Week Eleven: Objects and Culture

One of the most overlooked elements of worldbuilding can be the props that decorate our settings, the objects that frequently take front and center as plot devices, the goals of quests and obsessions.  Culture is embedded in objects and we use them to memorialize, to historicise and represent.  We wrap them in associations and memories.  We collect, we enshrine, we discard objects in tune with the dynamic changes in our values, our perspectives, our collective imagination. 

To discuss and discover some of the relationships between objects and culture and how we represent culture through the curation of objects, this week we will be visited by Dr. Genevieve Hill-Thomas our global art historian.  Dr. Hill-Thomas has asked that you read an article by Arthur Danto on Art and Artifact, this will be the required assignment for this week.  You will find a pdf of it linked to this week's Activity  Page.  Please read it before coming to class. 

Here is a direct link to this week's Activity Page.

These are the questions we are asking this week:

1. How do the objects on your planet reflect the identity of the inhabitants?

2. What power dynamics exists between your inhabitants?

3. Who chooses which objects go on display? What criteria do art objects have to meet?

4. How should the objects be "framed"?