This course on art-historical method is designed to offer students an historiographic overview of the discipline of art history, with a focus on developments of the present century. The course will survey the most influential concepts of the discipline, the evolving tasks it has set itself, and the methods it has adopted for executing them. Works of art will inevitably enter into our discussions, but the main objects of study will be texts about art, particularly texts about methods for a historical study of art. Topics include: concepts of the discipline; style and periodization; iconography, semiotics, and deconstruction; the social functions of images and the social history of art; gender and sexuality; and art history as representation. Each student will be responsible for several short papers on selected readings and a longer final paper. This course is restricted to and required of first-year students in the Graduate Program in the History of Art.