21H.343

Making Books in the Renaissance and Today

3-0-9 units. HASS-A · Undergraduate

Explores the impact of new technology on the recording and distribution of words and images in Europe from 1400-1800. Assignments include essays and online projects. Students participate in the design and printing of an eight-page pamphlet on a hand-set printing press. Limited to 12.

Spring 2016 · Making Books: The Renaissance and Today

Topics

Class visit to The Printing Office of Edes & Gill
Printing press construction session (HS)
Printing press construction session (HS) (cont.)
Paper-Making, Manuscript, and Print
Religion in Print
The Meanings and Uses of Early European Print—A Conversation
A visit to the Hart Nautical Gallery , MIT Museum
Print and Natural Philosophy
Experimental printing on completed press (HS)
Experimental printing on completed press (HS) (cont.)
Print Your Own Text I (HS)
Print Your Own Text II (HS)

Readings

Del Col, Andrea, ed. Domenico Scandella Known as Menocchio: His Trials Before the Inquisition (1583–1599) . Translated by John and Anne C. Tedeschi. Mrts, 1996. ISBN: 9780866981484.
Required
Ginzburg, Carlo. The Cheese and the Worms: The Cosmos of a Sixteenth-Century Miller . Translated by John and Anne C. Tedeschi. John Hopkins University Press, 2013. ISBN: 9781421409887. [Preview with Google Books ] ↗
Required
Febvre, Lucien, and Henri-Jean Martin. The Coming of the Book: The Impact of Printing, 1450–1800 . Translated by David Gerard. Seagull Books, 1976. ISBN: 9788170462668. [Preview with Google Books ] ↗
Required
Pettegree, Andrew. The Book in the Renaissance . Yale University Press, 2011. ISBN: 9780300178210.
Required

Prerequisites & course information

Same subject as CC.120[J] Prereq: None U (Fall, Spring) 3-0-9 units. HASS-A

Sources

Course catalogue ↗2026–2027
MIT OpenCourseWare ↗Spring 2016
MIT OCW syllabus ↗
MIT OCW calendar ↗
Historical MIT OpenCourseWare offering. Named reading entries and schedule topics are automatically extracted from the linked source pages.