 2015 - 2016 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| 0810-5076-01 | Archeology of the Senses | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| FACULTY OF VISUAL AND PERFORMING ARTS | FACULTY GRADUATE PROGRAM IN THE ARTS | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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University credit hours: 4.0
Course description
In this seminar we will follow the various ways in which the senses have been understood and constructed in relation to consciousness, society, economy, medicine, and politics. Our journey begins in antiquity with Aristotle’s essay on the soul, and continues through the middle ages with Augustine’s Confessions, ending with contemporary debates about the politics of the senses. Can we sense that we exist without consciousness? Can we sense sensation itself? What is the relation between sleep and awakening and aesthetics and anesthetics? How do we feel space and time? And do our ways of sensing have a history? What connects the different senses? Is synesthesia a normal state? And what connects or differentiates us from other animals? We will follow these questions and others from a broad cultural perspective, reading philosophical and literary texts with a selection of artworks and films.