Visual and Material Culture

The Minor in Visual Communication and Culture offers cross-cultural and interdisciplinary programming that encourages students to develop a comparative perspective on visual expression, communication, and culture. It is designed to complement degrees in Art History, Canadian Studies, Classical Studies, Commerce, Drama, Fine Arts, French Studies, Geography, German Studies, Hispanic Studies, History, International Relations, Music, Psychology, and Religious Studies.

The Minor in Visual Communication and Culture fosters critical engagement with the art world, consumer practice, the creative industries, the digital realm, politics, and popular culture. It will be an asset not only to students who wish to continue their studies at the graduate level but also those who seek post-graduation employment in the following fields: the arts, culture, and creative industries; communications and media relations; government and not-for-profit leadership; heritage and conservation; journalism and publishing; tourism; and marketing and advertising. Being able to proficiently decode and interpret various types of images produced in different cultural contexts and for a range of purposes, to appreciate them not only in their aesthetic appeal but also as carriers of meaning and persuasive devices will give students a clear advantage in their post-graduation endeavours. This training is relevant in that it will also enable students to develop a thorough understanding of the functioning mechanisms of social media, to better navigate digital domains, and to acquire skills transferable to the workplace.

Core courses are designed to provide theoretical and contextual knowledge of visual culture. One of the second-year core components, CANA 2201 Experience the Arts, provides students with an opportunity to practice their visual analysis skills while critically engaging with on campus performances, exhibitions, and cultural repositories. To encourage students to sample different approaches to visual expression, communication, and culture, complementary courses are classified under seven streams: 1) Art Historical, Visual, and Cultural Contexts; 2) Visuality in the Performing Arts; 3) Media and Popular Culture Studies; 4) Archeological and Classical Contexts; 5) Indigenous Perspectives; 6) The Arts, Culture, and Creative Industries; and 7) Images and Visual Representation in Cultural and Geographic Settings.

Interdisciplinary B.A. Programs

MINOR in Visual Communication and Culture is 24 credits earned as follows:

3	from VMCS 1201
3	from CANA 2201, VMCS 2111
3	from VMCS 3201, EXPL 3001
6	FREN/VMCS 1801, VMCS 2111, 3241, 3811, 1991, 2991, 3991, 4950, 4951, 4991
9	from any one of the following streams as indicated below.

Art Historical, Visual, and Cultural Contexts:

FINH 2101, 2111, 3031, 3051, 3061, 3071, 3081, 3141, 3241

HIST 1681

PHIL 2401

SPAN 4201

VMCS 3101

Visuality in the Performing Arts:

DRAM/ENGL 1701

DRAM 2161, 3001, 3161, 3201, 3301

GERM 2811

MUSC 3281

Media and Popular Culture Studies:

CANA 2211

ENGL 3621

FREN 2801

GERM 2701

HIST 4001

RELG 1661, 3971

SOCI 3451

Archeological and Classical Contexts:

CLAS 1651, 2501, 2521, 2531, 3501, 3511, 3621, 3631, 3721, 3731

CLAS/HIST 2051

Indigenous Perspectives

CANA 3231

CANA/HIST/INDG 2801, 3831

CANA/INDG 3111

INDG 1001

The Arts, Culture, and Creative Industries:

CLAS 3801

COMM 3271, 4301

HIST 3861, 4901

Images and Visual Representation in Cultural and Geographic Settings:

CANA 1011, 4201, 4611

FREN 1811, 1821, 3301, 3771

HIST 1661, 3361, 3721

POLS 4200

RELG 2841, 3311, 3321, 3671

SPAN 1801, 1811

Note: At least 6 credits must be from courses at the 3/4000 level

Note: Students are responsible for ensuring that they have prerequisites for 2/3/4000 level courses

VISUAL AND MATERIAL CULTURE

Note: The listing of a course in the Calendar is not a guarantee that the course is offered every year.

Note: Students must obtain a grade of at least C- in all courses used to fulfill prerequisite requirements. Otherwise, written permission of the appropriate Department Head or Program Co-ordinator must be obtained.

VMCS 1201 (3.00)

Introduction to Visual Culture: the Power of Images and Viewers

This course provides a cross-cultural and interdisciplinary introduction to visual culture from ancient civilizations to our contemporary global world. It presents key terms, concepts, and issues that are central to the study of images, visuality, practices of looking, as well as visual media, technology, and culture. It deconstructs the mechanism and impact of visual communication by illuminating how images exert power in specific geographic and cultural contexts, manufacture desire in viewers and consumers, and construct meaning and experience through time. Lectures target the acquisition of visual literacy and the understanding of visual culture around the world. (Format: Lecture 3 hours)

VMCS 1301 (3.00)

Introduction to Material Culture: Knowledge and Its Textures

This course provides a cross-cultural and interdisciplinary introduction to material culture from ancient civilizations to our contemporary global world. It presents key terms, concepts, and issues that are central to the study of materiality, including maker and creation practices, modes of objectification and commodification, and material ways of knowing often set aside by textually-expressed knowledge. By decentring the text and focusing on the material world, this course will allow a better understanding of otherwise overlooked knowledge and experiences. This course offers a range of approaches to material culture drawing from anthropology, archeology, art history, archival and curatorial studies, the history of the book, ethno-history, Indigenous studies, marketing, museology, race studies, sound studies, and women's and gender studies. (Format: Lecture 3 hours)

VMCS 1801 (3.00)

Paris, City of Light

This course introduces elements that define the essence of Paris through a series of literary and cultural snapshots. Using multimedia presentations of the Parisian cultural landscape and a broadly interdisciplinary perspective, lectures explore the development of a vibrant and unique urban centre that has always been a magnet for creative minds and cultural fervour. It uses drawings, engravings, paintings, maps, texts, songs, and film to investigate what is perceived as the singularity, timelessness, and seductive appeal of Paris. [Note 1: Language of instruction is English.] [Note 2: This course is cross-listed with FREN 1801 and may therefore count as three credits in either discipline.] (Format: Lecture 3 Hours)

VMCS 1991 (3.00)

Special Topic in Visual and Material Cultures

This course either focuses on topics not covered by the current course offerings in a department or program or offers the opportunity to pilot a course that is being considered for inclusion in the regular program. [Note 1: Prerequisite set by Department/Program when the topic and level are announced. Note 2: When a Department or Program intends to offer a course under this designation, it must submit course information, normally at least three months in advance, to the Dean. Note 3: Students may register for VMCS 1991 more than once, provided the subject matter differs.] (Format: Variable)

VMCS 2111 (3.00)

Maps and Empire: Uncovering the Instruments of Imperial Ambition

Prereq: 3 credits from VMCS 1201, 1301; or permission of the Department
Cartography implies not only the visualization of space, but also the creation of tools that can powerfully define and delineate space in political, social, and cultural ways, which give rise to borders and exclude or include people, things, and resources in life-changing ways. This course digests several thousand years of mapping in the western and non-western worlds to teach students how maps work and what types of knowledge they express. Students will be exposed to the uses and implications of mapping as an instrument that furthers the ambitions of kings, presidents, and even academics. Students will also be exposed to non-western ways of articulating space and reflect on how the digital realm is urgently requiring our society to assess the ways that maps control how we know the world around us. (Format: Integrated Lecture/Laboratory 3 hours)

VMCS 2991 (3.00)

Special Topic in Visual and Material Cultures

Prereq: 3 credits from VMCS 1201, 1301; or permission of the Department
This course either focuses on topics not covered by the current course offerings in a department or program or offers the opportunity to pilot a course that is being considered for inclusion in the regular program. [Note 1: Prerequisite set by Department/Program when the topic and level are announced. Note 2: When a Department or Program intends to offer a course under this designation, it must submit course information, normally at least three months in advance, to the Dean. Note 3: Students may register for VMCS 2991 more than once, provided the subject matter differs.] (Format: Variable)

VMCS 3101 (3.00)

The Colonising Word: Textual Culture and The Persistence of Colonialism

Prereq: Second-year standing; or permission of the department
By problematizing textual culture, this course exposes the ways that our architecture of knowledge continues to support white, primarily male supremacy through its valuation of textuality as a legitimate vehicle of truth and knowledge. In addition to exploring the origins of textual culture as well as its relationship with oral ways of knowing, this course interrogates non-western textual and oral knowledge. It seeks, moreover, to contrast the ways that non-western oral knowledge is valued differently than western verbal knowledge. Students will also be exposed to ways of knowing that do not rely upon textuality, with a focus on visual and material culture. By embracing non-textual knowledge, students will discover ways of knowing as expressed, created, and used by women, Indigenous groups, and people of colour more broadly. (Format: Integrated Lecture/Laboratory 3 hours)

VMCS 3201 (3.00)

The Innovative Gaze: Snapshots of Visual Culture in the City

Prereq: 3 credits from VMCS 1201, 1301; or permission of the Department
This course examines the multifarious relationship between the city and visual culture through the prism of creativity, innovation, and design. Using cultural snapshots of a selection of cities at defining moments in their history, it sheds light on the impact of images and visual expression on urban spaces and the communities inhabiting them. It focuses on culturally important and globally significant cities that foster innovation and embody a unique creative vision in their visual language, in order to reflect on how metropolitan culture and visuality in the public sphere display artistic principles, ideological preoccupations, societal values, and political views through architecture, fashion, food, open-air sculpture, street art, and interior and urban design. It considers the representation of cities in advertising, digital media, illustration, film, music videos, painting, photography, and other visual media. (Format: Integrated Lecture/Laboratory 3 hours)

VMCS 3241 (3.00)

Field Course in Visual Culture Culture in the City

This course offers an immersive opportunity to experience and examine visual culture in a real, non-simulated context though a first-hand encounter with images and visual representation. Fieldwork is designed to facilitate the direct application of key terms, concepts, and issues in visual culture to the analysis of images, practices of looking, and media of communication. Visits to sites of significance in visual culture (archives, castles, churches, libraries, monuments, museums, palaces, etc.), interactions with local image producers, and interest-guided exploration will illuminate how images communicate meaning, exert power in a specific geographic and cultural context, inspire desire in the viewer, and travel across borders. [Note: Enrollment is limited and students should be aware of the additional costs of travel and participation fees.] (Format: Field Study)

VMCS 3811 (3.00)

Images and Texts / Images Et Textes

Prereq: second-year standing; or permission of the Department
This course explores the intersection of verbal texts and visual arts in Francophone literature and culture from the Middle Ages to the twenty-first century. It adopts an interdisciplinary approach to examine how, different yet inseparable, words and images have always interacted with each other in a variety of ways and forms such as verbal portraiture, literary references to pictorial works, engravings and photographs used as illustrations or book covers, and the use of words in paintings. [Note 1: Language of instruction is English.] [Note 2: This course is cross-listed as FREN 3811 and may therefore count as three credits in either discipline.] (Format: Lecture 3 Hours) (Exclusion: Any version of FREN 3811 previously offered with a different title)

VMCS 3991 (3.00)

Special Topic in Visual and Material Cultures

Prereq: 3 credits from VMCS 1201, 1301; or permission of the Department
This course either focuses on topics not covered by the current course offerings in a department or program or offers the opportunity to pilot a course that is being considered for inclusion in the regular program. [Note 1: Prerequisite set by Department/Program when the topic and level are announced. Note 2: When a Department or Program intends to offer a course under this designation, it must submit course information, normally at least three months in advance, to the Dean. Note 3: Students may register for VMCS 3991 more than once, provided the subject matter differs.] (Format: Variable)

VMCS 4950 (6.00)

Independent Study in Visual And/Or Material Culture

This course permits senior students, under the direction of faculty members, to pursue their interest in areas not covered, or not covered in depth, by other courses through a program of independent study. [Note 1: Permission of the Department/Program Advisor. Students must obtain consent of an instructor who is willing to be a supervisor and must register for the course prior to the last day for change of registration in the term during which the course is being taken. Note 2: A program on Independent Study cannot duplicate subject matter covered through regular course offerings. Note 3: Students may register for VMCS 4950/51 more than once, provided the subject matter differs.] (Format: Independent Study)

VMCS 4951 (3.00)

Independent Study in Visual And/Or Material Cultures

VMCS 4991 (3.00)

Special Topic in Visual and Material Cultures

Prereq: 3 credits from VMCS 1201, 1301; or permission of the Department
This course either focuses on topics not covered by the current course offerings in a department or program or offers the opportunity to pilot a course that is being considered for inclusion in the regular program. [Note 1: Prerequisite set by Department/Program when the topic and level are announced. Note 2: When a Department or Program intends to offer a course under this designation, it must submit course information, normally at least three months in advance, to the Dean. Note 3: Students may register for VMCS 4991 more than once, provided the subject matter differs.] (Format: Variable)