Slavery to Liberation: The African American Experience

Slavery to Liberation: The African American Experience gives instructors, students, and general readers a comprehensive and up-to-date account of African Americans’ cultural and political history, economic development, artistic expressiveness, and religious and philosophical worldviews in a critical framework. It offers sound interdisciplinary analysis of selected historical and contemporary issues surrounding the origins and manifestations of White supremacy in the United States. By placing race at the center of the work, the book offers significant lessons for understanding the institutional marginalization of Blacks in contemporary America and their historical resistance and perseverance.

Material Type: Textbook

Authors: Gwendolyn Graham, Joshua Farrington, Norman W. Powell

ENGL 300 - Lecture 21 - African-American Criticism

In this lecture, Professor Paul Fry examines trends in African-American criticism through the lens of Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Toni Morrison. A brief history of African-American literature and criticism is undertaken, and the relationship of both to feminist theory is explicated. The problems in cultural and identity studies of essentialism, “the identity queue,” expropriation, and biology are surveyed, with particular attention paid to the work of Michael Cooke and Morrison’s reading of Huckleberry Finn. At the lecture’s conclusion, the tense relationship between African-American studies and New Critical assumptions are explored with reference to Robert Penn Warren’s poem, “Pondy Woods.”

Material Type: Lecture

Author: Paul Fry

Art History

The history of Art is long and varied, spanning tens of thousands of years from ancient paintings on the walls of caves to the glow of computer-generated images on the screens of the 21st century.

Material Type: Textbook

The Art of Fresco Painting in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance

Known for its durability, a fresco painting is created in "sections" on freshly laid wet plaster, allowing the painter to comprehensively portray the subject and execute designs with ease. As both the paint and plaster dry, they become completely fused. Highly popular during the late-thirteenth to the mid-sixteenth centuries, fresco painting was almost a lost art by the time this book was first published in 1846. This volume, by a recognized authority in the field, was highly influential in reintroducing fresco painting to public attention. In addition to translating descriptions of painting methods used by such masters as Alberti, Cennini, Vasari, Borghini, Pozzo, and Pacheco, the author also interprets passages from rare manuscripts on the causes of fresco destruction and how to retouch, repair, and clean these works of art. Curators and art historians will find this classic reference work of immense importance and interest.

Material Type: Textbook

Author: Mary Merrifield

Byzantine Art: Justinian and His Attendants

This art history video discussion examines "Justinian and His Attendants," 6th century, San Vitale, Ravenna.

Material Type: Diagram/Illustration, Lecture

Authors: Beth Harris, Steven Zucker

Colosseum

This art history video discussion looks at the Colosseum (Amphitheatrum Flavium), c. 70-80 C.E., Rome.

Material Type: Diagram/Illustration, Lecture

Authors: Beth Harris, Julia Avra Ugoretz, Steven Zucker, Valentina Follo

Edo: Art in Japan, 1615-1868

This program surveys two centuries of art and culture in the city now known as Tokyo. Ceramics, screens, textiles, prints, paintings, and armor are among the materials discussed.

Material Type: Diagram/Illustration, Reading, Teaching/Learning Strategy, Textbook

The Elements of Art

The goal of this unit is to introduce students to the basic elements of art (color, line, shape, form, and texture) and to show students how artists use these elements in different ways in their work. In the unit, students will answer questions as they look carefully at paintings and sculpture to identify the elements and analyze how they are used by different artists.

Material Type: Diagram/Illustration, Unit of Study

Gothic Art

The Gothic style brought both divine light and soaring height to medieval churches.

Material Type: Lesson

Guide to Ancient Aegean Art

This book contains all of Smarthistory’s content for the Ancient Aegean, including Cycladic, Minoan, and Mycenaean art.

Material Type: Reading, Textbook

Authors: Beth Harris, Ruth Ezra, Steven Zucker

Guide to Ancient Egyptian Art

This book contains all of Smarthistory’s content for Ancient Egyptian art.

Material Type: Textbook

Authors: Beth Harris, Ruth Ezra, Steven Zucker

Guide to Ancient Etruscan Art

This book contains all of Smarthistory’s content for the Ancient Etruscan art.

Material Type: Reading, Textbook

Authors: Beth Harris, Ruth Ezra, Steven Zucker

Guide to Ancient Greek Art

This book contains all of Smarthistory’s content for Ancient Greek art.

Material Type: Reading, Textbook

Authors: Beth Harris, Ruth Ezra, Steven Zucker

Guide to Ancient Near Eastern Art

This book contains all of Smarthistory’s content for Sumerian, Akkadian, Neo-Sumerian / Ur III, Babylonian, Assyrian and Persian art.

Material Type: Reading, Textbook

Authors: Beth Harris, Ruth Ezra, Steven Zucker

Guide to Ancient Roman art

This book contains all of Smarthistory’s content for the Ancient Roman art.

Material Type: Reading, Textbook

Authors: Beth Harris, Ruth Ezra, Steven Zucker

Guide to Byzantine Art

The “Beginner’s guide” introduces foundational concepts, such as the chronology of Byzantine history, sacred imagery, and wearable objects. Subsequent sections are arranged chronologically, covering the Early Byzantine period (c. 330–700), the Iconoclastic Controversy (c. 700s–843), the Middle Byzantine period (843–1204), the Latin Empire (c. 1204–1261), and the Late Byzantine period (c. 1261–1453) and beyond. These sections include thematic essays on Byzantine art and architecture, essays that focus on key works (subtitled artworks in focus or architecture in focus), and essays that explore Byzantium’s relationships with other cultures (subtitled cross-cultural perspectives). Finally, we have included questions for study or discussion to encourage teachers, students, and other readers to engage with videos and other content on the Smarthistory website which could not be included in this book format but which we believe richly compliments what is presented here.

Material Type: Textbook

Authors: Anne McClanan, Evan Freeman

Guide to Italian art in the 1300s

This book contains all of Smarthistory’s content for Italian art in the 1300s. Table of Contents Part I. A Beginner's Guide Part II. Florence Part III. Siena Part IV. Pisa, Pistoia, Rome

Material Type: Textbook

Authors: Beth Harris, Ruth Ezra, Steve Zucker

Guide to Italian art in the 1300s

This book contains all of Smarthistory’s content for Italian art in the 1300s.

Material Type: Reading, Textbook

Authors: Beth Harris, Ruth Ezra, Steven Zucker

Guide to Italian art in the 1400s

This book contains all of Smarthistory’s content for Italian art in the 1400s.

Material Type: Textbook

Authors: Beth Harris, Ruth Ezra, Steven Zucker

Ideals of the East: The Spirit of Japanese Art

Written by the foremost authority of the era on Oriental archeology and art, this extremely influential book offers a brief but concise introduction to Asian art. First published in 1883, it responded to a vogue in Western culture for a growing awareness and appreciation of Japanese artistic expressions of beauty and philosophy -- a perspective that remains fresh and valid.Author Kakuzo Okakura (1862-1913) was a co-founder of the Tokyo Fine Art School (now known as Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music) and a curator of Oriental art at Boston's Museum of Fine Arts. He also wrote The Book of Tea, and together with this volume, his writings rank among the most widely read English-language works about Japan. Ideals of the East wrought profound effects on the Western understanding of the internal consistencies and strengths of East Asian aesthetic traditions. One of its major themes, the connections between spirituality and the evolution of Asian art, provided English-speaking people with the earliest lucid account of Zen Buddhism and its relation to the arts.

Material Type: Textbook

Authors: Kakuzo Okakura, Sister Nivedita