This module aims to provide an updated and in-depth examination of historical and contemporary theories and debates relating to formal, social, cultural, and political dimensions of film and screen media, emphasizing these as transnational, globalized phenomena.
Through weekly screenings and class discussions of key film, media, and theoretical texts, we shall aim to call into question both the apparently 'obvious' or 'straightforward' ways in which we talk about film and screen media, and the importance of addressing and mastering theoretical approaches in the field in order to inform and deepen our analyses and debates. These may include among them historical, ideological, psychoanalytic, semiological, postmodernist, feminist, queer, phenomenological, haptic, and other emerging approaches to film and screen media.
While stressing the importance of close analysis, the module is designed as a 'tool kit' approach to the critical understanding and analysis of film and media rather than a series of 'close readings' of selected texts. Classes will involve detailed discussions of different theoretical perspectives as well as drawing on extracts from texts which may complicate certain established positions and readings. Classes function as a space for you to develop your own ideas, through a process of constructively discussing and critiquing those of key theorists, artists, and practitioners. This will help facilitate students to move on to create their own distinctive interventions – whether as practitioners, historians, critics, or theorists.
Broad topics for seminar discussion are indicated in the reading list in the module documentation, though please consult the updated module handbook for the specific week-by-week subject matter and texts.
Bibliography and reading list (indicative):
Bordwell, David and Kristin Thompson, Film Art: An Introduction, 7th edn (Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2004)
Carnes, Mark et al. (eds), Past Imperfect: History According to the Movies (New York: Holt, 1995)
Cook, Pam and Mieke Bernink, The Cinema Book, 2nd edn (London: BFI Publishing, 1999)
Turner, Graeme, Film as Social Practice, 4th edn (London: Routledge, 2006)
Bazin, André, What is Cinema?, 2 vols (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967)
Deleuze, Gilles, Cinema 1: The Movement Image (London: Athlone, 1986)
____________, Cinema 2: The Time Image (London: Athlone, 1989)
Easthope, Antony (ed.), Contemporary Film Theory (Harlow: Longman, 1993)
Heath, Stephen, Questions of Cinema (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1981)
Jenkins, Keith (ed.) The Postmodern History Reader (London: Routledge, 1997)
Sobchak, Vivian (ed.), The Persistence of History: Cinema, Television, and the Modern Event (New York and London: Routledge, 1996)
Stam, Robert, Film Theory: An Introduction (Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2000)
Tosh, John and Sean Lang, The Pursuit of History: Aims, Methods, and New Directions in the Study of Modern History, 4th edn (Harlow and New York: Longman, 2006)
Turner, Graeme (ed.), The Film Cultures Reader (London: Routledge, 2002)
White, Hayden, The Content of the Form: Narrative Discourse and Historical Representation (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987)