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Animals in Nineteenth-century Art and Visual Culture

Module description

In this module, you will learn about the history of animal representation in nineteenth-century art and visual culture. You will encounter a wide variety of artistic practices to consider what nonhuman subjects tell us not only about the changing relationship between humans and the rest of nature, but also the evolving role of visual media in modern society. You will learn how to apply different methodological and critical approaches in your analysis of artworks and historical sources. Topics may include class, gender, racialisation, museum history, the materiality of artworks and conservation practices.

Module aims - intentions of the module

This module aims to allow you to:

• Develop and apply critical analysis skills to a wide range of topics related to art and animals in the nineteenth century
• Develop a good understanding of the historical discourses about animals and their representation, and how these relate to current-day discussions about humans’ relationships with nature
• Consider the collection and display of animals in public institutions in relation to scholarship on institutional critique and visual culture
• Understand the integral role of animal matter to the production and circulation of modern art and visual culture
• Analyse the relationship between the depiction of animals and social categories such as class, gender and race, as they were defined in the nineteenth century

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 1. Apply a variety of methodological and theoretical approaches to nineteenth-century art and visual culture
• 2. Take a critical approach to animal studies scholarship and its application within art history and visual culture studies
• 3. Analyse the importance of animal history to art production in modernity
• 4. Develop museological interpretation skills

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 5. Demonstrate a capacity for independent research, presentation skills and critical analysis of art and visual culture in relation to wider discourses about nature and culture in modernity
• 6. Take a critical approach to primary and secondary sources, and apply this in analysis of relevant artworks/ examples of visual culture

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 7. Develop your research and notation skills
• 8. Demonstrate your ability to construct compelling arguments through analysis of scholarship and visual sources
• 9. Develop confidence in verbal communication and presentation skills
• 10. Develop your time management and collaborative-working skills

Syllabus plan

The module will consist of a series of lectures and workshops. The lectures will be organised according to weekly themes, in which artworks and images will receive critical attention. In seminars, you will be able to engage more deeply with the themes through the discussion and analysis of academic texts and primary sourcess.

Topics may include:

• Animals and cultures of display
• Animals and systems of knowledge
• Animal matter and artistic materials
• Art, visual culture and ‘nature’
• Art and colonial societies

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

Formative assessment

Summative assessment (% of credit)

Details of summative assessment

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Re-assessment notes

Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons judged acceptable by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of deferral will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.

Referral – if you have failed the module overall (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 40%) you will be required to redo the assessment(s) as necessary. If you are successful on referral, your overall module mark will be capped at 40%.

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

• Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture
• Baker, Steve. Picturing the Beast: Animals, Identity and Representation. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993
• Berger, John. Why Look At Animals? London: Penguin Books, 2009
• Broglio, Ron. Surface Encounters: Thinking with Animals and Art. Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press, 2011
• Burton, Antoinette and Renisa Mawani, ed. Animalia: An Anti-Imperial Bestiary for Our Times. Durham: Duke University Press, 2020.
• Chen, Mel Y. Animacies: Biopolitics, Racial Mattering, and Queer Affect. Durham: Duke University Press, 2012.
• Cronin, J. Keri, Art for Animals: Visual Culture and Animal Advocacy, 1870-1914. University Park, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2018.
• Deb Roy, R. ‘Nonhuman Empires’. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East , 35 (1). pp. 66-75.
• Derrida, Jacques. The Animal That Therefore I Am, ed. by Marie-Louise Mallet, trans. by David Wills. New York: Fordham University Press, 2008.
• Donald, Diana. Picturing Animals in Britain, 1750-1850. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2007.
• Kalof, Linda and Amy Fitzgerald, ed. The Animals Reader: The Essential Classic and Contemporary Writings. Oxford: Berg, 2007.
• Ritvo, Harriet. The Animal Estate: The English and Other Creatures in the Victorian Age. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1987.
• Shukin, Nicole. Animal Capital: Rendering Life in Biopolitical Times. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2009.

Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources

• ELE – Faculty to provide hyperlink to appropriate pages

Key words search

Visual culture, art history, animal studies