King's College Course Offerings for 2002-03

Note: At the present time, these offerings are still tentative. When next year's courses have been confirmed, the page will be updated to reflect any changes.

Middle English Literature
AE0105
Ms. Janet Cowen

This course will enable students to attain a basic competence in the reading of Middle English and to acquire familiarity with examples of some of the main literary genres and traditions of the period of Chaucer and his contemporaries. Through detailed class study of selected texts and with seminar discussion of relevant background material and critical questions, students will develop an awareness of issues particularly connected to the study of literature of this period. Possible readings include Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, selected Canterbury Tales, and Langland's Piers Plowman. Full-year students must complete four pieces of written work -- one piece of translation/commentary and one 2,000-word essay each semester -- along with a three hour written examination at the course's end. Single term students must complete one translation/commentary and one 3,000-word essay.

Literature 1700-1790
AE0109
tba

The aim of this course is to increase knowledge and understanding of British literature and culture in the eighteenth century, and to develop critical skills in reading and writing on texts from a wide range of genres, e.g., verse and prose satire, the epistolary novel, women's writing, periodicals and criticism, drama, etc. Given our location, the course offers a particularly appropriate choice of material for students interested in the study of literary London. Authors likely to be included are Pope, Gay, Swift, Defoe, Richardson, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, Johnson, and Burney. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

Chaucer
AE 0117
B. Mills

This course is a concentrated study of the works of Chaucer, with attention to sources and literary contexts. There will be no set texts, but students will be expected to become familiar with the range of Chaucer's work and to attain competence in translation. Therefore, some previous experience of Middle English is required. Possible readings include excerpts of The Canterbury Tales, the Dream Visions (The Book of the Duchess, The Hous of Fame, etc.), and the shorter lyrics. Students taking the course for the whole academic year will be required to complete one 2,000-word essay, one 4,000-word essay, and one translation exam (2 hours). The requirements for one-semester students include one piece of translation with commentary and one 3,000-word essay.

Shakespeare
AE 0129
tba

This course aims to provide a detailed examination of the writings of William Shakespeare. We will focus on approximately twenty of the plays in the Shakespeare canon, along with examples of Shakespeare's non-dramatic writings. We will examine these texts in a range of contexts: textual and theatrical, historical and cultural, and will consider such issues as the conditions of production for drama; the nature and development of dramatic genre; political and religious topicality; the theatre's response to Elizabethan and Jacobean cultural, political, sexual, and familial structures; and the relationship between Shakespeare's work and that of his contemporaries. We will also be considering examples of Shakespeare in performance, based on those plays currently in production in London. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

Comparative Fiction
AE 0134
Dr. Max Saunders

This course will examine a range of fiction from diverse national traditions -- in particular nineteenth and twentieth-century realist and existentialist texts. Overall, we will relate fictional texts to philosophical and theoretical ideas, encouraging comparison across the boundaries of nationality, genre, discipline, or historical period. Foreign-language texts will be studied in translation. Possible readings include Jean-Paul Sartre's Nausea, Soren Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling, Gustave Flaubert's Madame Bovary, and Leo Tolstoy's The Death of Ivan Ilyich. Full-year students will complete two essays, of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Students taking the course for one semester can choose between writing two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

19th Century American Literature
AE 0136
Dr. Shamoon Zamir

This course is a survey of major works of 19th century American literature in their cultural and historical contexts. This literature offers complex and exhilarating investigations of a culture and society experiencing rapid transformation and crises. The nation seeks to consolidate its political separation from Europe in the previous century through the fashioning of a new cultural identity. The expansion along the western frontier goes hand in hand with the development of a mythology of the pioneering West and 'New World.' At the same time, the nation is torn apart by civil war at mid-century and its optimisms are continually challenged by the history of slavery and the war against the North American Indians. This period is also witness to the growth of a strong women's movement, rapid industrialization and urban growth, and major developments in technology and the social sciences. Possible readings include Cooper's The Pioneers; Poe's poetry, short fiction, and essays; Thoreau's Walden; Dickinson's poetry; and Douglass's Narrative of the Life of a Slave. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

Nineteenth Century Writings of Landscape
AE 0145
Professor Leonee Ormond

This object of this course is to study the changing shape of the nineteenth century landscape. Landscape here is understood to mean the natural and the urban settings in which human activity and speculation take place; it further subdivides into the setting as given object and human apprehensions, interpretations, and implementations of that object. Part of the course, therefore, will be devoted to actual changes taking place in the external environment in the period, but the main focus will be on the use of landscape as topic or background in works of art -- principally writing, but with attention to the visual arts. Possible texts include Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, George Eliot's Adam Bede, and Henry James's The Ambassadors. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

Elizabethan Writers
AE0151
Dr. Rivkah Zim

This course examines sixteenth-century concepts of human individuality and the literary forms which were designed to represent men and women within an historic European and English national culture. In the first semester, we will look at how stories drawn from biblical and classical traditions provided different contexts for humanist discussions of personal motivation and moral choices. We shall also focus on how selected readings of English chronicles became paradigms for statements on contemporary politics relating to such sensitive issues as the throne. In the second semester, we move on to examine the functions of poetry and rhetoric at the heart of the Elizabethan establishment -- the Court. Possible readings include Wyatt's "Seven Penitential Psalms," Marlowe's Hero and Leander, Shakespeare's Lucrece, Sidney's Astrophel and Stella, as well as the texts surrounding such historical events as the Essex revolt. Full-year students will complete one 2,500-word essay and one 6,000-word essay. One-semester students will be expected to complete two essays of 2,000-2,500 words.

Sociolinguistics
AE 0161
I. Singh

This course will give students an awareness of current theories concerning the relationship between language systems and their use in social contexts; the relationships between linguistic features and social factors; and the notion of different types of socially-situated language. We will become familiar with the nature and critique of social perceptions of language, and will also become equipped with the techniques and concepts of sociolinguistics to a level which allows them to carry out a small independent research project. Topics include language, dialect and sociolect; code switching; and language in the media. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

Writing and Culture in Jacobean England
AE 0164
Dr. Gordon McMullan

This course aims to provide a detailed examination of text and culture in the reign of James I (1603-1625), offering students the opportunity to student in depth a relatively brief but immensely vibrant period in literary history, a period in which English society (especially urban society) was undergoing rapid transformation. The course concentrates on the textual responses to, and construction of, a society of achievement and unease, configuring Jacobean culture as a dialogue between opportunity and oppression, empowerment and enclosure, discovery and displacement. The focus is primarily (but by no means exclusively) dramatic. Texts are analyzed in a range of categories, including festivity and carnival, violence and revenge, gender and sexuality, exploration and colonization. There will be a particular emphasis on writings by and about women, including examination of the categorization and marginalization of women as wives, whores, and witches. The canonical and non-canonical will be considered alongside each other, and 'literary' works will be examined alongside historical and cultural texts. Writers studied will include some or all of the following: Bacon, Beaumont, Cary, Chapman, Dekker, Donne, Fletcher, Heywood, Jonson, Lanyer, Marston, Massinger, Middleton, Shakespeare, Webster, and Wroth. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

English Historical Linguistics
AE0166
I. Singh

In this course, students will gain an over-view of the major stages and developments in the history of the English language from the Early Middle English period to the beginning of the twentieth century, as well as a grasp of the nature, methodology, and proposals of the theory of Historical Linguistics. They will become aware of the interactions between synchronic linguistics theories (including sociolinguistics) and the diachronic study of the language. They will also be able to discuss linguistic changes in English within a theoretical framework and with an awareness of the issues surrounding data, methodology, and the relation between the internal and external history of the language. Possible readings include Graddol, Lieth, and Swann's English: History, Diversity and Change (Routledge) and Trask's Historical Linguistics(Arnold). Full-year students will complete two essays, of 2,500 and 6,000 words. One-term students will complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or one 4,500-word essay.

Creative Writing: Dramatic Form
AE0167
Professor David Nokes

This course is designed to encourage students to develop their skills in dramatic writing. The seminars will be organized on a 'workshop' basis and will tackle various problems of dramatic composition. Each week students will be given a specific exercise (in plot, dialogue, stagecraft, etc.); the results will be rehearsed and discussed by the seminar group. The course will be mainly concerned with stage drama but will conclude with some discussion of screenplay. There is no prescribed reading list for this course, although some familiarity with the works of modern playwrights (eg., Samuel Beckett, Harold Pinter, David Hare, David Mamet) would be useful. Full-year students will complete various exercises, 2,000-4,000 words on a set topic, and 2,000-4,000 words on a self-chosen topic. Single-semester students will complete exercises and one piece of written work of 2,000-4,000 words.

British Literature and Film
AE 0171
Dr. Clare Brent

This course will introduce students to a range of British films and literature from the period -- mostly novels and short stories, with an emphasis on popular rather than canonical texts. It will also introduce students to a range of critical methodologies for interpreting literature and film, both separately and in relation to each other, with an emphasis on cultural and historical criticism. Students will read women's novels, supernatural tales, crime stories, war fiction, and will view films of roughly the same genres. Readings and viewings may include Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca, Graham Greene's Brighton Rock, and Ian Fleming's James Bond novels and films. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

Postcolonial Australian Literature
AE 0172
tba

Postcolonial literatures have emerged not only in response to imperialism but also as a discursive resistance to class, race, and gender oppressions. This course aims to explore those ideas in the context of Australian literature and history, whilst introducing key concepts in postcolonial literary theory. Both canonical and controversial Australian texts are used to explore cultural icons such as convicts, Aborigines, the bush, the beach, 'blokes and sheilas,' migrants, 'commos,' youths, suburbanites, and 'poofters,' all within the ambit of postcolonial critique. This course ultimately explores how postcolonial texts rewrite our idea of history, place, and language. Possible readings include Peter Carey's Oscar and Lucinda, Stephen Elliot's The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, and Mudrooroo's Doctor Wooreddy's Prescription For Enduring the End of the World. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

Literature 1840-1900
AE 1111
M. Turner

This course will introduce students to the complexity of Victorian literature. We will examine ways in which literary works reflected the cultural and social preoccupations of an age marked by economic and imperial expansion on the one hand, religious doubt and insecurity on the other. Core readings include Mill's On Liberty, Dickens's Bleak House, and selections from The New Oxford Book of Victorian Verse. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

Literature 1900-1930
AE 1112
Dr. Max Saunders/Dr. George Myerson

This course will introduce students to the main innovations in narrative, form, and thought as expressed by leading writers of the modernist period. We will begin by discussing what makes up the landscape of modernity, and will include in our discussion the influence of Edwardian texts as well as the Great War. Among the issues we will investigate include imperialism, the representation of violence, and modernist innovations in language. Possible readings include Conrad's Heart of Darkness, Wells's The War of the Worlds, Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

Old English II
AE 1115
C. Lees

This course will continue the work done in Old English I, providing an opportunity to a range of Old English literature, including heroic poetry, wisdom literature, Cynewulfian poetry, and biblical translation. Possible readings include selections from Aelfric's writings, The Phoenix, Widsith, and The Battle of Brunanburh. Full year students must complete one essay of 2,500 words and one or two essays totaling 5,000-6,000 words. An alternative mode of examination would be a three-hour written exam at the course's end. Single term students will complete essays and commentary tasks as determined by the course convenor.

American Culture and Society: 1900 to Present
AE 9002
Dr. Jessica Maynard

This course examines a range of key topics in American culture and society in the 20th century. The course is interdisciplinary, combining the study of literary texts, cultural criticism, and cinema. The kinds of topic normally covered include: 'the Woman Question,' the development of early Hollywood, immigration and urbanization, Prohibition and the '20s, the rise of mass culture, African-American culture and Civil Rights, the Cold War, the rise of consumer society after World War II, American feminism, the Counter Culture of the '60s, and Vietnam. To give examples of the kinds of materials that will be taught in the course: the study of the 1920s and early 1930s may include the film Little Caesar (1930), a novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, a play by Clifford Odets and some contextual reading; examination of the Woman Question at the turn of the century could include fiction by Edith Wharton alongside sociological theory by Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Thorstein Veblen; and classes on Vietnam could include a novel, a film, contemporary journalism and historical documents and interpretations. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

Culture and Society in the US 1945-65
AE 9004
Prof. Clive Bush

This course will examine what is probably the most exciting twenty-year period in 20th century American history. It is truly a multi-disciplinary course. A main question running through the course will be how do we describe history beyond the traditional historian's brief, and with what heuristic presuppositions and modes of discourse do we come to the arts in general. To this end, in addition to some well-known and some not-so-well-known literary classics, we shall be looking at film, social commentators of the period, historians of technology, some radical psychoanalytic writers, feminists, and African-American writers. Possible readings and viewings include Gertrude Stein's Wars I Have Seen, John Ford's The Searchers, Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique, and Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man. Full-year students must complete two essays of 2,500 and 6,000 words. Single term students must complete two 2,000-2,500-word essays or a single 4,500-word essay.

The Ancient and Medieval Book
AE TL08
Prof. David Ganz

This course provides an introduction to the differences between a modern edition and what an ancient or medieval manuscript looked like. We shall explore how books were copied and how they circulated in the ancient and medieval world, and what surviving manuscripts can reveal about how they were read and understood. In the second semester, students will concentrate on an ancient or medieval author and explore the circulation of their works in detail. Full year students must complete three essays of 2,000, 3,000, and 4,000 words. Single term students will discuss work requirements with the course convenor.

Film Studies Courses

Asian Popular Cinemas (0.50 cu)
AQ/FS 350
Dr Mark Betz

Semester: 2
Teaching method: 2 hr seminar with required screening weekly
Method of assessment: 1 oral presentation worth 25% of final mark; 2 essays of 2500-3000 words each, worth respectively 25% and 50% of final mark

Prerequisite: Introduction to Film Studies or permission of instructor

This class offers an analysis of some of the popular cinemas of Asia, including Japan, China, Taiwan, and/or Hong Kong since the 1960s. A key issue to be explored is the circulation of national-popular traditions within international contexts. To focus this issue, the course is organized by a series of case studies of some of the more enduring and exciting genres, stars, and directors/producers who have both shaped this field of cinematic production and achieved some measure of export success beyond Asia, including: action, comedy, horror and the supernatural, gangster, martial arts, and anime; Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Michelle Yeoh, Chow-Yun fat, and Maggie Cheung; Shaw Brothers, Raymond Chow, King Hu, Seijun Suzuki, Ann Hui, John Woo, Tsai Hark, Takeshi Kitano, and Shinya Tsukamoto. A screening will run each week, followed by a seminar.

Classical Film Theory (0.50)
AQ/FS T200
Prof David Rodowick

Semester: 1 (Tues 12-2)
Teaching method: 2 hr seminar with required screening weekly
Method of assessment: 1 oral presentation worth 25% of final mark; 2 essays of 2500-3000 words each, worth respectively 25% and 50% of final mark

Prerequisite: Introduction to Film Studies: Forms (may be taken coterminously) or permission of instructor

A critical and historical survey of the major issues and trends in international film theory and aesthetics primarily but not exclusively in the silent period. Weekly readings and discussion will examine major film movements of the classical period; for example, French impressionism and Surrealism; as well as the work of major figures such as Hugo Munsterberg, Rudolf Arnheim, Jean Epstein, Germaine Dulac, Bela Balazs, Siegfried Kracauer, Walter Benjamin, Andre Bazin, and Stanley Cavell.

Film and Nationalism (0.50 cu)
AQ/FS 310
Dr Mark Betz

Semester: 1 (Mon 4-6 + Mon 6-8)
Teaching method: 2 hr seminar with required screening weekly
Method of assessment: 1 oral presentation worth 25% of final mark; 2 essays of 2500-3000 words each, worth respectively 25% and 50% of final mark

Prerequisite: Introduction to Film Studies: Forms & Contexts or permission of instructor

A critical and historical analysis of the major issues of film and nationalism in relation to the Europe-America axis. The course takes the form of four case studies, each lasting two to three weeks in length and focusing on a particular period of importance (Film Europe and film America, 1920-1935; national film industries of the Soviet bloc, 1955-1968; swinging London of the latter 1960s; European cinema today). Overriding questions of the course include: How do national film cultures engage with international ideological and economic imperatives? What are the aesthetic markers of national film production? In what way is language a key aspect of nation-building? What is at stake in maintaining nationhood in relation to globalization? Readings will concentrate on recent theoretical and critical work on the subjects of nationalism and film. A screening will run each week, followed by a seminar.

Film Noir (0.50 cu)
AQ/FS 325
Dr Lee Grieveson

Semester: 2
Teaching method: 2 hr seminar with required screening weekly
Method of assessment: 1 oral presentation worth 25% of final mark; 2 essays of 2500-3000 words each, worth respectively 25% and 50% of final mark

Prerequisite: Introduction to Film Studies or permission of instructor

Looking closely at a body of films frequently labeled film noir, this course seeks to delineate the visual styles and narrative structures common to these films and to situate the films in institutional, discursive, social, political and cultural contexts. We will consider the contested European origins of noir, the influence of emigre creative personnel on noir, the classical cycle of noir in the 1940s and 50s, and conclude by examining the so-called neo-noir exemplified by films like Taxi Driver (1976), Blade Runner (1982), and The Last Seduction (1994). Key questions about genre, visual style, narrative form, sexuality, gender and American national identity will inform our readings and discussions.

History of Silent Cinema (0.50 cu)
AQ/FS H205
Dr Lee Grieveson

Semester: 1 (Wed 12-2 + Wed 6-8)
Teaching method: 2 hr seminar with required screening weekly
Method of assessment: 1 oral presentation worth 25% of final mark; 2 essays of 2500-3000 words each, worth respectively 25% and 50% of final mark

Prerequisite: Introduction to Film Studies: Forms & Contexts or permission of instructor

Silent Cinema will survey the development of the film medium and the film industry from the beginnings in the 1890s up to the conversion to sound in the late 1920s, covering key textual and institutional transformations and tying these together with the broader cultural and social context in which films were made, exhibited, and understood. Students will examine the emergence of classical Hollywood cinema as the dominant form of film production, distribution, and exhibition, and will engage with different national traditions of filmmaking in the silent period. Building on the module Introduction to Film Studies and other modules in the film history and theory sequences, the lectures, screenings, readings and discussions will allow students to apply and develop their film analytical skills examining both fiction and non-fiction films, both narrative and non-narrative films; to explore the rich generic diversity of silent cinema; to take a closer look at the crucial part played by audiences in the development of the film medium; to study the work and changing status of important filmmakers such as D.W. Griffith and the crucial economic and cultural function of stars such as Mary Pickford and Rudolph Valentino; and to study the various ways in which film was criticized and censored as a form of cheap mass entertainment.

History of Post-War Cinema (1945-1975) (0.50 cu)
AQ/FS H215
Dr Mark Betz

Semester: 2 (Mon 4-6 + Mon 6-8)
Teaching method: 2 hr seminar with required screening weekly
Method of assessment: 1 oral presentation worth 25% of final mark; 2 essays of 2500-3000 words each, worth respectively 25% and 50% of final mark

Prerequisite: Introduction to Film Studies: Forms & Contexts or permission of instructor

This course will survey the developments of world cinema from 1945 through 1975, covering key national and international film movements, principal directors, and critical concepts by situating them within broader social, political, and cultural contexts. Building on the module Introduction to Film Studies and other modules in the film history and theory sequences, the course will focus on important issues of this period, including: the technological and aesthetic developments of the medium; the industrial and political developments giving rise to particular film movements; the growing prominence of differing national traditions of filmmaking over and against the commercial dominance of Hollywood; the rise of film culture and the legitimation of film as an art and an object of intellectual inquiry; tand he question of alternative or oppositional political or national film styles. In their course of study, students will become aware of issues in post-war film history and learn more about how film studies as a discipline was built upon many of the debates and paradigms initiated in this period.

Independent Study (1 cu)
AQ/FS 400

This is an optional course unit for students following combined studies options with Film Studies. Its aim is to test the student's ability to conceive, plan, and execute an independent study project in the final year of their course. Projects will be vetted by the Film Studies Programme both for their viability and their relevance to the degree programme in question. Students will be expected to have relevant skills in the area in which they want to study. All students will be assigned a supervisor for their projects. In the main, the projects will involve writing an extended essay on a topic supported by appropriate reading in film studies or related areas of media or visual studies. However, in exceptional circumstances projects involving creative work may also be considered. Examples could include writing a screenplay, making a film or video, or creating for digital media. Proposals involving creative work will not be approved unless the student can assure: 1) that appropriate supervision is available; 2) that they have the financial resources for completing the project. All students will be obliged to produce a protocol for their independent study project by 1 November of their final year and a small portion of their mark for the unit will be awarded for the quality of the protocol.

Assessment for the course will be as follows: 15% of the mark for the course will be assigned to a protocol or preliminary statement of the student's intended subject of study, to be submitted before the end of the second semester in the penultimate year of study. 85% of the mark will be assigned to the final submission, whether a single essay or portfolio of work.

Movie censorship and American culture (0.50 cu)
AQ/FS 330
Dr Lee Grieveson

Semester: 1 (Wed 9-11)
Teaching method: 2 hr seminar with required screening weekly
Method of assessment: 1 oral presentation worth 25% of final mark; 2 essays of 2500-3000 words each, worth respectively 25% and 50% of final mark

Prerequisite: Introduction to Film Studies: Forms & Contexts or permission of instructor

A historical and critical analysis of the major issues in film censorship in America. The course takes the form of four case studies that mark critical moments in the regulation and shaping of cinema from the silent period to the present day. We will consider the social, political, and cultural context of these regulatory debates, ensuing legal decisions, and the responses of the film industry. We will ask four questions of each of the case studies: why were various groups anxious about cinema and about particular films? What did they do as a consequence of this? How did the film industry respond? And what effects did this have on cinema and filmmaking? Special attention will be paid to the effects of regulatory debates about sexuality, obscenity, race, national identity, and public order on the shaping of film texts and of American cinema more generally. Weekly readings will be a mixture of historical documents and recent critical work and will frequently focus closely on controversial films from the periods under consideration.

Soviet Film and Film Theory (0.50 cu)
AQ/FS T210
Prof David Rodowick

Semester: 2 (Fri 9-11 + Thu 6-8)
Teaching method: 2 hr seminar with required screening weekly
Method of assessment: 1 oral presentation worth 25% of final mark; 2 essays of 2500-3000 words each, worth respectively 25% and 50% of final mark

Prerequisite: Introduction to Film Studies: Forms & Contexts (may be taken coterminously) or permission of instructor

A critical and historical survey of the major issues and trends in Soviet film theory and aesthetics from the time of the 1917 revolution through the end of WWII. Weekly readings and discussion will examine the major directors--Lev Kuleshov, Vselovod Pudovkin, Dziga Vertov and Sergei Eisenstein--through their films and writings, as well as the film theories of important critics such Boris Eikhenbaum and Jurij Lotman. We will also study the films and aesthetic theories of the period in the larger contexts of art movements, such as Futurism and Constructivism, and literary theories such as Russian Formalism.

Third Cinema and Beyond (0.50 cu)
AQ/FS 360
Dr Mark Betz

Semester: 2
Teaching method: 2 hr seminar with required screening weekly
Method of assessment: 1 oral presentation worth 25% of final mark; 2 essays of 2500-3000 words each, worth respectively 25% and 50% of final mark

Prerequisite: Introduction to Film Studies or permission of instructor

This course will examine in detail the cinemas and filmmaking traditions of Latin America, Africa, Asia, and the Middle East since the 1960s, as well as the growing body of diasporic, exilic, and indigenous moving image productions in the west since the 1980s. Readings will be drawn both from the writings and the manifestos of the filmmakers themselves and from contemporary critical and theoretical work. Some of the issues examined in the course include: the cultural and socio-political contexts of film production; the relationship between decolonization, national liberation, and film/culture; fiction and documentary as mutually informing aesthetic strategies; the importance of folk cultural codes and of acculturation, or the passing down of local traditions from one generation to the next; the use of film as document. A screening will run each week, followed by a seminar.

(Compiled by Matthew Merlino, February 2002)

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