Teaching the History of the Book

Course Description

“I learned some new ways to present materials to students, but more importantly I learned new ways of looking at materials that will allow me to develop my own classroom activities in the future.” — January 2018 student 

Aimed at academics and librarians who are currently teaching undergraduate or graduate courses dealing with the history of books and printing, this course will emphasize not history but pedagogy. It will compare a number of different approaches, including (but not only) printing history as the history of technology, history of art, intellectual history, business history, descriptive and historical bibliography, the dissemination of texts and their reception. The course will consider the varieties of currently available print and (especially) non-print resources available to instructors and students in the field. This course will investigate different ways of thinking about, designing, and conducting a course on the history of the book. It is a course not on the history of books and printing, but on the teaching of that subject. Three assumptions inform the plan of this course: (1) the current realities of pedagogy in the academy define the context in which such courses must be conceptualized and practiced; (2) the distinction between history of the book courses directed at undergraduate and graduate students is fundamental; and (3) the range of resources available for such courses is both large and—primarily as a result of the Web—growing. The first purpose will be the assessment of some of the strengths and weaknesses of differing approaches to the subject. The second purpose will be the investigation of resources available to teachers and students in this field. Rare Book School’s extensive collection of resources for teaching the history of the book will play an integral role in this course. The third purpose is to help teachers planning or already engaged in teaching history-of-books-and-printing courses to find additional techniques or approaches that may help such courses to be more productive and enjoyable for student and teacher alike. The intention is to consider the options and resources open to instructors—whether full- or part-time academics or librarians, or others—who are either currently engaged in teaching such a course, or who will begin doing so in the coming academic year. In their personal statement, applicants should describe the courses they are (or hope be) teaching. We encourage applicants to provide a sample course syllabus, whenever possible.

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Advance Reading List

Preliminary Advices

In this RBS course, we will be leading a series of discussions about pedagogical approaches to teaching the history of the book on both the undergraduate and graduate levels. The reading below will constitute the texts for the discussions. Building on these conversations, each student will have an opportunity to prepare and present to the group an individual session on some topic in the history of the book as a practicum. This will allow everyone to engineer his/her own “experiment” before the term begins.

The reading is a small sample from a huge literature now available on any and every aspect of the history of the book. We have selected individual titles either because they have achieved the status of a “classic” in the field or because they are provocative and provide an interesting perspective. If we have overlooked your “favorite,” please do let us know.

Required Reading

Darnton, Robert. “What is the History of the Book?” Daedalus, 111:3 (Summer, 1982). Frequently reprinted.

Howard, Nicole. The Book: The Life Story of a Technology. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009.

Howsam, Leslie. Old Books and New Histories: An Orientation to Studies in Book and Print Culture. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006.

McKenzie, D. F. Bibliography and the Sociology of Texts. London: British Library, 1986. Pay particular attention to titular essay.

Tanselle, G. Thomas. Bibliographical Analysis: A Historical Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009.

Williams, William Proctor and Craig S. Abbot, An Introduction to Bibliographical and Textual Studies. New York: Modern Language Association of America, 2009.

 

Recommended Reading

Hawkins, Ann R., ed. Teaching Bibliography, Textual Criticism and Book History. London: Pickering & Chatto, 2006.

Additional pedagogical web-essays at Pickering & Chatto.

McKenzie, D. F. Making Meaning: “Printers of the Mind” and Other Essays, edited by Peter D. McDonald and Michael F. Suarez, S.J. Amherst, MA: The University of Massachusetts Press, 2002.

McGann, Jerome J. The Textual Condition. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1991. Read “The Socialization of the Text” pp. 69–83.

McGann, Jerome J. Black Riders: The Visible Language of Modernism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993.

Finkelstein, David, and Alistair McCleery. An Introduction to Book History. New York & London: Routledge, 2005. This text is best as a review than an introduction since it presupposes a knowledge of the conversation.

Shillingsburg, Peter. From Gutenberg to Google. Cambridge & New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006.

Hume, Robert. “Aims and Uses of Textual Scholarship.” Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America 99:2 (June 2005): 197–230.

Cowley, Des, and Clare Williamson. The World of the Book. Victoria, Australia: The Miengunyah Press, 2010.

Kelemen, Erick. Textual Editing and Criticism. New York & London: W.W. Norton and Company, 2009.

Recommended Browsing as interest, time and money allows; Or, a list for the over-achiever

Gaskell, Philip. A New Introduction to Bibliography. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972; corrected edition, 1974; several subsequent British and American reprintings with minor corrections; paperback edition published in 1995 by Oak Knoll Press.

Greetham, D. C. Textual Scholarship. New York & London: Garland, 1994.

de Hamel, Christopher. The Book: A History of the Bible. London & New York: Phaidon, 2001.

Eisenstein, Elizabeth. The Printing Revolution in Early Modern Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983.

Ezell, Margaret. Social Authorship and the Advent of Print. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999. Read pp. 1–40.

Jackson, H. J. Marginalia. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001.

Manguel, Alberto. A History of Reading. New York: Penguin, 1997.

Olmert, Michael. The Smithsonian Book of Books. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1992.

Sher, Richard B. The Enlightenment and the Book: Scottish Authors and Their Publishers in Eighteenth-Century Britain, Ireland, and America . Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2006.

Woudhuysen, Henry. Sir Philip Sidney and the Circulation of Manuscripts. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996. Read the Introduction, pp. 1–21.

See also:

Journals to browse, according to interest: Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America; Book History (an annual published by SHARP); Publishing History; The Library.

Any of the various national histories of the book, such as the History of the Book in England, History of the Book in America, or L’Histoire de l’edition francaise.

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Course Evaluations

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Course History