Hell, Purgatory and Heaven. To these general considerations are appended illustrations (textual and visual) of the spaces of the mind in which we have legitimated ourselves collectively or just individually in time.
Course instructor: Prof. Mihaela Irimia
SCHEDULE
Week 1: WHAT IS CULTURAL HISTORY?
Reading: Burke, Peter, What Is Cultural History?, 2004, 1-30
Week 2: TOWARDS A NEW DISCIPLINE
Reading: Kelley, Donald, ‘The Old cultural History’, History of the Human Sciences, 1996, Vol. 9, No. 3, 101-126
Week 3: CULTURAL HISTORY
Reading: Elias, Norbert, ‘On the Sociogenesis of the Concepts of “Civilization” and “Culture”, in Elias, N., The Civilizing Process, 2000, 3-40
Week 4: CULTURAL HISTORY IN ANTHROPO-CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE
Reading: Burke, Peter, ‘The Moment of Historical Anthropology’, in Burke, P., What Is Cultural History, 2004, 30-48
Week 5: MATERIAL CULTURE: IMAGES
Reading: Burke, Peter, Eyewitnessing: The Uses of Images as Historical evidence, London, 2001, 81-102
Weeks 6-7: MENTALITIES: HELL
Reading: Minois, Georges, Istoria infernurilor, Bucuresti, 1998, 11-32, 54-70, 71-87
Weeks 8-9: MENTALITIES: PURGATORY
Reading: Le Goff, Jacques, Nasterea Purgatoriului, Bucuresti, Vol. 2, 191-157
Weeks 10-11: MENTALITIES: PARADISE
Reading: Delumeau, Jean, Gradina desfatarilor – O istorie a Paradisului, Bucuresti, 1997 24-36, 86-102
Week 12: THE NEW PARADIG OF MATERIAL CULTURE
Reading: Elias, Norbert, The Civilizing Process, 2000, 365-380
Weeks 13-14: Revision and discussion of essay topics
REQUIREMENTS AND EVALUATION
- A minimum of 50% attendance
- Participation in class discussions, counting for 25% of the final mark
- An end-of-term written essay or written test, counting for 75% of the final mark
British Cultural Studies 