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The Archaeological Imagination (ARC 125)
Of all the sciences, archaeology seems to be the most concrete—literally "grounded" in material evidence. But, of course, all the “stuff” that archaeologists dig up is in bits and pieces, and can be rendered whole again only by an act of the imagination—and good story telling. How does it happen that dirty bits of stuff can become coherent and often enchanting stories of the past? That is the subject of this course. We will investigate some of the strategies of the archaeological imagination—“digging deep,” “the face of the past,” “footprints of time,” “forensics and decipherment,” “the romance of ruin”—and some of the best stories it has produced, from the novels of Walter Scott and the paintings of Turner to the poems of Seamus Heaney and modern TV detective stories. We will use the latest contemporary media—video, 3-D simulation, and other computer graphics programs—to understand how lost cities like Pompeii and Machu Picchu can now be visited imaginatively, and how our ancestors from thousands of years ago can be retrieved through facial reconstruction, and look us in the eye once more.
Michael Shanks
The Omar and Althea Hoskins Professor of Classical Archaeology
Michael Shanks is the Omar and Althea Hoskins Professor of Classical Archaeology at Stanford. His books include Re-Constructing Archaeology, Classical Archaeology of Greece: Experiences of the Discipline, Experiencing the Past: On the Character of Archaeology, and Theatre/Archaeology. He received a PhD from Cambridge University. His current work focuses on antiquarian collection and travel in the 18th century as well as the Roman borders around Hadrian's Wall in the UK.
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Course Details
Thursdays
7:00 - 8:50 pm
10 weeks
Sept 25 - Dec 4
2 units $365
Drop by: Oct 8
(No class on November 27)
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