ENGL 23040 - Global? Book? History?

Course Credit: 1
Maximum Credit: 0

Global? Book? History? What is a book? The answer might seem obvious at first, but it starts to get more complicated when we observe that the same word can refer to a rectangular prism made of paper, the words printed on that paper, the same words translated into pixels on a screen (or lines of code making up the file thus displayed), or the idea of the work in the mind of the author or reader. In this course we’ll explore the material and technological histories of information sharing by examining just what “book” can mean across times and cultures. We’ll look (virtually) at cuneiform tablets, papyrus scrolls, palm leaf sutras, wax and stone tablets, and illuminated manuscripts. We’ll trace the origins of printing technologies in ancient China and medieval Korea-and their continual use to the present day-before examining the “revolutionary” effects of those technologies in Renaissance Europe and beyond. Along the way, we’ll try to interrogate our terms of study as we grapple with the Eurocentric history of “book history,” the ongoing digital revolution in book technologies and the pressing questions it raises (pun intended?), and the alternative perspectives available when we decenter Western narratives. [AH]