Prescribed Electives

HR2008 (DD2012 / DD8008) Faith and Art 
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

This course is designed to situate art and artists in a number of diverse spiritual, geographical and historical contexts and in so doing allow you to explore art history through a variety of human beliefs. This will include, but is not limited to the rituals of worship, sacred spaces, divine objects, images of magic, illuminated manuscripts and so on. We will examine case studies that demonstrate how stained-glass windows tell us Biblical stories; ask what kind of secrets the faceless Venus of the Stone Age hides from us; suggest which tunes Islamic calligraphy ‘sings’ to our eyes; analyze what Jocho’s Amida Buddha has been telling us throughout the centuries, and much more. This course is open to all students from any academic background. Once completed you will have a deeper understanding of these concepts and they can provide the basis for further study in Art History and History.

HR2011 Global Modernisms: 1850-1950
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

This course examines modern art in the West and in selected global contexts in the period of circa 1850 to 1950. In the course, we will study the historical development of modern art in the West, while considering its relationship to the development of modern art in other global contexts, especially in colonised regions. We will also critically examine the competing narratives about Western and global art histories which have emerged in recent scholarship. The course is an intermediate-level course which lays a basis for your further studies and professional endeavours in fields related to modern art (including, for example: contemporary art, curatorial studies, museum studies, art criticism and art history). Building on your knowledge of premodern Western and Asian art, this course seeks to introduce you to key artistic expressions of modernity and modernism, and to the interactions between modernity and colonialism as expressed in and shaped by art. In the course you will be engaged in thinking critically about the development of modern art in Western and global contexts, and about Southeast Asia’s place in these competing narratives. 

HR3003 (DD3013) From Modern to Post-Modern Art 1945-1985
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

This course is designed for students who’ve already taken foundational Art History courses and chronologically follows DD3005 Survey of Modern Art 1900-1945. In this course you will be introduced to the moment of transformation from modern to contemporary art. It’s intended as a historical and conceptual framework for the development of critical thinking and visual analysis regarding today’s art practice. You will be introduced to a series of art forms and ideas, which still pervade the contemporary, 21st century global art world. You will examine the cultural and socio- political contexts through which these art forms and ways of thinking emerged. The analysis of these artistic contexts is essential for the understanding of a number of parallel situations in contemporary Southeast Asian art and will provide a strong knowledgebase for taking further Art History modules that focus on the contemporary.

This course introduces you to the diverse content and methods of global art histories. In questioning the monolithic binaries of Western and non-Western art, you will study various objects that crossed national and regional boundaries during the age of colonialism. This course prepares you for more advanced academic writing, reading, and research in art history.

HR3008 (DD3026 / DD8011) Aesthetic Manifestations of Buddhist Devotion & Practice
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

This course is intended to deepen and widen your pre-existing knowledge of Asian or Buddhist art, and to develop critical frameworks for rethinking prevailing canons of Buddhist art. It covers a selection of artefacts, sites and works of art from over two millennia from ca. 300BCE to the 21st century. The geographical scope mirrors the internationalisation of Buddhism, from South Asia to East, Southeast Asia, and the Western world, since the first millennium. We ask: how have Buddhist teachings been interpreted by image-makers over space and time, and how have the representations been subsequently experienced, read and used, and what makes “Buddhist art” “Buddhist” and “art”? These studies will provide a basis for further in-depth studies of Buddhist Art.

HR3010 Weird Art Writing
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

Why write about art? What can writings by art historians and critics, as well as poets, novelists, and artists themselves tell us about artworks – and what can artworks tell us about these writings? What experimental and downright weird forms does art writing take, and why? In this course you will examine a diverse range of unconventional approaches to writing about art and develop skills to critically evaluate these in relation to artworks. Through close readings of selected texts and artworks, you will gain a deeper understanding of the relationships between art and writing, guiding you to a theoretically and historically rigorous appreciation for the motivations for writing about art, and the nature of Art History as a scholarly discipline and de facto literary genre. This course is designed for students who have already taken introductory courses in art history and are interested in the discipline’s global turn, and its relationships to literary studies and other fields in the humanities. In this course, you will study texts and artworks from various contexts globally, including in Southeast Asia, other Asias, the Global South and the West. This course invites you to participate in key scholarly debates within the discipline of Art History that coincide with the growth of interest in global art histories and decolonising approaches to art-historical knowledge. 

DD3016 History of Design
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

This is an introductory-level course that surveys the historical context of cinema from its inception in the silent era, through to the current era, with a special focus on Asian cinema and its forms. You will examine how changing political, social, and cultural discourses have affected film production practices for Asian filmmakers, and explore identity politics in the age of globalized cultural production. You will then apply critical analysis and academic research of specific films and/or national cinema in Asia. This learning will form the foundation for further studies in theories and practices of film studies and well as give contextual knowledge to your own film projects.

DP2002 History of Photography
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

DT2007 History of Animation
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

HH1025 World Archaeology
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

This course will enable students to rectify a criticism which is often levelled against historians: that the field is becoming increasingly narrow, hyper-specialized, and does not prepare students to grapple with large-scale, long-term changes and processes, and to be able to formulate analogies with case studies from different parts of the world and periods of time. At the end of the course, students will be able to: 1) gain an understanding of the human and natural factors which led to the formation of large political, social, and cultural units in different areas in the world, 2) be able to differentiate superficial short-term processes of change from more profound but subtle evolutionary trajectories by isolating and comparing specific attributes found in case studies derived from different eras, 3) develop processes of reasoning which will enable them to distinguish between necessary and sufficient causal factors, and dependent versus independent variables which fostered the growth of large-scale socio-cultural units with specific geographical correlates and boundaries or frontiers, and be able to explain why these variables differ when discussing the origins of political, technological, economic, or religious institutions and adaptations in various parts of the world, and 4) be able to identify and critique hypotheses and assumptions advanced by some basic works of scholarship dealing with topics on which the course focuses: for example, what constitutes a common long-term evolutionary trend which can be compared across different places and times, and what superficial differences mask or obscure common evolutionary processes between different societies or geographical regions?

Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

Prerequisites: DD1003 OR DD1004 | 3 AUs

This course will introduce you to the basic precepts of contemporary curating. You will learn about the history of exhibitions, compare museum and independent curatorial approaches, and examine contexts/conditions specific to the curating of contemporary art, particularly in Singapore and the Southeast Asia region. This course is a foundation for further studies in curating practice and museum studies.

Prerequisites: DD1003 OR DD1004 OR HL1001 OR HH1001 | 4 AUs

Prerequisites: Nil | 3 AUs

Prerequisites: Nil | 3 AUs

more advanced investigations into cultural heritage and technology.

In this course, you will adopt a multicultural approach to heritage and media in contemporary and future global societies to discuss the maritime silk roads "as a metaphor for the on-going flow of [goods,] ideas and knowledge in Afro-Eurasia, which in turn contribute to the reconfiguration of global economic and diplomatic relationships" (van der Ploeg, J. - G. A. Persoon & H. Liu, p. 6). This course will challenge the monocultural bias of common perceptions and expand your awareness towards a multicultural perspective. This broader knowledge will provide a valuable contribution to other studies of the Afro-Eurasia context.

HH1125 History and Archaeology: An Introduction
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

History and Archaeology: An Introduction provides a comprehensive overview of the development of two closely related fields of study: history and archaeology. In the course, students gain an understanding of the objectives, tools and sources of archaeology and history and how the similarities in the two disciplines provided the basis for the establishment of historical archaeology as a field of study in the United States in the mid-20th century. Since then the field has expanded to other parts of the world including Africa, Europe, and Australia. The course introduces students to the history of archaeology defined by its focus on material culture, and how its development intersects with history, especially in the study of past cultures, societies and technologies of periods when historical documentation was also available. The course begins with a diachronic survey of the relations between history and archaeology before narrowing its focus to the specific development of historical archaeology in North America and its impact on other parts of the world, especially Asia. By examining case studies, images, and readings, the course helps students to acquire elementary skills to interpret the information presented in the course. Students will learn to identify and discuss key questions, approaches, methods, and sources used in historical archaeology at the end of the course. 

HH4005 Culture and Heritage: Perspectives from History
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 4 AUs

This course contributes to the History programme’s offerings in Interdisciplinary History. It will expand your knowledge of the debates surrounding the preservation and contestation of heritage and culture. It provides practice in the analysis of historical sources, historiography, as well as in written and oral expression. This course explores the distinction between authentic and inauthentic distinctions, and examines the impact of globalization and commercialization on heritage sites and practices around the world.​ ​

HR3006 (DD3024) 20th Century Southeast Asian Art: Being Modern
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs

This course examines the modern art of Southeast Asia in the 20th century. Through diverse examples from across the region, we enrich our understandings of “the modern” by considering how art reveals the complexities of modernities. Art in 20th century Southeast Asia can be characterised as being modern, and also as having other qualities – for example, art can be modern and nationalist, or even modern and traditional. We will traverse these issues while outlining the historical development of modern art in Southeast Asia, familiarising and critically engaging you with key actors, agents and art-historical narratives. The intermediate-level course is suited for students with some grounding in art history; however, no prior study of Southeast Asia’s art is required.

Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs 

The course is a social and intellectual history of pre-modern Japan, mapping both institutional shifts and the distinct cultures that emerged in the early Buddhist temple complexes of ancient Nara, in women’s quarters of the Heian court of Kyoto, in the medieval capital of Kamakura, among the samurai of the Warring States Period and in the tea houses and pleasure districts of Edo (early Tokyo). The course will engage the Japanese experience from a wide range of thematic and cultural perspectives. Themes will include political and military cultures, the machinations of court intrigue, the brilliant and melancholy literary productions of aristocratic women, the rise of a Buddhist intelligentsia, and the emergence of the high arts that have come to define what we all know and love about Japanese culture today.

The intermediate level course charts the evolution of British painting, sculpture, architecture and music from Wellington's victory at Waterloo in 1815 to the Wall Street Crash in 1929. Within this pivotal, long century, Britain experienced high social disruption. British art responded in kind: from the conservative canvases of Victorians at the Royal Academy to the Modernist abstractions of the Rebel Art Centre; and from the painters of the Great War caught within a doomed generation to the dance halls of The Roaring Twenties in the West End of London? We have been bequeathed priceless artefacts from this century of change. This course observes, analyses and assesses the role of art and artists within this rapidly evolving society and is of value for students engaged in the study of art history and the British world in the 19th and early 20th century.

DF2005 Writing for Film
Pre-requisite(s): Nil | 3 AUs 

This course is designed to introduce you to fiction film screenwriting. It covers the professional practice of developing, writing and rewriting short film scripts in a collaborative, workshop environment. Upon completing this course, you will have significantly developed your practice in preparation for future screenwriting projects.