1. How to Study Cultural Artifacts No artifacts are ever totally self-evident, self-interpreting * adapted from work by Dr. Harry Coverston

2. Cultural Artifacts - anything made by human creativity, labor Example: If explorers on Mars discover a doll on the surface, what might that tell us? Humans have lived here Shiva, Hindu goddess regeneration

3. Cultural Artifact/Primary Source The object itself which is being considered (as opposed to secondary sources which merely quote, depict, represent the primary sources).

4. Every Cultural Artifact/Primary Source is composed of: 1.TEXT: The cutural artifact, primary source itself which is composed of: a. Medium b. Form c. Content Full round sculpture, bust, John Kennedy By Robert Berk, 1967 a. Bronze b. bust is sculpture of head alone c. President Kennedy

5. a. Medium answers the question What is the primary source made of ? literature – words arts - wood, clay, stone, ceramic, paint, canvas, walls, metals, glass, neon, computers, fabric music - sound Chaucer, illuminated Canterbury Tales

6. b. Form answers the question What is its outward shape ? What does it look like? literature -poetry, prose, narratives, dialogue e.e. cummings "r-p-o-p-h-e-s-s-a-g-r"r-p-o-p-h-e-s-s-a-g-r [and page proof] page proof

7. arts - depends upon formal elements: - color - lines - texture - space Jackson Pollack “Untitled (Green Silver),” 1949

8. music - formal elements include: - melody - rhythm - harmony - tone color “This Old Man” children song Score, Rite of Spring, Stravinsky

9. c. Content – what is the subject it describes ? Andy Warhol, Marilyn Monroe J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter

10. BUT to adequately consider any TEXT, one must always consider: 2. CONTEXT 3. SUBTEXT

11. 2. CONTEXT – What is the historical and cultural environment in which the text was produced ? Without knowing the people who produced a text, it cannot make any sense to us

12. Context tells us What was its function within the society which produced it ? What was its purpose - magical ? didactic ? decorative ? propagandistic ? Did it serve religious, political needs of the community ? Thor’s Hammer, ancient Norse culture symbol of power Claw hammer, 20 th CE tool

13. 3. SUBTEXT tells us What secondary, implied meanings might be present ? -emotional, intellectual messages embedded within a primary text So what is this? Symbol of a country? Medium for sculpture? Advertising, means of selling cars? Material on which to blow one’s nose?

14. Let’s Try One… What is the text, medium, form, content, context, subtext?

15. TEXT: Guernica, Picasso Medium – Oil, canvas Form – analytic cubism, black, white, gray shades Content – Spanish Civil War, unsuspected Nazi air raid on Spanish village

16. TEXT: Guernica, Picasso CONTEXT: Spanish Civil War, first recorded air raid in human history, technology used for war SUBTEXT: Agony of human suffering in world war era, analytic cubism accentuates social fragmentation

17. How to study the Humanities Definition: Humanities is the study of a. the creative process b. of cultural tradition c. as it occurs in the past d. and continues to occur in the present Cave ofof the Bulls, France 14,000 BCE Diego Rivera The Conquest Cortez Palace, Cuernavaca 20 th CE

18. II. Modes of Humanities: A.EXPRESSIONB. REFLECTION

19. a. Expressive Humanities - Occurs on the exterior, Visible, tangible, expressed not simply Idealized 1. visual arts 2. performing arts 3. literary arts Nijinsky, Rite of Spring

20. b. Reflection (Questions of Meaning) - Interior, intangible, invisible until expressed in expressive arts 1.Philosophy 2. Religion

21. III. How do we encounter Humanities a. Begin with object itself (Noumenon) b. Perceived through my life experience, value system (Hermeneutical lens) c. Resulting in perception, interpretation, understanding of object (Phenomenon)

22. d. BUT - How much of my response is Holy Virgin Mary (2006) Chris Ofili Medium included elephant dung sacred in Africa Form included female genitalia 1. shaped, produced by the work itself (extrinsic) 2. Shaped, produced by my experience/values (intrinsic) Your should always use specific evidence from the source your writing assignments.

23. e. NOTE: No artifacts are ever totally self-evident, self-interpreting