FALL 2007 HONORS COURSES

HONR 288I Learning to Read the American Landscape: From Parks to Parking Lots
Tuesday/Thursday, 11:00 a.m.-12:15 p.m.
Dr. Jane Loeffler, Visiting Associate Professor

How much do we really see in the landscape around us? To what extent are we part of what we see? Learning to read landscape, we find answers to those questions and develop a more complete understanding of our surroundings–and possibly ourselves. This course is designed to stimulate awareness through personal observation, reading, research, and discussion and gives students an opportunity to think critically about the world they encounter every day. It will examine how landscape has shaped American character and how changing landscape ideals reflect social, cultural, and political values. It will also give students a chance to question knee-jerk assumptions about “hot” topics such as wilderness protection, historic preservation, and authenticity. There will be site visits to places such as the U.S. Capitol and its grounds, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House, the National Mall, Montgomery (Westfield) Mall, Prince George’s Plaza, or Route 1 in College Park.

Students will be graded on the basis of class discussion, several short response papers, a quiz, and a final project that includes a class presentation. For that project, they will analyze one local landscape in depth and find a way to tell its story.

Readings will include works by some or all of the following:
Frederick Law Olmsted, John Muir, J.B. Jackson, Yi-Fu Tuan, John McPhee, Peter Jackson, and Dolores Hayden. Other “texts” include photographs by Carleton Watkins, William Henry Jackson, Ansel Adams and others who have documented the American scene.

CORE: History or Theory of the Arts [HA]