ENGL 277 | The Book as Human Artifact

This course is an introduction to the "book" as a material object. We will learn to look at the physical object closely and with new eyes, examining its paper, binding, printing, typography, images, format, and much more. Our purpose is to use the material artifact to learn about the labor of the many people who created books, whether with quill-parchment-and-ink or a wooden press and types. Books -- in their many forms such as broadsides, newspapers, newsletters -- have, in some cases, survived thousands of years, and we will use these objects to learn about the societies and cultures that gave rise to them and that they left an indelible mark on. Our examples will largely draw on the manuscript and print products of Euro-America, but we will also attend to Asia, where papyrus was perfected and moveable type originated.