The History of Art Concentration

The objectives of the undergraduate program are to develop a sophisticated level of visual literacy, specifically:

• the ability to analyze works of art and their social effects, both within their original settings and in subsequent contexts of reception.
• an understanding of the rhetoric and the politics of visual culture as it is played out in different historical moments and in different regions of the world.
• an awareness of how social, religious, intellectual, and personal values can be negotiated or manipulated through art objects and other forms of visual culture.
• the ability to engage with a wide range of critical methods and theoretical perspectives in the Humanities and Social Sciences.
• the ability to compare art and visual representation with other forms of human communication.
• an understanding of the relations between art history and other disciplines.
• an awareness of the impact of technology on the production, dissemination, and reception of art works and of visual culture in general.

A Concentration in History of Art must include:

Prerequisites.

• Any two (2) courses at the 100- or 200-level (except History of Art 194, which may used in the concentration).
• One 100-level survey course may be met through Advanced Placement (AP) credit upon approval by a HA advisor.

Concentration

The Concentration requires a minimum of 27 credit hours at the 200-level or higher, distributed as follows:

• At least four courses (12 credits) must be at the 300-level or higher.
• Students must take at least one Seminar (HA194 First-Year Seminars may fulfill this requirement).
• Three or more courses must meet the distribution requirements described below. Any seminar or course at 200-level or higher may be used to satisfy distribution requirements.

Distribution requirements:

The Department of History of Art at UM offers courses in a wide range of art-producing traditions. It maintains distribution requirements for the following reasons:

1. The History of Art as a discipline often employs a comparative method of investigation. The comparative method requires exposure to multiple traditions of art-making and the visual cultures that produce them.

2. The University of Michigan is known for its multi-disciplinary approach to research. Through exposure to different visual cultures, students in the History of Art learn to "think outside the box" and, as a bonus, sample fields of study which they may later wish to pursue in depth.

3. The discipline of the History of Art in the twenty-first century is global in scope and multi-centric in orientation. Transculturation, intervisuality, and diaspora now rank among the central concerns of the field. Students thinking of careers in the History of Art will need exposure to multiple traditions in order to be competitive in applying to graduate schools.

There are two kinds of distribution requirement, one focused on Time and the other on Area. The former familiarize the student with social practices associated with different moments in historical time—hagiography and pilgrimage, for instance, as opposed to print culture or mass media. The latter introduce the student to problematics and methods peculiar to different kinds of area expertise—those of Classical Studies or Asian Studies for instance.

Because every course taught falls into both time and area categories, the distribution requirements can be satisfied with as few as three courses.

Time

1) Ancient
2) Medieval
3) Early Modern
4) Modern and Contemporary

Area

A. The Middle East (includes Western and Central Asia, and North Africa)
B. Sub-Saharan Africa
C. Asia (includes China, Japan, India, Southeast Asia)
D. Europe and the U.S.
E. Latin America and the Caribbean

The distribution fields can be conceived as a matrix in which each course satisfies both a time component and an area component:

The Proseminar
History of Art 393 (Junior Proseminar) is offered three times a year. It is required for junior concentrators who plan on pursuing a history of art degree with departmental honors. Please consult the description of "The Honors Program" on this web site and in the Handbook for Concentrators)

Cognates
Two cognate courses at 300-level or higher are also required for the concentration. A cognate is any course outside the History of Art Department which nonetheless is relevant to the History of Art. Most courses in History, Archaeology, Cultural Anthropology, Screen Arts and Cultures, Comparative Literature, or the literatures of various cultures would count as cognates, but certain courses or internships in other programs or departments may be acceptable as well. One course may be at a lower level if it is a studio/practicum course or a studio course taken in Art & Design, Architecture & Urban Planning, or the RC. All cognates must be approved by a HA advisor.

Students are otherwise free to choose whatever they wish to make up their Concentration. A maximum of 12 History of Art credit hours (including study-abroad courses) transferred from other universities, and a maximum of 6 HA 399 credits, may be counted toward the Concentration.

Language
There is no specific language requirement associated with the concentration program, but students who plan to pursue graduate study are encouraged to acquire a reading knowledge of languages in their chosen field of expertise.

Study Abroad
Students concentrating in History of Art are expected to discuss their programs with a departmental concentration advisor at least once a year. Students who wish to earn history of art credit in a study abroad program must have the program pre-approved by a faculty advisor and provide course descriptions and other information at the request of the advisor. Once the student returns to the U-M campus, he or she must provide the HA faculty advisor with a syllabus, papers, and other work completed in the study abroad course. Students who enroll in a UM study abroad program are exempt from this requirement.

ULWR (Upper Level Writing Requirement) and R&E (Race and Ethnicity) courses
The History of Art department offers one upper-division course for Upper Level Writing Requirement (UL WR) credit each semester. Courses satisfying the R&E requirement are offered frequently. Check the listing on the Departmental or LS&A web site before registering.