Introduction to Book History

Catalog description

ENGL-UA 732 : "Introduction to Book History" offers an introduction to the rapidly-expanding nexus of fields known as the History of the Book. Book History addresses more than just books: it investigates the production, dissemination, and readership of all kinds of textual materials, from papyrus to e-books. This course, aimed at those who want a broad, introductory overview to the field, offers a sweeping survey of key issues and historical moments and transformations from oral culture to manuscript to print to hypertext. Specific topics will vary from semester to semester, but what unites all book historians is the conviction that the material format of text itself matters. Hands-on workshops and field trips will allow all students to learn how to "read" and describe books, manuscripts, or other texts as meaningful artifacts in themselves (rather than as transparent vehicles of meaning). Other typical topics include major format changes and technological transitions in book production (e.g. the printing revolution) and their cultural impact, the history of censorship, copyright, and intellectual property, newspapers and periodicals, ephemera, Grub Street and the history of authorship, and the ways that digital texts, resources, and media, and computational tools and methods are currently transforming research in the humanities.