Shipwrecks

Catalog description

The image of a shipwreck looms large: the excitement of storms, danger, and rescue; the boredom and resourcefulness of a castaway floating in a lifeboat; the colonial fantasy of survival on a “discovered” island; the sublime ruin of a rotting ship on a rocky coastline or the otherworldly beauty of an underwater wreck. In this combined arts workshop and interdisciplinary seminar, we will explore shipwrecks from the perspectives of history, social science, literature, visual art, and recent political events. What happens in a shipwreck? Why are they such powerful metaphors with which to think? Are shipwrecks romantic accidents and adventures or the failures of states, institutions, and policies? What is the relationship of the “abnormal” shipwreck to “normal” life? What can shipwrecks teach us about other sorts of disaster, from climate change to genocide? What can we learn about one set of contemporary shipwrecks–those of migrants and refugees in the Mediterranean Sea–from examining other shipwrecks? This course combines two cohorts: students taking the course as an Interdisciplinary Seminar and students taking the course as an Arts Workshop (with the option to work in their choice of mediums). All students will always meet together, but students in each cohort will respond to assignments in different modalities. Texts and artworks we may consider include those by William Falconer, Chaim Grade, Lisa Moore, Jamin Wells, Chihyung Jeon, J.M.W. Turner, Caspar David Friedrich, Zainab Sedira, Monica Bonvicini, and Pinar Öğrenci.