Monuments and Documents: Panofsky on the Object of Study in the Humanities
2016; University of Chicago Press; Volume: 1; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1086/684635
ISSN2379-3171
Autores Tópico(s)Hermeneutics and Narrative Identity
ResumoIn this essay, I argue for a reorientation of discourse about the humanities to the objects of humanistic study rather than claims for their value or effect. Returning to an essay Erwin Panofsky published in 1940, “The History of Art as a Humanistic Discipline,” I build on Panofsky’s rich distinction between “monuments” and “documents” as the two sides of the humanistic object of study. By “monuments,” Panofsky refers to all of those human artifacts, actions, or ideas that have urgent meaning for us in the present. By “document,” he refers to all of those traces or records by means of which we recover monuments. Monuments and documents bring the long time of human existence, past or future, into relation to the short time of human life, a relation that defines the objects of study in all the humanities and confirms the undeniable interest of that study.
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