SHUM 6680 - Art and the Remapping of the World

(crosslisted) ARTH 6620, VISST 6680

Spring. 3 credits. Student option grading.

Enrollment limited to: graduate students. Co-meets with ARTH 4620/SHUM 4680/VISST 4680.

K. Presutti.

What possibilities does art offer to challenge the primacy of mapping in visualizing our world? Maps allow us to move through space, but they do so by abstracting space to its barest aspects—an act of reduction that has historically served to eliminate Indigenous inhabitants, ecological entanglements, non-spatial elements, and countless other features of our lived environment. This course posits remapping as an act of repair, a means of correcting some of the reductive tendencies of maps. Moving between the history of cartography, particularly as it appears in Cornell’s extensive Map Collection, and a study of artistic critiques of the map, we will develop a critical vocabulary for assessing cartographic practice and explore new tools for imagining it otherwise. For longer description and instructor bio visit the Society for the Humanities website.