Course description
This course emphasizes the chief forces now shaping the American understanding of everyday forms, such as the manipulation of aesthetic standards by advertising and Hollywood imagery; the perfection of powered flight and the aerial view; the importance of snapshot photography in relation to home video; the post-1960s fascination with outdoor privacy; contemporary and potential spatial disorientation resulting from computer-aided electronic media; the post-1920 retreat of well-educated people into wilderness; the shaping of gender roles and self-image through clothing design and fashion shifts; and the long-term impact of national advertising campaigns on American notions of quality, uniqueness, proportion, and pleasure as reflected in ordinary visual realms.
