Image, Evidence and Authority in Europe and the Islamic World, ca. 500-1450

Instructor Seth Hindin

Spring Quarter.
Monday / Wednesday, 1:10-4:00 pm

This seminar will investigate the functions of the visual arts, particularly manuscript painting, in the production and transmission of scientific knowledge during the Middle Ages (c. 500-1450 CE). We will also consider the role of scientific instrumentation in mediating access to knowledge and to the natural world. Some of the key questions to be explored include: What was the evidentiary or epistemological status of the image in medieval scientific texts? To what degree can “scientific” representation be separated from moralizing representation? What roles did scientific knowledge—both textual and visual—play in the production and negotiation of political, cultural, and religious authority? How did images and instruments complement, complicate, and confound the cross-cultural transfer of scientific knowledge between the Western and Islamic worlds? While firmly grounded in current approaches to art history, we will regularly read articles by historians of science and technology, as well as consult original medieval texts (in English translation) that relate to the images we are studying. Students will lead weekly discussion and prepare a final paper.

Open to both undergraduates and graduate students.