Consult the AU Library resource, “Guide to the Research Process.”Choose six monuments and a general topic Select from the course Study Guide six(6) monuments, one from each of the six units, and from at least two(2) different continents.
Using these six monuments as case studies, begin to identify a topic that will tie your choice of buildings together and that will provide a rich avenue for research.The key to identifying a topic is to think about architecture as revealing something about the choices made in the design and construction process. Architects or builders find solutions to problems, and historians look at architecture to try to understand what those problems and solutions are.
The solutions create a kind of language: they tell a story about the architecture. Thus, even though you are looking at architecture from different times and cultures, you can identify common problems: light, circulation, walls, windows, material, geography, and function, for example. The story these features tell is often about choices related to intangibles, such as belief and value systems, dominant powers, etc., but also sometimes about practical choices.
Historians use research to identify these choices and to explain why these choices were made. In short, start with an idea or theme, and then create a narrative around it that leads you to a specific topic.Start to narrow down a topic that is of interest to you.
Do some preliminary research to see if anyone has written about one of these topics with regard to a monument discussed in the course.Consider these questions The following questions should guide the way you choose your monuments and the way you begin your research.
Do not simply copy these questions into your assignment’s “research plan” (Step3); instead, use them to think about why you have to ask certain questions; how you can find the answers to these questions; what evidence you can assemble; and what sources you can use.
Avoid talking about the obvious; you do not need to explain how and where you will find your sources.
You are not expected to answer these questions for this assignment. However, you will need to address them in some fashion in
Assignment5:
Long Research Essay. [Your rough notes about these answers are the kind of thing you could put into your Course Work Journal, to submit as part of
Assignment6
Who built these monuments? When were they built?
Where?What did they look like?
What do they look like now? Are they as originally built? Or have they evolved over time through various uses and ownerships?
Why were they built? What beliefs, values, and intentions motivated the builders, and how are they revealed in as-built plan, form, or decorative details?
What were they used for? What rituals, activities, or events were they to accommodate?
How were they built?
What did construction technologies, building materials, geographical setting or climatic conditions contribute to their form and function?
What is the geographical, chronological, or ideological context for these monuments, and how are they the similar to, or different from, other buildings that responded to similar stimuli in different times or places?
How well did the monuments function compared with each other?
How well did the buildings function according to the intentions of the builders, given the constraints and opportunities of time and place, form and function
