Using contemporary scholarship, this course reexamines Canadian art history in light of multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary meanings of culture. Using the study of visual language, the examines mass-produced images such as photographs and prints, as well as the technologies of display that influence perceptions of nationhood, citizenship and Indigeneity.
Outline
Unit 1: Introduction: What Is Visual Culture?
Unit 2: Historical Background: A Survey of Key Events and Themes
Unit 3: Points of Contact: Early Canadian Settlement
Unit 4: Frontier/Metropole: Constructing a Visual Identity in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries
Unit 5: Canadian Modernism in the Twentieth Century: Nationalism and the Group of Seven
Unit 6: Colonialism and Practices of Display
Unit 7: Representing Nation and Identity Through the Lens
Unit 8: Post-modern Issues: Race and Gender in Canadian Art
Evaluation
To receive credit for ARHI 301, you must complete six written assignments (four critical responses, a term paper proposal, and a major term paper) and write a final examination. Your final grade is determined by a weighted average of the grades you receive on these activities. You must achieve a minimum of D (50%) on the final examination and an overall grade of D (50 percent) for the entire course.
Activity
Weight
Assignment 1 Critical Response
5%
Assignment 2 Critical Response
5%
Assignment 3 Critical Response
5%
Assignment 4 Term Paper Proposal
10%
Assignment 5 Critical Response
5%
Assignment 6 Term Paper
35%
Final Exam
35%
Total
100%
The final examination for this course must be requested in advance and written under the supervision of an AU-approved exam invigilator. Invigilators include either ProctorU or an approved in-person invigilation centre that can accommodate online exams. Students are responsible for payment of any invigilation fees. Information on exam request deadlines, invigilators, and other exam-related questions, can be found at the Exams and grades section of the Calendar.
To learn more about assignments and examinations, please refer to Athabasca University’s online Calendar.
Materials
This course either does not have a course package or the textbooks are open-source material and available to students at no cost. This course has a Course Administration and Technology Fee, but students are not charged the Course Materials Fee.
Belton , Robert J. Sights of Resistance: Approaches to Canadian Visual Culture. Calgary: Calgary University Press, 2001. (PDF)
Other materials
Required readings are provided in electronic format, either as PDFs or via links to websites and the AU Library periodicals databases.
Challenge for credit
Overview
The challenge for credit process allows you to demonstrate that you have acquired a command of the general subject matter, knowledge, intellectual and/or other skills that would normally be found in a university-level course.
Full information about challenge for credit can be found in the Undergraduate Calendar.
Evaluation
To receive credit for the ARHI 301 challenge registration, you must achieve a grade of at least D (50 percent) on each part of the examination.
Athabasca University reserves the right to amend course outlines occasionally and without notice. Courses offered by other delivery methods may vary from their individualized study counterparts.