College Bulletin 2022-2023 
    
    Mar 29, 2024  
College Bulletin 2022-2023 [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

ARTH 001D. First-Year Seminar: Architecture of Philadelphia


Philadelphia offers a virtual hall of fame of architectural and urban history. Even a cursory list touches on many of the major developments in the built environment over the last five centuries and beyond: William Penn’s Philadelphia Plan; Independence Hall; Eastern State Penitentiary; Levittown; Society Hill; the Vanna Venturi House; and the Barnes Foundation. This discussion-based seminar turns to this history not only to understand the architecture of one important metropolitan area, but to understand how these examples can teach about broader themes including the history of land use and planning, the industrial and urban revolutions, social struggle and social change, public memory, metropolitan growth and urban renewal, and aesthetic and formal innovation. Through field trips, archival research, critical interpretation of interdisciplinary sources, and writing assignments, students will learn the foundational methods of architectural history as well as many of the major cultural and social forces that have shaped it.
Humanities.
Writing course.
1 credit.
Fall 2024. Goldstein.
Catalog chapter: Art and Art History: Art History  
Department website: http://www.swarthmore.edu/art


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