Spectators and rioters during public celebrations of the seventieth anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising. Warsaw, Poland, August 1, 2014. Photograph copyright Jerzy Elżanowski.
CLMD 6106F/CDNS 5003C/ARCH 5100F: Issues in History and Culture- Heritage and Memory in Canada and Central Europe
Instructor: Jerzy Elzanowski
The goal of this course abroad is to juxtapose experiences of urban space devoted to recording and performing public memory in order to gain insight into cultural heritage theory and practice. The course will take students to six cities in Central Europe and Canada: Berlin and Weimar (Germany), Warsaw (Poland), Montréal, Ottawa, and Toronto (Canada). It will take place in two blocks: September 17-27 (Canada) and October 19-28 (Europe), with one or two preparatory and concluding sessions. Students with conflicting course obligations may be accommodated. Significant travel funding is available to Carleton students.
The course is structured as a cooperation between Carleton University and the Technical University in Berlin, and will facilitate meaningful scholarly exchange for graduate students studying at both institutions. Students will benefit from the mentorship of numerous academics, heritage/museum professionals, and artists from all three countries. Thematically, the course will consider intersections between memory politics and the production and use of cultural heritage. Topics discussed in a comparative manner will include:
- complicity and perpetratorhood at historic sites
- politics/architectures of commemoration and redress
- individual and collective cultural appropriation
- land/real estate ownership and restitution in a neoliberal context
- diasporic architectures, monuments, and neighbourhoods
- guilt and heroism as imagined by national museums
- urban ruins and cultural landscapes of death
The course will engage literatures in heritage conservation, memory studies (including Holocaust studies and death studies), Indigenous studies, settler-colonial studies, cultural landscapes, architectural theory, as well as diaspora art and community histories.
The course is open to graduate and upper year undergraduate students from all faculties, but will require a simple application. Please submit a 300 word statement of interest (images welcome), a short bio, and a complete CV. For more information, and to apply, please email the instructor: jerzy.elzanowski@carleton.ca
Information sessions will be announced by email to those who express interest in the course.