Courses

Medieval Illumination in the Low Countries: Origins, Sources, Materials (Art History and Archaeology  GU4041, 4 credits)
Prof. Lieve Watteeuw

This course aims to reflect on the place of illumination and the illuminated manuscript in the artistic profile and cultural, literary, political and religious life in the Low Countries and beyond. The development of illumination is closely linked to the cultural and economic situation of the Low Countries during more than eight centuries, but it is also deeply influenced by the intersection of contacts in European artistic, religious and intellectual contexts. The links between artistic networks in other media, the mobility of artists, models and materials are crucial to understanding the production of illuminated manuscripts and to framing them as fully representative of the dynamics of the cultural habitat of the Low Countries. The course will be illustrated with numerous examples and case studies of manuscripts in collections in Belgium and the Netherlands, as well as in collections in US and around the world. A special file rouge in the course will be devoted to recent research approaches in material culture and digital access of illuminated manuscripts. The course will be accompanied by PPP and a reading list to guide students ( scans and online resources will be provided).

Cultures of Reading Early Modern Europe (Comparative Literature GR6281, 4 credits)
Prof. Arnoud Visser

Reading was an essential part of early modern culture, but also a highly flexible, instable form of communication. It could be done in many different ways, depending on a host of historical, social, and religious contexts. In the past three decades the ‘History of Reading’ has become a vibrant scholarly field, exploring historical theories, debates and practices. Historians of different backgrounds have developed challenging new approaches, highlighting a diversity of reading styles and at least as great a variety of research opportunities. New digital resources have vastly increased our access to relevant evidence. During the seminars we will discuss and analyze primary and secondary sources from a variety of different historical and disciplinary perspectives, including classical and early modern humanist writings, as well as recent scholarship by social, cultural, intellectual, and book historians.

Music, Musicians, and Mobility in the Early Modern Period (Music GU4109, 3 credits)
Prof. David Burn

In the early modern period—here roughly limited to the fifteenth through early seventeenth century—the Western idea of the world underwent two contrasting, but equally fundamental shifts. On the one hand, the known world expanded in unprecedented and entirely unexpected ways. At the same time, on the other hand, Europe itself splintered dramatically along conflicting religious lines that would shape politics and warfare for centuries after, erecting barriers and boundaries where they previously did not exist. This course studies the effect of these changes on music, through the lens of mobility, understood in various ways, both social and physical.

Between the Second World War and the Cold War: Europe 1943-1950 (History GU4041, 4 credits)
Prof. Ido De Haan

This course introduces students to some of the major themes of postwar reconstruction in Europe, between the end of World War II to the advent of the Cold War. This is a crucial turning-point in contemporary European history, yet its nature varies dramatically in different parts of Europe, while it also leads to a fundamental restructuring of the political, social and economic, and cultural relations in Europe as a whole. This period is therefore studied from a comparative as well as a transnational perspective. Students will acquire insight in the main historical events and processes, the historiographical debates on this period, relevant primary sources, and methods for studying contemporary history.

Bruegel's Comic World: Everyday Life in 16th-Century Netherlandish Art (Art History UN3322, 4 Credits)
Professor Katharine Gobel
We are told, in one of the earliest accounts of the life and work of the Netherlandish artist Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1525–1569), that his prints and paintings elicited laughter. From his visualizations of carnival celebrations and children's games to peasant weddings to riotous hellscapes, the comic Bruegel makes his viewers, both in the late sixteenth century and today, question whether any of it should be taken seriously. This advanced undergraduate seminar examines Bruegel's innovative comic practice and the social context of laughter and humor in the era of the Dutch Revolt, a time fraught with social, political, and religious strife. We will explore the reception of Bruegel's work in his time, in particular the possibilities of both entertainment and didacticism for viewers. Our studies of pictorial humor in Bruegel's oeuvre will include broader investigations of the secularization of the image in the Reformation context, iconoclasm, the vernacular artistic mode, print culture in early modern Europe, humanism, global expansion and trade, the relationship between pictorial and literary humor, and the functions of satire in visual art. A field trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art will allow us to encounter Bruegel's images in person.

Dutch Seventeenth Century Art (Art History BC3928, 4 Credits)
Professor Adam Eaker
This course is devoted to a close examination of Dutch art of the seventeenth century, one of the most celebrated chapters in the history of art. Students will be exposed to seminal art historical texts on the period, at the same time as they receive exposure to connoisseurship, conservation, and technical art history.

Making and Knowing in Early Modern Europe (History UN4962, 4 Credits)
Professor Pamela Smith
This course introduces undergraduate and graduate students to the materials, techniques, contexts, and meanings of skilled craft and artistic practices in early modern Europe (1350-1750), in order to reflect upon a series of topics, including craft knowledge and artisanal epistemology; the intersections between craft and science; and questions of historical methodology in reconstructing the material world of the past.

The course will be run as a “Laboratory Seminar,” with discussions of primary and secondary materials, as well as hands-on work in a laboratory. The first semester long course to use the published Edition of Fr. 640 as its focus, it will test the use of the Edition in a higher education classroom to inform the development of the Companion. This course is associated with the Making and Knowing Project of the Center for Science and Society at Columbia University.The first semester-long course to use the published Edition of Fr. 640 as its focus, it will test the use of the Edition in a higher education classroom to inform the development of Phase II of the Making and Knowing Project - a Research and Teaching Companion. Students’ final projects (exploratory and experimental work in the form of digital/textual analysis of Ms. Fr. 640, reconstruction insight reports, videos for the Companion, or a combination) will be published as part of the Companion or the Sandbox depending on content and long-term maintenance considerations.

The World We Have Lost (History GU4101, 4 Credits)
Professor Pamela Smith
What was daily life like for the “average” European in pre-industrial society?  This course examines the material circumstances of life and death in Europe from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century. It also asks the question of whether and how we can enter into the inner life of people of the past. How did people experience their material conditions? How did they experience the life of the mind and of the emotions? What are the methods used by historians to gain knowledge about the material conditions and lived experience of the past?

Science and Pseudoscience (History UN2978, 4 Credits)
Professor Pamela Smith
During the 2020 US presidential election and the years of the COVID-19 pandemic, science and “scientific truths” were fiercely contested. This course provides a historical perspective on the issues at stake. The course begins with an historical account of how areas of natural knowledge, such as astrology, alchemy, and “natural magic,” which were central components of an educated person’s view of the world in early modern Europe, became marginalized, while a new philosophy of nature (what we would now call empirical science) came to dominate the discourse of rationality. Historical developments examined in this course out of which this new understanding of nature emerged include the rise of the centralized state, religious reform, and European expansion. The course uses this historical account to show how science and pseudoscience developed in tandem in the period from 1400 to 1800. This historical account equips students to examine contemporary issues of expertise, the social construction of science, pluralism in science, certainty and uncertainty in science, as well as critical engagement with contemporary technologies.

Dutch Seventeenth Century Art (Art History BC3928, 4 Credits)
Professor Adam Eaker
This course is devoted to a close examination of Dutch art of the seventeenth century, one of the most celebrated chapters in the history of art. Students will be exposed to seminal art historical texts on the period, at the same time as they receive exposure to connoisseurship, conservation, and technical art history.

Making and Knowing in Early Modern Europe (History UN4962, 4 Credits)
Professor Pamela Smith
This course introduces undergraduate and graduate students to the materials, techniques, contexts, and meanings of skilled craft and artistic practices in early modern Europe (1350-1750), in order to reflect upon a series of topics, including craft knowledge and artisanal epistemology; the intersections between craft and science; and questions of historical methodology in reconstructing the material world of the past.

The course will be run as a “Laboratory Seminar,” with discussions of primary and secondary materials, as well as hands-on work in a laboratory. The first semester long course to use the published Edition of Fr. 640 as its focus, it will test the use of the Edition in a higher education classroom to inform the development of the Companion. This course is associated with the Making and Knowing Project of the Center for Science and Society at Columbia University.The first semester-long course to use the published Edition of Fr. 640 as its focus, it will test the use of the Edition in a higher education classroom to inform the development of Phase II of the Making and Knowing Project - a Research and Teaching Companion. Students’ final projects (exploratory and experimental work in the form of digital/textual analysis of Ms. Fr. 640, reconstruction insight reports, videos for the Companion, or a combination) will be published as part of the Companion or the Sandbox depending on content and long-term maintenance considerations.

Science and Pseudoscience (History UN2978, 4 Credits)
Professor Pamela Smith
During the 2020 US presidential election and the years of the COVID-19 pandemic, science and “scientific truths” were fiercely contested. This course provides a historical perspective on the issues at stake. The course begins with an historical account of how areas of natural knowledge, such as astrology, alchemy, and “natural magic,” which were central components of an educated person’s view of the world in early modern Europe, became marginalized, while a new philosophy of nature (what we would now call empirical science) came to dominate the discourse of rationality. Historical developments examined in this course out of which this new understanding of nature emerged include the rise of the centralized state, religious reform, and European expansion. The course uses this historical account to show how science and pseudoscience developed in tandem in the period from 1400 to 1800. This historical account equips students to examine contemporary issues of expertise, the social construction of science, pluralism in science, certainty and uncertainty in science, as well as critical engagement with contemporary technologies.

Dutch Seventeenth Century Art (Art History BC3928, 4 Credits)
Professor Adam Eaker
This course is devoted to a close examination of Dutch art of the seventeenth century, one of the most celebrated chapters in the history of art. Students will be exposed to seminal art historical texts on the period, at the same time as they receive exposure to connoisseurship, conservation, and technical art history.

Making and Knowing in Early Modern Europe (History UN4962, 5 Credits)
Professor Pamela Smith
This course introduces undergraduate and graduate students to the materials, techniques, contexts, and meanings of skilled craft and artistic practices in early modern Europe (1350-1750), in order to reflect upon a series of topics, including craft knowledge and artisanal epistemology; the intersections between craft and science; and questions of historical methodology in reconstructing the material world of the past.

The course will be run as a “Laboratory Seminar,” with discussions of primary and secondary materials, as well as hands-on work in a laboratory. The first semester long course to use the published Edition of Fr. 640 as its focus, it will test the use of the Edition in a higher education classroom to inform the development of the Companion. This course is associated with the Making and Knowing Project of the Center for Science and Society at Columbia University.The first semester-long course to use the published Edition of Fr. 640 as its focus, it will test the use of the Edition in a higher education classroom to inform the development of Phase II of the Making and Knowing Project - a Research and Teaching Companion. Students’ final projects (exploratory and experimental work in the form of digital/textual analysis of Ms. Fr. 640, reconstruction insight reports, videos for the Companion, or a combination) will be published as part of the Companion or the Sandbox depending on content and long-term maintenance considerations.

Fifteenth Century Art in the Netherlands (Art History GR8310, 4 Credits)
Professor David A Freedberg
This course, often taught under the rubrics of “Early Netherlandish Painting” or even “Northern Renaissance Painting” might also be described as “Art in the Age of Van Eyck” or “Painting from Van Eyck to Bosch”. It will begin with manuscripts, and deal with the contribution of great sculptors like Sluter as well. The claim implicit in the title is that the techniques pioneered and perfected by the Van Eycks affected all the other arts too –  even though the most original and compelling achievements of the century are probably those of painting, which will form the chief focus of this class. Attention will also be paid to the social and historical contexts of the main works discussed. Several museum visits will be included.

Transforming Texts: Textual Analysis, Literary Modeling, and Visualization (History GU4031, 4 credits)
Prof. Pamela Smith; Prof. Dennis Tenen

Designed for graduate and advanced undergraduate students in the social sciences, humanities, and computer science, this hybrid course is situated at the crossroads of historical exploration and computer sciences. Students will be exposed to digital literacy tools and computational skills through the lens of the Making and Knowing Project. The edition will draw on collaboration with and research done by the Making and Knowing Project http://www.makingandknowing.org/ on an anonymous 16th-century French compilation of artistic and technical recipes (BnF Ms. Fr. 640). Students will work from the encoded English translation of the manuscript, prepared by the Spring 2017 course “HIST GR8975 What is a Book in the 21st Century? Working with Historical Texts in a Digital Environment.” This course will also utilize the concepts and prototypes developed by computer science students in the Spring 2018 “COMS W4172: 3D User Interfaces and Augmented Reality (AR). The skills students will learn over the course of the semester are widely applicable to other types of Digital Humanities projects, and indeed, in many fields outside of traditional academic study.

For the final project, students will collaborate to investigate linguistic features of Ms. Fr. 640 using natural language processing and text mining techniques. These projects will shed light on topics of interest within the manuscript and uncover connections within the textual data. By using the tools prototypes in a Spring 2018 COMS W4172 course, and working alongside computer science students, the groups will learn to adapt and recode data sets, and to view them into a variety of visualizations.

BOSCH AND BRUEGEL (Art History GR6302, 3 credits)
Prof. David Freedberg

In this course we will examine the radical paintings of Hieronymus Bosch and Pieter Bruegel the Elder in their political, religious and ethnographic contexts. At stake will be not only the meaning of their work, but also their innovative style and technique. We will assess the influence of radical religious movements on both Bosch and Bruegel and consider the material and political functions of painting in an age of Reformation, Revolt and Iconoclasm.

CRAFT AND SCIENCE IN THE EARLY MODERN WORLD (History GR8906, 4 credits)
Prof. Pamela Smith

This course studies the materials, techniques, settings, and meanings of skilled craft and artistic practices in the early modern period (1350-1750), in order to reflect upon a series of issues, including craft knowledge and artisanal epistemology; the intersections between craft and science; and questions of historical methodology and evidence in the reconstruction of historical experience. The course will be run as a “Laboratory Seminar,” with discussions of primary and secondary materials, as well as text- and object-based research and hands-on work in a laboratory. One component of the Making and Knowing Project of the Center for Science and Society, this course contributes to the collaborative production of a transcription, English translation, and critical edition of a late sixteenth-century manuscript in French, BnF Ms. Fr. 640. In fall 2018, the course will focus on the cultural context, materials, and techniques of “making impressions” upon a variety of surfaces, including making reliefs for ornament and for printing, and inscribing metal, including engraving and etching. Several entries in the manuscript use what we think of as “print techniques” for metal decoration or making seals and molds, and other entries discuss printers’ type, and make use of prints for image transfer. Students will begin with skill-building exercises in culinary reconstruction, pigment making, and molding, and then, with advice from a visiting “expert maker,” will choose a research focus from the entries in the manuscript that cover such topics as draftsmanship, engraving techniques, print transfer, and other topics that intersect with printing and printmaking. The course will be taught this year only in fall 2018. It is not necessary to have either prior lab experience or French language skills. Please don't hesitate to contact Pamela Smith, [email protected], if you have questions.

Elementary Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW1101, 4 Credits)
Two sections: Professor Wijnie De Groot and Professor Ben De Witte
Fundamentals of grammar, reading, speaking, and comprehension of the spoken language. During the spring term supplementary reading is selected according to students' needs.

Intermediate Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW2101, 4 Credits)
Two sections: Professor Wijnie De Groot and Professor Ben De Witte
Continued practice in the four skills (aural comprehension, reading, speaking, and writing); review and refinement of basic grammar; vocabulary building. Readings in Dutch literature.

Advanced Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW3101, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Elementary Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW1102, 4 Credits)
Two sections: Professor Wijnie De Groot and Professor Pieter Lauwaert
Fundamentals of grammar, reading, speaking, and comprehension of the spoken language. During the spring term supplementary reading is selected according to students' needs.

Intermediate Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW2102, 4 Credits)
Two sections: Professor Wijnie De Groot and Professor Pieter Lauwaert
Continued practice in the four skills (aural comprehension, reading, speaking, and writing); review and refinement of basic grammar; vocabulary building. Readings in Dutch literature.

Advanced Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW3102, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Supervised Individual Research (Dutch DTCHW3998, 3 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Elementary Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW1101, 4 Credits)
Two sections: Professor Wijnie De Groot and Professor Ben De Witte
Fundamentals of grammar, reading, speaking, and comprehension of the spoken language. During the spring term supplementary reading is selected according to students' needs.

Intermediate Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW2101, 4 Credits)
Two sections: Professor Wijnie De Groot and Professor Ben De Witte
Continued practice in the four skills (aural comprehension, reading, speaking, and writing); review and refinement of basic grammar; vocabulary building. Readings in Dutch literature.

Advanced Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW3101, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Elementary Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW1102, 4 Credits)
Two sections: Professor Wijnie De Groot and Professor Pieter Lauwaert
Fundamentals of grammar, reading, speaking, and comprehension of the spoken language. During the spring term supplementary reading is selected according to students' needs.

Intermediate Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW2102, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot
Continued practice in the four skills (aural comprehension, reading, speaking, and writing); review and refinement of basic grammar; vocabulary building. Readings in Dutch literature.

Advanced Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW3102, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Special Reading Course (Dutch DTCHW3994, 1 Credit)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Elementary Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW1101, 4 Credits)
Two sections: Professor Wijnie De Groot and Professor Pieter Lauwaert
Fundamentals of grammar, reading, speaking, and comprehension of the spoken language. During the spring term supplementary reading is selected according to students' needs.

Intermediate Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW2101, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot
Continued practice in the four skills (aural comprehension, reading, speaking, and writing); review and refinement of basic grammar; vocabulary building. Readings in Dutch literature.

Advanced Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW3101, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Elementary Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW1102, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot
Fundamentals of grammar, reading, speaking, and comprehension of the spoken language. During the spring term supplementary reading is selected according to students' needs.

Intermediate Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW2102, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot
Continued practice in the four skills (aural comprehension, reading, speaking, and writing); review and refinement of basic grammar; vocabulary building. Readings in Dutch literature.

Advanced Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW3102, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Special Reading Course (Dutch DTCHW3994, 1 Credit)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Elementary Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW1101, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot
Fundamentals of grammar, reading, speaking, and comprehension of the spoken language. During the spring term supplementary reading is selected according to students' needs.

Intermediate Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW2101, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot
Continued practice in the four skills (aural comprehension, reading, speaking, and writing); review and refinement of basic grammar; vocabulary building. Readings in Dutch literature.

Advanced Dutch I (Dutch DTCHW3101, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Supervised Individual Research (Dutch DTCHW3997, 1 to 6 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Elementary Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW1102, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot
Fundamentals of grammar, reading, speaking, and comprehension of the spoken language. During the spring term supplementary reading is selected according to students' needs.

Intermediate Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW2102, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot
Continued practice in the four skills (aural comprehension, reading, speaking, and writing); review and refinement of basic grammar; vocabulary building. Readings in Dutch literature.

Advanced Dutch II (Dutch DTCHW3102, 4 Credits)
Professor Wijnie De Groot

Special Reading Course (Dutch DTCHW3994, 1 Credit)
Professor Wijnie De Groot