Week+1

=Week 1 Tues Jan 11 and Thurs Jan 13, 2011=

**Tues Jan 11 2011**
= In class Activities: We meet and introduce ourselves and learn a little about the Humanities=

We explore basic questions and have a discussion about what humanities involve, how we can study them and how these relate to various aspects of our lives. = Homework tonight: **We don't have any homework tonight except for reflection/thinking**=


 * Thurs Jan 13 2011**

= In class Activities: More discussion focused on Laguna Pueblo and the photo of the funeral (see below) in order to practice our methods/understanding/research/thinking skills=

= Homework tonight Read EE Pritchard's ideas/Levy Bruhl's ideas about the Primitive Mind available here=

= In class Activity: We'll learn by doing a practice Web quest. Bring laptops, smart phones, smart brains=

**Art Form = Photo** **Subject Matter = Funeral Procession at Laguna Pueblo, NM** **How does humanities scholarship study this image?** Use the following guidelines to begin your study.
 * **Use a method of analysis that works for the particular art form**
 * 1) This is a photo in black and white. Probably the best method of analysis is to describe the photo thoroughly.
 * 2) Use a journalist's questions to guide your description: who, what, where, when, how, why and why. You might not be able to answer these questions until you've completed some research. Start with the aspects of the image that stand out most to you.

possible resources: http://www.nmai.si.edu/subpage.cfm?subpage=exhibitions&second=online http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/award98/ienhtml/essay2.html or read more brochures here [|site]. The existence of such brochures suggests that Indians were sort of historic objects/places to be enjoyed by tourists. Does this help us understand the photo? Find laguna pueblo on a map (start with google maps) or search google. Read the brochure above to think about the context in which the photo was produced. Does the idea of tourism have anything to do with the photo? Visit this web [|site] to find out more about the creation of the southwestern US as a tourist destination see above - is the image a representation with a purpose (like Curtis's 'Disappearing Culture' photographs)? Where would you look to begin this research? Which context are you working on - the event and its meaning or the taking of a photo? think about the production of images for a mass market - does that model have any significance in this context? Why/Why not? Can any of these questions be answered? Are they necessary for your response to this web quest? Can you reasonably speculate/offer reasoned arguments to answer these questions?
 * **Look at component parts to see how they work together**
 * 1) This photo has no components, but we know that most photos don't exist as an isolated object – so we might consider that the photo is one component of a larger whole, perhaps a photo album, an exhibit, someone's holiday snaps, a marketing/advertisement product?
 * 2) Can you establish if the photo is part of a larger whole (whatever that might be)?
 * **Place the work in its social, political, cultural context**
 * 1) First realize that the photo has two aspects -
 * 2) The content of the photo documents an event at Laguna Pueblo, New Mexico at some point in the past. The event has social, political and cultural contexts relating to Laguna Pueblo.
 * 3) The photo is also an object created by someone to document this event. So the photo itself has social, political and cultural contexts that are likely to be different from the event documented in the photograph..
 * **Discover its purpose (intention)**
 * 1) Focus on the purpose of the photograph (or at least its likely purpose).
 * **Uncover how it was received by contemporaries**
 * 1) If you can establish the photo's context (social, political and cultural) you can potentially uncover its reception by contemporaries.
 * **Learn iconography (subject matter of art object)**
 * 1) The two aspects noted above apply here also: the event depicted in the photo, and the fact of the photo itself – what is the iconography of this photo (or the iconography of the event depicted in the photo)?
 * **Investigate biographical remarks, which may include psychological revelations**
 * 1) Who made the photo?
 * 2) Why was the photo made?
 * 3) Who was the photo made for?
 * 4) Why was the photo made for that particular audience?

What resources do you need to develop a humanistic approach to the analysis of this photo? In class, we'll use the internet to find resources and address these different needs. I've given you some starting places above, but there are many more books, journals, images, websites, databases etc. that humanities scholars use to discover and develop an understanding of objects such as this.