First-Year Writing Seminar - Non-Western History (103-8-26)

Topic

A Beginner's Guide to Forgery

Instructors

Paul James Gillingham
847/467-4829
Harris Hall - Room 323

Meeting Info

Harris Hall L04: Tues, Thurs 2:00PM - 3:20PM

Overview of class

Societies forge the objects they value most. Despite this, scholarship on forgery tends to be a footnote to the histories of art and archaeology. This seminar puts forgery at the centre of history as a window onto the cultures, political economy and geography of knowledge of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Students will use a broad range of primary sources, including court records, forgers' diaries, intelligence files, novels and expert reports, to explore the historical detective stories of frauds such as the evolutionary "missing link" of Piltdown Man, the tomb of the last Aztec emperor, the Hitler diaries and the masterly pre-Hispanic epic of the Codex Cardona. These detailed case studies of archaeological, artistic and paleontological fraud are juxtaposed with social histories to investigate why people go to immense trouble to make fakes; why other people buy them; and what their efforts tell us about societies ranging from late Imperial China to post-revolutionary Mexico.

Learning Objectives

Learning the art and science of forgery and what it can tell us about different societies and times

Evaluation Method

Reading quizzes, 10%; participation through class presentation, 20%; document analysis, 10%; research paper, 30%; forgery, 30%

Class Attributes

WCAS Writing Seminar