Historiography of Islamic Architecture

Arab Hall in the Leighton House Museum located in London shown with gold, blue and turquoise Islamic tile mosaics.

The Leighton House Museum in London was once home to the Victorian artist Frederic Leighton. Over the course of 30 years, the house was built to Leighton's specifications and eventually included the Arab Hall, which showcased a gold dome and elaborate mosaics constructed of Islamic tiles. (Image courtesy of Context Travel on flickr.)

Instructor(s)

MIT Course Number

4.619

As Taught In

Fall 2014

Level

Graduate

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Course Description

Course Features

Course Description

This seminar offers a critical review of scholarship on Islamic architecture through close reading of scholarly texts, museum exhibitions, and architectural projects. It also tackles methodological and historiographical questions about the field's formation, genealogy, recent expansion, and its evolving historical and theoretical contours.

Related Content

Nasser Rabbat. 4.619 Historiography of Islamic Architecture. Fall 2014. Massachusetts Institute of Technology: MIT OpenCourseWare, https://ocw.mit.edu. License: Creative Commons BY-NC-SA.


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