Below are descriptions for courses in the undergraduate concentration in Cinema and Media Studies (CMS). For further work in Cinema and Media Studies, students are also encouraged to investigate other courses taught by the resource faculty. Film screenings add three to four hours per week to class time for the majority of courses.

10100. Introduction to Film I (=ArtH 19000, COVA 25300, ENGL 10800, gshu 20000):

This course introduces basic concepts of film analysis, which are discussed through examples from different national cinemas, genres, and directorial oeuvres. Along with questions of film technique and style, we consider the notion of the cinema as an institution that comprises an industrial system of production, social and aesthetic norms and codes, and particular modes of reception. Films discussed include works by Hitchcock, Porter, Griffith, Eisenstein, Lang, Renoir, Sternberg, and Welles. J. Stewart. Autumn.

21100. African American Literature on Film (=ENGL 27100, AFAM 21100):

This course surveys a range of 20th century African American literary works that have been adapted to the screen in order to explore the formal and stylistic relationships between literature and the cinema, and our approaches to them as objects of intellectual inquiry. How are different literary forms, genres and approaches (i.e., novels, plays, autobiography, melodrama, social realism) translated into cinematic terms? What tools of literary analysis can or should we bring to the interpretation of cinematic texts—adaptations and others? How can we think about the "authorship" of an adaptation, particularly when a Black-authored text is re-presented by a white screenwriter or director or "white" production context (e.g., the Hollywood studio system)? How are films with Black literary origins presented to and received by different readers/audiences? We will pay particular attention to the ways in which race complicates issues of production, representation and address between literary and cinematic institutions. Titles we will examine include: novels and films by Oscar Micheaux; Richard Wright/Pierre Chenal/Jerrold Freedman (Native Son); Lorraine Hansberry/Daniel Petrie (A Raisin in the Sun); Chester Himes/Ossie Davis (Cotton Comes to Harlem); Alice Walker/Steven Spielberg (The Color Purple); Malcolm X & Alex Haley/Spike Lee (The Autobiography of Malcolm X); Walter Moseley/Carl Franklin (Devil in a Blue Dress); Julie Dash's film and novel Daughters of the Dust. J. Stewart Autumn.

21200. Politics of Film in 20th Century American History (=HIST 18500):

This course examines selected themes in 20th-century American political history through both the literature written by historians, and filmic representations by Hollywood and documentary filmmakers. We will read one historical interpretation and view one film on themes like the following: Woodrow Wilson and WW I, the emergence of Pacific Rim cities like Los Angeles, Roosevelt's New Deal, the Japanese-American experience in World War II, McCarthyism and the Korean War, the cold war and the nuclear balance of terror, the radical movements of the 1960s, and multiculturalism in the 1990s. B. Cumings. Spring.

22100. Art and Film in Weimar Germany (=CMST 32100, ARTH 26000/36000, GRMN 23100/33100):

The period of the Weimar Republic in Germany, from the end of World War I and the collapse of Imperial Germany in 1918 to the rise to power of Adolf Hitler and Nazism in 1933, was a time of intense economic, social and intellectual turmoil and revolution. It also was witness to Germany's arguably most influential, innovative artistic activity and productivity in the various visual arts and film, as well as literature and music, during the 20th century. This course will explore broadly the visual culture of Weimar Germany, with particular focus on the fine arts and more popular imagery, the intersections with Weimar cinema, and their interactions with the contemporary the social and political milieus. To be considered are such art and film movements as Expressionism, Dada and Neo-Objectivity; artists' groups encompassing the Bauhaus, the November Group and the Association of Revolutionary Visual Artists of Germany; artists ranging from George Grosz and Otto Dix to Kurt Schwitters and Wassily Kandinsky; and films including The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Metropolis, M, and Kuhle Wampe. R. Heller. Autumn.

22300. Staging Femininity: Gender as Spectacle in Opera and Film (=CMS 32300, GRMN 23800/33800, MAPH 33500, GNDR 23800, CMLT, MUSI 23800/31900):

This course will explore the relationship between cultural production and gender identity. We will read a broad range of texts from contemporary cultural, performance, and film theory (e.g. Judith Butler, Catherine Clement, Mary Ann Doane, Susan McClary, Laura Mulvey, Slavoj Zizek) and examine a number of symptomatic films and operas where gender norms become apparent through their exaggeration, violation, or suspension. All readings in English. Films by Josef von Sternberg (The Blue Angel, 1930), Busby Berkeley (The Gang's All Here, 1943), King Vidor (Gilda, 1946), Werner Schroeter (Death of Maria Malibran, 1972) Rainer Werner Fassbinder (Lili Marleen, 1980), and Jean-Jacques Beineix (Diva, 1982); operas by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Marriage of Figaro), Gaetano Donizetti (Lucia di Lammermoor), and Giacomo Puccini (Turandot). D. Levin. Spring.

22700. The Divided Heaven: The 1960s in West Germany and the German Democratic Republic (=CMST 32700, CMLT, GRMN 23700/41400, GSHU 21200/31200):

PQ: Knowledge of German required. The building of the Berlin Wall in 1961 cemented the divison of Germany but it also, paradoxically, catalyzed a period of aesthetic experimentation and political ferment in West Germany and in the GDR. Beginning with the differing accounts of l961 produced on either side of the Wall, this course compares the cultural life of both Germanies, as manifested in literature and in film. Our focus is at once on aesthetic questions (late modernism, New Waves, the relationship between avant-garde and documentary impulses) and artistic attempts to process social and policial developments (the generation gap: the new, divided topography of Berlin; the Auschwitz trials, new discussions of fascism and stalinism; the student and feminist movements). K. Trumpener. Spring.

23400. Classical French Cinema (=CMST 33400, FREN 23400/33400):

Classic French cinema (from the earliest filmmakers to the beginnings of the New Wave) will be studied through the examples of ten movies, which influenced its history and represented the development of an esthetical movement: the French school before 1914 (Louis Feuillade's Fantômas), the "avant-garde" of the 20s (Jean Epstein's La Chute de la maison Usher), the surrealist cinema (Luis Buñuel's L'Age d'or), the musical comedy (Rene Clair's Le Million), the "100% talking" film (Sacha Guitry's Le Roman d'un tricheur), the poetic realism (Jean Renoir's La Bête humaine, Marcel Carne Le Jour se lève), the cinema under the Occupation (Henri-Georges Clouzot's Le Corbeau), the evocation of the Belle Epoque (Max Ophuls' Le Plaisir), the revival of the literary adaptation (Robert Bresson's Journal d'un cure de campagne. N. Herpe. Spring.

24100. Film in India (=CMST 34100, ANTH 20600/31000, HIST 26700/36700, SALC 20500/30500):

Considers the film world from 1975 to the present. Most attention will be paid to the Hindi film and especially to its "peculiar" features, for example, the song and dance. Emphasis is placed on the reconstruction of film-related activities which can be taken as life practices from the stand point of "elites" and "masses," "middle classes," men and women, people in cities and villages, governmental institutions, businesses, and the "nation." The course will rely on people's notions of the everyday, festive days, paradise, arcadia and utopia to pose questions about how people try to realize their wishes and themselves through film. How film practices articulated with nationalism, first in the wake of a failing "socialist pattern of development," and, then, with "liberalization," of the promise or threat "free markets" would bring, will be the major concern. A brief look will also be taken at how film is related to other media such as television. Some comparisons with Hollywood will be made. Students will be asked to familiarize themselves with existing approaches to Indian film against the background of more general approaches to film and the media. Some knowledge of Hindi desirable but not required (films will be subtitled in English and have English synopses). One film per week will be shown. Requirement: One 10-page paper, written in two stages. R. Inden. Autumn.

24300. Religion and Modernity in Film (=CMST 34300, ANTH 21900/32400, HIST 26800/36800):

Considers the problem of how popular films in the US, Europe, and Asia have represented the conventional religions' relation to modernity: the idea of film practices ("youth culture") as constituting a secular religion alternative or antagonistic to the conventional religions and the recuperation and transformation of conventional religiosity in modernist, especially patriotic and science-fiction films as a national theology ("civil religion"). One to two films per week will be shown. Requirement: One 10-page paper, written in two stages. R. Inden. Winter.

25400. Women and New China Cinema (=CMST 35400, CHIN 25400/35400, EALC 25400):

In this course we will study the representation of women in a series of films from different stages of New China cinema. Specifically we will examine a collection of "rural films" (such as Li Shuangshuang and Ermo) in which the transformation of a female character constitutes the central action. We will explore questions of a film genre, quotations, subjectivity and the projection of desire. All readings in English. Xiaobing Tang. Winter.

25600. Magic and the Cinema (=CMST 35600, ARTH 29700/39700):

This course will trace relations between motion pictures and traditions of magic, both as a theatrical entertainment and as a belief system. The invention of cinema's roots in the magic lantern and other "philosophical toys" which trick the senses into seeing visual illusions will be explored in relation to traditions of "Natural Magic" as well as a secularization of magical practices into entertainment from the Renaissance on. The early trick films of Méliès and others will be discussed in relation to the tradition of stage magic in the 19th century, as well as a particular reception of the magical nature of new technologies (electricity, photography, sound recording). The relation between cinema and hypnosis, both as a social concern and as metapsychological description of spectatorship will also be explored. A consideration of the appeal of magic systems of thought (spiritualism, theosophy, ritual magic) for Avant-Garde movement and their relation to experimental films by Epstein, Artaud, Deren, Anger, Smith, Fischinger, and others. T. Gunning. Spring.

26400. Charlie Chaplin: The Man, the Artist, the Cultural Hero (=CMST 36400, ARTH 28900/38900):

The three aspects stressed in the course title define the approach to (and explain the significance of) this key figure in the history of film and twentieth-century culture. As a man, Chaplin was a frequent target of large-scale political and sexual scandals; as an actor-director he was not only responsible for the Tramp figure, but also for such genres as social-comedy and comedy-melodrama; as a myth, Chaplin's figure was key to a number of twentieth-century art movements, such as Expressionist poetry, Cubist painting, and Soviet Constructivist art. Y. Tsivian. Winter.

27100. Film Aesthetics, Spectatorship, and Cinema Experience (=ENGL 28000, GSHU 20700):

This course focuses on the relation between the film medium, its aesthetic possibilities and practices, and the forms of reception mandated by and available within the institution of cinema. Beginning with a few classical film theorists (Balazs, Kracauer, Eisenstein, Benjamin), we will explore questions of film aesthetics and spectatorship through more contemporary theorists in the psychoanalytic-semiotic vein (Metz, Baudry, Mulvey) as well as from the perspective of recent film history (Gunning, Musser, Tsivian, Carbine, Hansen) which emphasizes the significance of the entire cinema experience—the social space of the theater, music, programming, the public horizon of the audience—for the process by which films convey meaning, pleasure, and subjectivity. M. Hansen. Winter.

27200. Slavic Critical Theory from Jakobson to Zizek. (=CMST 37200, BALT 28500/38500, GSHU 21300/31300):

This seminar style course surveys the cultural and literary theory of critics including Roman Jakobson, the Russian Formalists, Jan Mukarovsky, the Prague School, Mikhail Bakhtin, Tzvetan Todorov, Julie Kristeva, Mikhail Epstein, Slavoj Zizek and the Slovenian Lacanians.M. Sternstein. Winter.

27600. Beginning Photography (=CMST 37600, COVA 24000):

PQ: COVA 101, 102, or consent of instructor. A camera and light meter are required. Photography affords a relatively simple and accessible means for making pictures. Through demonstration, students are introduced to technical procedures and basic skills, and begin to establish criteria for artistic expression. Possibilities and limitations inherent in the medium are topics of classroom discussion. Class sessions and field trips to local exhibitions investigate the contemporary photograph in relation to its historical and social context. Course work culminates in a portfolio of works exemplary of the student's understanding of the medium. Lab fee $40. L. Brown, Autumn. L. Letinsky, Winter, Spring.

27700. Advanced Photography (=CMST 37700, COVA 27800):

PQ: COVA 101 or 102, and 240 or 241, or consent of instructor. Throughout the quarter, students concentrate on a set of issues and ideas that expand upon their experience and knowledge, and that have particular relevance to them. All course work is directed towards the production of a cohesive body of either color or black-and-white photographs. An investigation of contemporary and historic photographic issues informs the students' photographic practice and includes visits to local exhibitions, critical readings, darkroom techniques, and class and individual critiques. Lab fee $40. L. Letinsky. Spring.

27800. Theories of Media (=CMST 37800, ARTH 25800/35800, COVA 25400, ENGL 12600/32600):

This course explores the fundamental questions in the interdisciplinary study of visual culture: What are the cultural (and by the same token, natural) components in the structure of visual experience? What is seeing? What is a spectator? What is the difference between visual and verbal representation? How do visual media exert power, elicit desire and pleasure, and construct the boundaries of subjective and social experience in the private and public spheres? How do questions of politics, gender, sexuality, and ethnicity inflect the construction of visual semiosis? W. J. T. Mitchell. Winter.

28500. History of International Cinema, Part I, Silent Era (=CMST 48500, ArtH 28500/38500, ENGL 29300/48700, MAPH 33600):

PQ: This is the first part of a two-quarter course. The two parts may be taken individually, but taking them in sequence is helpful. The aim of this course is to introduce students to what was singular about the art and craft of silent film. Its general outline is chronological. We will discuss main national schools and international trends of filmmaking. Y. Tsivian. Autumn.

28600. History of International Cinema, Part II, Sound Cinema to 1960 (=CMS 48600, ARTH 28600/38600, ENGL 29600/48900, MAPH 33700):

PQ: This is the second part of the international survey history of film covering the sound era up to 1960. It is strongly recommended that students take the first section first. This survey will deal with issues of film form, industry organization and film culture during three decades, focusing on the crystallization of the Classical Hollywood Film as a key issue. But international alternatives to Hollywood will also be discussed, from the unique forms of Japanese cinema to movements like Italian Neo-realism and the beginnings of the New Wave in France. Film style, from the classical scene break down to the introduction of deep focus, stylistic experimentation and technical innovation (sound, wide screen, location shooting) will form the center of the course, while attention will also be paid to the development of a film culture. Texts will include Bordwell and Thompson, Film History: An Introduction, and works by Bazin, Belton, Sitney, Godard and others. Screenings will include films by Hitchcock, Welles, Rossellini, Bresson, Ozu, Antonioni, and Renoir. T. Gunning. Winter.

28900. Introduction to Video and Film (=COVA 10500, GSHU 20300):

PQ: COVA 101 or 102, or CMS 101. This course is a hands-on production course dealing with basic techniques and concepts of composition, editing, lighting, and story telling through images. Through exercises, screenings, discussions, and critiques, students will explore experimental, narrative and documentary video and filmmaking. Students must have a video camera. Staff. Autumn.

29700. Reading Course:

PQ: Consent of faculty adviser and Director of Undergraduate Studies. Students are required to submit the College Reading and Research Course Form. This course may be used to satisfy distribution requirements for Cinema and Media Studies concentrators. Staff. Autumn, Winter, Spring.

29800. Senior Colloquium

PQ: CMS 10100. Required of all Cinema and Media Studies concentrators. This seminar is designed to provide senior concentrators with a sense of the variety of methods and approaches in the field (such as formal analysis, cultural history, industrial history, reception studies, psychoanalysis). Students will present material relating to their B.A. project, which will be discussed in relation to the issues of the course. J. Lastra. Autumn.

29900. B.A. Research Paper

PQ: Consent of instructor. Students are required to submit the College Reading and Research Form. This course may not be counted toward distribution requirements for the concentration, but may be counted as a free-elective credit. Staff. Autumn. Winter. Spring.