WAX TABLETS OF THE MIND:
History, Memory, Psychology
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Elizabeth Johnston Science Center 313, Ex. 2245 ebj@slc.edu |
Pauline Watts pwatts@slc.edu |
Topics and Readings: Fall Term 2000
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Iconic Key:
means that the source is a book available in the SLC bookstore and on reserve
in the library.
means that the source is a photocopy of an article or book excerpt that you
will receive in class.
means that this reading is available on the World Wide Web and you can link
to it directly from the online version of this syllabus.
Introduction to Themes and Materials
Tuesday: how to prepare for class. A handout of Oliver Sacks'
"The Landscape of His Dreams".
Thursday: Lab -
Introduction to website for course. Proposal for construction of "memory palaces".
A virtual visit to the Exploratorium
exhibit of Magnini's paintings
Handout for an experiment to be conducted out of class.
Card Catalogs and the Memex:
Two Modern Modes of Information Storage and Retrieval
Tuesday: Bush,
V. (1945) As
We May Think. The Atlantic.
Focus on sections 6, 7 and 8 where he describes the Memex.
Baker, N.
(1994) Discards. In The Size of Thoughts. New York: Vintage.
Small, J.P.
(1997) Wax Tablets of the Mind. New York: Routledge. Part 1: Logistics
of the classical literate.
Thursday: Lab - Internet Searching
The Stomach of the Mind -- Augustine on Memory
(seminar both meetings)
Augustine:
Confessions, Book 10.
Wills, G. (1999)
Saint Augustine (Penguin Lives). New York: Viking Press.
There is a useful
web site devoted to Augustine, maintained by Professor J.J. O'Donnell of the
University of Pennsylvania: http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/jod/augustine.html.
Read the Katz article
on Memory and Mind and the Henry
lecture: Augustine on Personality.
Additional Readings:
Stock, B. (1996) Augustine the Reader. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press,
The Mind of a Mnemonist
Alexander Luria:
The Mind of A Mnemonist.
Additional Readings:
A memoir of Vygotsky
(the major intellectual influence on Luria) by his daughter is on-line: http://www.j51.com/~tatyana/his_life.htm
Baron-Cohen, S. & Harrison, J. (Eds.) (1997) Synesthesia: Classic and Contemporary Readings. New York: Blackwell.
Week of October 9th
Models of Memory
Carruthers,
M. (1990) The Book of Memory. New York: Cambridge University Press. Introduction,
Chapters 1 &2.
Additional Readings:
Marshall, J.C. & Fryer, D.M. (1978) Speak, Memory! An introduction to some historic studies of remembering and forgetting. In Gruneberg & Morris (Eds.), Aspects of Memory.
Roediger, H.L. (1980) Metaphors of Memory in Cognitive Psychology. Memory &Cognition, 8, 231-246.
October Study
Days (Thursday - lab class)
The Ars Memorativa: Places and Images
(seminar both sessions)
Excerpts from
ancient rhetoric manuals for cultivating the "art of memory": Cicero, De Oratore,
Quintilian, Institutio Oratoria, Ad Herennium.
Small, J.P.
(1997) Wax Tablets of the Mind. New York: Routledge. Part II.
Additional Readings:
Yates, F.A. (1966)
The Art of Memory. Chapter 1. This is more compact than the Small reading
and covers the same territory.
For background
on rhetoric please look at the Silva
Rhetoricae.
The Classics Department of the University of Texas maintains a Cicero
Homepage.
A web site which explores the connections between ancient memory arts and the
structure and operations of the internet: The
Semiotics of The Web.
Bartlett's Vision of Constructive Memory
F.C. Bartlett (1932)
Remembering: A Study in Experimental and Social Psychology. Chapters
1, 5, and 10.
Constructions of Memory
Johnston, E.B. (2000) Repeated Reproductions
of Remembering.
Schacter, D. (1996)
Searching for Memory, Chapters 1,2 and 4.
Mnemonics and Performance in Oral Traditions
Selections from David
Rubin: Memory in Oral Traditions.
Performing section
of Neisser's Memory Observed.
Noice, H. (1993)
Effects of Rote Versus Gist Strategy on the Verbatim Retention of Theatrical
Scripts. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 7, 75-90.
Thanksgiving
First visit to the dance studio - MacCracken 9.15 sharp.
Schacter, D.L. (1996) Searching for Memory, Chapter 6: The Hidden World of Implicit Memory.
Body Languages, Choreography and Memory
Tuesday: Second visit to the dance studio: Exchange with Emmy
Devine's Dance class.
Thursday: Open Lab - for those completing the memory palace assignment.
Ancient Sources: Plato and Aristotle
Tuesday: Seminar - Photocopied selections from Plato and Aristotle.
Thursday: Open Lab - for those completing the memory palace assignment.
Losing Memory
Tuesday: Seminar - Discussion of John Bayley's An Elegy for Iris.
Thursday: Open Lab - for those completing the memory palace
assignment.
Tuesday: Seminar - Discussion of Course Themes. Be prepared to discuss your conference work in relation to the class themes.
Thursday: Open Lab - for those completing the memory palace assignment.