Medieval Architecture · Art History And Archaeology
weekly reading, a short paper (worth little), midterm and take-home final. Work hard and you'll be fine. I was nervous having read the CULPA reviews and did better than expected.
No, Johanna is not evil. But she is not the best TA I've ever had. She is a nice person, she is available, she is helpful...and in that better than most. I believe she is genuinely interested in being helpful rather than...well, a snark like some other TA's. But I think she is a tough grader. Maybe a bit too tough. I was surprised. Her sessions were not focused. Part of that was her objective to answer questions we had from lecture. This means our hour was often up before we could really get to the readings. And the discussions were mostly of the "what do you think that is?" "why do you think that?" type, with no real focus or direction. Harmless. As I said, no need to avoid her: you could do a lot worse. (the other TA's graded harder)
What an amazing course! Murray is one of the world's foremost scholars on the subject, and generally brilliant. He often shares current projects with the class, giving you insight into current events in Medieval architectural history. Importantly, he also can teach. I admit that for the first part of the semester I felt completely lost. The powerpoints jump around from building to building (organized by idea instead), Prof. Murray often expects some knowledge of nomenclature, and I wondered why he would spend time listing minutia without getting to any overarching significance. But then it all clicked. Once you begin to follow his way of thinking (and thus teaching), the material really comes alive. Prof. Murray goes beyond the usual description and analysis, and discusses historiography as well. He asks you not simply to memorize facets of buildings, but also to ask larger questions about the social framework that built them. The class sort of feels like an induction into serious architectural history. He is also entertaining, cracking jokes and taking the class to St. John the Divine one day during class. His TAs are great as well, but discussion section was a little boring, if necessary. Like the reviewer below said, however, you might not like the class so much if you're not really interested in buildings. A lot of time is spent of "this type of arch versus that" and "this…
One threeish-page non-research paper; standard midterm of IDs, comparisons, and essay; aborted ID quiz; fairly boring but light reading for section; blessedly short take-home final.
Professor Murray himself is like an incredibly knowledgeable marshmallow Peep, all soft and bearded and spouting trivia about French illuminated manuscripts on the side. He's what you want your grandfather to be. But the class material is less accessible, especially if you're not an art history major. It's not that it's so hard, but the opposite - he spends so, so, so much time giving seemingly trivial details about each cathedral that by the end of class you're left with half a page of notes and a sinking feeling that once again, you've missed the point of the day's lecture. If you're on the fence about the importance of art history as a field in general, don't take Medieval Architecture. It will only encourage the worst, why-don't-you-get-a-real-job instincts in you. On the other hand, architecture people loooove this class, because building adoration is building adoration, you know?
Easier than what I expected. Only 1 5 page paper, weekly sections, non-cumulative midterm and final, and final was a take-home anyway. Suspiciously easy, but the TAs and Prof. Murray graded hard. Few A- get upgraded to an A at the end of the term.
I think Prof. Murray needs to be upgraded to a gold nugget. This man encompasses everything Columbia wants in every professor: not just a brilliant scholar (check out all his publications in Avery) but a very able teacher. Even though he looks like he's skirting 65 (70?), he had better knowledge of how QuickTime works than I did. He is one of the champions for including more technology in the teaching of Art History in the future and has always been involved in all sorts of projects to visually capture the beautiful buildings in France either on video or through a navigable QuickTime interactive video which is made available free to the public. Throughout the course, our slides were accompanied by these videos so we could actually experience what it was like to stand in the building and have Prof. Murray point out what we would have seen. He brought medieval architecture to life for me, and made each and every building individual and unto itself, which gets hard because we studied over a hundred buildings and all of them are churches and things start to look the same past the 6th week. The way he blends teaching the primary material by looking at the building's features with the theories of past art historians is excellent, and we never get bogged down solely in theory, or just looking at buildings without a context of how they have been viewed. His powerpoints are all posted…
Mid term. Final. Take home. If you have a decent TA, you will get a B+ for hard work. Don't blame Murray. Medieval TA's have something to prove I guess. But don't let that turn you away.
Murray is great. He is funny and an enjoyable lecturer. The readings are a bit dry, but it is Medieval Architecture. In his own way, he is "cunning" and subversive. Putting pictures up on powerpoint of his eminent collegues in various states of inebriation is wicked. His dog makes the powerpoint too. This guy is great fun. The lectures are cool. Don't miss the trip to St. John the Divine (he will gallumph for you, don't ask, but it is really something to see.)