tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-306902572024-03-07T15:22:16.434-08:00Category D: A Film and Media Studies BlogChris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.comBlogger695125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-81448931205946035922019-10-13T19:12:00.003-07:002019-10-13T19:12:59.643-07:00Teaching the History of Film Craft (pt. 7)<b>Teaching the History of Film Craft:</b><br />
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
<div>
<b>Syllabi</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Last in a series of posts about teaching the history of below-the-line film artists (cinematographers, sound designers, etc.) and of screenwriting.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-1.html">Part 1 introductory post</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-2.html">Part 2 scholarly books </a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-3.html">Part 3 video resources</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-4.html">Part 4 student research projects</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-5.html">Part 5 the theory of craft</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-6.html">Part 6 limtations</a><br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I have not been able to find any syllabi online that do the kind of course I'm describing - a history of editing or screenwriting or some other craft. I do know colleagues elsewhere teach courses along these lines, and some programs like NYU have them listed in their catalog.<br />
<br />
I am sharing syllabi of the three courses I've taught: History of Cinematography, History of Sound Design, and History of Screenwriting. Of these, I've taught only the cinematography course more than once, so these syllabi can definitely use refinement. But perhaps they can provide a model for what's possible in this kind of course. <br />
<br />
In addition to the issues I raised in my previous post, I've wondered how much emphasis I should put on theory. I do think some is useful - for instance, Chion in a sound class, narrative theory in a screenwriting class, or color theory in a cinematography class. Relatedly, I face the issue of how much to organize the syllabus conceptually. So far, I organize the classes historically, in chronological order, but one could also conceive of a cinematography course with each unit corresponding to an aesthetic/technological problem in the craft: movement, color, grayscale, etc.<br />
<br />
Forgive the long post, but I thought it would be helpful to include the syllabi here rather than to link to a document elsewhere.<br />
<br />
<b>HISTORY OF CINEMATOGRAPHY</b><br />
<br />
This course will study the history of cinematography from the 1930s to present, exploring the connections between the technologies and the artistic practices of cinematography. Looking at Hollywood and international art cinema, as well as alternative practices of independent cinema and documentary, we will examine how cinematographers embraced or adapted to new changes (talking pictures, deep focus, color, widescreen, and digital) and how aesthetic norms evolved. Students will use case studies of film industry history and of the careers of directors of photography to improve researching and writing skills.<br />
<br />
<u>Books</u><br />
Patrick Keating, ed., <i>Cinematography</i><br />
Patrick Keating, ed., <i>Hollywood Lighting from the Silent Era to Film Noir</i><br />
<br />
<b>Silent Cinema</b><br />
<i>The Last Laugh</i> (F. W. Murnau, 1924, 90m, d.p. Karl Freund)<br />
Patrick Keating, “A Homeless Ghost: The Moving Camera and its Analogies”<br />
<br />
<b>Classical Hollywood Lighting</b><br />
<i>It Happened One Night </i>(Frank Capra, 1934, 105m, d.p. Joseph Walker)<br />
Reading: Patrick Keating, “Conventions and Functions,” and “The Art of Balance” (HL)<br />
David Bordwell, “Daisies in the Crevices”<br />
“Aces of the Camera: Joseph Walker”<br />
<br />
<b>Film Noir </b><b><b>and Postwar Realism</b></b><br />
<i>He Walked By Night </i>(Alfred Werker/Anthony Mann, 1948, 79m, d.p. John Alton)<br />
Reading: Patrick Keating, "Film Noir and the Limits of Classicism" (HL)<br />
Lisa Dombrowski, “Postwar Hollywood, 1947–1967” [in <i>Cinematography</i>]<br />
<br />
<b>Cinematographer as Auteur</b><br />
<i>Exterminating Angel </i>(Luis Buñuel, 1962, 94m, d.p. Gabriel Figueroa)<br />
<i>The Fugitive </i>(John Ford, 1947, 104m, d.p. Gabriel Figueroa)<br />
Reading: Evan Lieberman and Kerry Hegarty, “Authors of the Image: Cinematographers Gabriel Figueroa and Gregg Toland”<br />
<br />
<b>Technicolor </b><br />
<i>Rope</i> (Alfred Hitchcock, 1948, 80m, d.p. Joseph A. Valentine and William V. Skall)<br />
Reading: Scott Higgins, “Order and Plenitude: Technicolor Aesthetics in the Classical Era”<br />
<br />
<b>Postwar Art Cinema</b><br />
<i>Red Desert</i> (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1964, 120m, d.p. Carlo Di Palma)<br />
Reading: Richard Misek, “Surface Color”<br />
<br />
<b>Widescreen</b><br />
<i>When a Woman Ascends the Stairs</i> (Mikio Naruse, 1960, 111m, d.p. Masao Tamai)<br />
David Bordwell, “CinemaScope: The Modern Miracle You See Without Glasses”<br />
Reading: Lisa Dombrowski, “Postwar Hollywood, 1947–1967” [in <i>Cinematography</i>]<br />
Eric Crosby, “Widescreen Composition and Transnational Influence: Early<br />
Anamorphic Filmmaking in Japan”<br />
<br />
<b>Documentary, 16mm, and Handheld</b><br />
<i>Lights</i> (dir. and d.p. Marie Menken, 1966, 6m)<br />
<i>Happy Mother’s Day</i> (dir. and d.p. Richard Leacock and Joyce Chopra, 1963, 26m)<br />
<i>Smithereens</i> (Susan Seidelman, 1982, 94m, d.p. Chirine El Khadem)<br />
Reading: Robert Allen and Douglas Gomery, “The Beginnings of American Cinema Verité”<br />
Susan Seidelman, “Sets and the City: On the History of <i>Smithereens</i>”<br />
<br />
<b>Hollywood Renaissance</b><br />
<i>All the President's Men </i>(Alan Pakula, 1976, 138m, d.p. Gordon Willis)</div>
<div>
Reading: Bradley Schauer, “The Auteur Renaissance, 1968–1980” [in <i>Cinematography</i>]<br />
<br />
<b>The New Hollywood and 1980s Art Cinema</b><br />
<i>Yeelen </i>(Souleymane Cissé, 1987, 105m, d.p. Jean-Noël Ferragut and Jean-Michel Humeau)<br />
<i>Working Girl</i> (Mike Nichols, 1988, 116m, d.p. Michael Ballhaus)<br />
Reading: Paul Ramaeker, “The New Hollywood, 1981–1999” [in <i>Cinematography</i>]<br />
<br />
<b>Lighting and Race</b><br />
<i>Pariah</i> (Dee Rees, 2011, 86m, d.p. Bradford Young)<br />
Reading: Richard Dyer, “Lighting for Whiteness”<br />
“The Visual Aesthetic of <i>Pariah</i> – An Interview w/ Cinematographer Bradford Young”<br />
<br />
<b>Digital Cinema</b><br />
<i>Gravity</i> (Alfonso Cuarón, 2013, 91m, d.p. Emmanuel Lubezki)<br />
Reading: Christopher Lucas, “The Modern Entertainment Marketplace, 2000-Present” [in <i>Cinematography</i>]<br />
<br />
<b>Color Correction</b><br />
<i>Carlos</i>, pt. 1 (Olivier Assayas, 2010, 98m, d.p. Yorick Le Saux)<br />
Reading: Richard Misek, from <i>Chromatic Cinema</i><br />
<br />
<br />
<b>HISTORY OF SOUND DESIGN</b><br />
<br />
This course will explore the history of film sound form the 1920s to present by<br />
examining the connections between the technologies of sound recording and reproduction<br />
and the artistic practices of sound design. Students will learn the process of researching<br />
and writing about the history of the film industry and the about the careers of sound<br />
designers. Topics to include: the emergence of the talkies, the impact of radio, avant-garde<br />
and documentary practices, the “golden age” of sound design, and the impact of<br />
Dolby and digital surround sound.<br />
<br />
<u>Books</u><br />
Kathryn Kalinak, ed. <i>Sound: Dialogue, Music, and Effects </i>(SDME)<br />
Mark Kerins, <i>Beyond Dolby (Stereo): Cinema in the Digital Sound Age</i><br />
<br />
[sound attributed below to supervisor/designer where credited]<br />
<br />
<b>The Coming of Talking Pictures/Technology of Analog Sound Reproduction</b><br />
<i>Their Own Desire</i> (E. Mason Hooper, 1929, 64m, sound: Douglas Shearer)<br />
<i>A Century of Sound: The History of Sound in Motion Pictures, 1876-1932</i> (Robert Gitt, 1991)<br />
Vitaphone shorts<br />
Reading: Donald Crafton, “Electric Affinities”<br />
Kathryn Kalinak, “Classical Hollywood,” pp. 37-49 (SDME)<br />
<br />
<b>The Avant-Garde and the British Documentary Movement</b><br />
<i>Deserter</i> (Vsevolod Pudovkin, 1933, excerpt)<br />
<i>Song of Ceylon </i>(Basil Wright, 1934, 38m)<br />
<i>Testament of Dr. Mabuse</i> (Fritz Lang, 1933, 120m, sound: Adolf Jansen)<br />
Reading: Michel Chion, from T<i>he Voice in Cinema</i><br />
<br />
<b>Classical Hollywood</b><br />
<i>I am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang </i>(Mervyn Leroy, 1932, 92m)<br />
Barry Salt, from Film Style and TechnologyHelen Hanson and Steve Neale, “Commanding the Sounds of the Universe: Classical<br />
Reading: Hollywood Sound in the 1930s and Early 1940s”<br />
<br />
<b>Labor in the Studio System</b><br />
Kathryn Kalinak, “Classical Hollywood,” pp. 50-58 (SDME)<br />
Laura (Otto Preminger, 1943, 88m, sound: Thomas Moulton)<br />
Reading: Helen Hanson, from <i>Hollywood Soundscapes </i><br />
<br />
<b>Magnetic Tape</b><br />
<i>Rear Window </i>(Alfred Hitchcock, 1954, 112m)<br />
Reading: Nathan Platte, “Postwar Hollywood” (SDME)<br />
<br /><b>European Art Film</b><br />
<i>Ikarie XB-1 </i>(Jindřich Polák, 1963, 88m, sound: Bohumír Brunclík)<br />
<i>A Man Escaped</i> (Robert Bresson, 1956, 99m)<br />
Reading: David Bordwell, “Functions of Film Sound: A Man Escaped”<br />
<br />
<b>Portable Sound Recording: The Case of Direct Cinema</b><br />
<i>Salesman</i> (Albert and David Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin, 1968, 85m, sound: Dick Vorisek)<br />
Reading: Robert Allen, Douglas Gomery, “Case Study: The Beginnings of American Cinema Verité”<br />
Jeffrey Ruoff, “Conventions of Sound in Documentary”<br />
<br />
<b>The Hollywood Auteur: The Modern Era of Sound Design</b><br />
<i>The Conversation </i>(Francis Ford Coppola, 1974, 113m, sound: Walter Murch)<br />
<i>The Black Stallion</i> (Carroll Ballard, 1979, 118m, sound: Alan Splet)<br />
Reading: Jeff Smith, “The Auteur Renaissance” (SDME)<br />
Eric Dienstfrey, “The Myth of the Speakers: A Critical Reexamination of Dolby History”<br />
<br />
<b>Dolby Stereo</b><br />
<i>The Silence of the Lambs </i>(Jonathan Demme, 1991, 118m, sound: Skip Lievsay)<br />
Reading: Jay Beck and Vanessa Theme Ament, “The New Hollywood” (SDME)<br />
Jay Beck, “The Sounds of ‘Silence’: Dolby Stereo, Sound Design, and The Silence of the<br />
Lambs”<br />
<br />
<b>Digital Surround Sound</b><br />
<i>Saving Private Ryan </i>(Steven Spielberg, 1998, excerpt, sound: Gary Rydstrom)<br />
Reading: Mark Kerins, “The Modern Entertainment Marketplace” (SDME)<br />
Mark Kerins, <i>Beyond Dolby</i>, ch. 1, “Cinema’s Hidden Multi-Channel History”<br />
<br />
<b>DSS Audio Aesthetics</b><br />
<i>Wild</i> (Jean-Marc Vallée, 2014, 115m, sound: Mildred Iatrou)<br />
Reading: Mark Kerins, <i>Beyond Dolby</i>, ch. 2, 7<br />
<br />
<b>Contemporary Art Cinema</b><br />
<i>In Bloom </i>(Nana Ekvtimishvili, Simon Groß, 2013, 102m, sound: Paata Godziashvili)<br />
Reading: Michel Chion, from Audio-Vision<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>HISTORY OF SCREENWRITING</b><br />
<br />This course will cover the history of screenwriting form the 1930s to present by examining<br />
the connections between the role of the screenwriter in film/television industries and the development of narrative form. Students will learn the process of researching and writing film history through<br />
the careers of screenwriters. Topics to include: the form of the screenplay, gender and<br />
screenwriting labor, the role of story conferences, genre, literary adaptation, screenwriting in<br />
non-US cinema, and conventional and long-form television writing.<br />
<br />
<u>Books:</u><br />
Steven Price, <i>A History of the Screenplay</i><br />
Kristin Thompson,<i> Storytelling in the New Hollywood</i><br />
Marguerite Duras, <i>Hiroshima Mon Amour</i><br />
optional: Andrew Horton and Julian Hoxter, eds, <i>Screenwriting</i> (Horton)<br />
<br />
<b>20th Century Literary Culture</b><br />
<i>A Woman in Grey </i>(James Vincent, 1920, screenplay: Walter R. Hall), episodes<br />
reading: Gordon Hutner, from <i>What America Read</i><br />
Ben Singer, from <i>Melodrama and Modernity</i><br />
<br /><b>The Screenwriter in the Studio System</b><br />
<i>Grand Hotel </i>(Edmund Gouldng, 1932, screenplay: Vicki Baum)<br />
reading: Steven Price, ch. 7: “The Hollywood Sound Screenplay to 1948”<br />
Mark Eaton, “Classical Hollywood” (Horton)<br />
Claus Tieber, “Story Conferences and the Classical Studio System”<br />
Erin Hill, “Women's Professions in Media Production”<br />
<br />
<b>The Continuity Script</b><br />
<i>Talk of the Town</i> (George Stevens, 1942, screenplay: Sidney Buchman)<br />
reading: Sidney Buchman, <i>Talk of the Town</i> Script<br />
<br />
<b>Labor in the Studio System</b><br />
reading: Miranda Banks, from <i>The Writers</i><br />
<br />
<b>Censorship</b><br />
<i>Now Way Out</i> (Joseph Mankiewicz, 1950, screenplay: Lesser Samuels and Joseph L. Mankiewicz)<br />
reading: Ellen Scott, from <i>Civil Rights Cinema</i><br />
Production Code Administration files<br />
<br />
<b>The Literary Screenplay and Art Cinema</b><br />
<i>Hiroshima Mon Amour </i>(Alain Resnais, 1959, screenplay: Marguerite Duras)<br />
reading: Marguerite Duras, Hiroshima Mon Amour script<br />
Rosamund Davies, “Screenwriting strategies in Marguerite Duras’s script for<br />
<i>Hiroshima, Mon Amour </i>(1960)”<br />
<br />
<b>Neorealism</b><br />
<i>Paisan</i> (Roberto Rossellini, 1946, excerpt)<br />
<i>Il Grido</i> (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1958, screenplay: Michelangelo Antonioni,)<br />
reading: Cesare Zavattini, “Some Ideas on the Cinema”<br />
Steven Price, ch. 8: “European Screenwriting, 1948-60”<br />
<i>Il Grido</i> screenplay, excerpt<br />
<br />
<b>The Master-Scene Screenplay</b><br />
<i>The Sting</i> (George Roy Hill, 1973, screenplay: David S. Ward)<br />
reading: Steven Price, ch. 9: “Master-Scene Screenplays and the ‘New Hollywood’”<br />
David S. Ward, <i>The Sting</i> screenplay<br />
<br />
<b>Three/Four-Act Structure and the Screenplay Curriculum</b><i> </i><br />
<i>Groundhog Day</i> (Harold Ramis, 1993, screenplay: Danny Rubin and Harold Ramis)<br />
reading: Steven Price, ch. 9, 10: “The Contemporary Screenplay and the Screenwriting Manual”<br />
Syd Field, from <i>Screenplay</i> (1979 edition)<br />
Kristin Thompson, intro, “Groundhog Day,” from <i>Storytelling the New Hollywood</i><br />
<br />
<b>American Indie Scripts</b><br />
<i>Eve's Bayou</i> (Kasi Lemmons, 1997, screenplay: Kasi Lemmons)<b> </b><br />
reading: Michael Newman, "Indie Realism"<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Television Writing</b><br />
<i>Hill Street Blues</i>: “Presidential Fever,” and “Politics as Usual” (1981, showrunners/writers: Steven Bochco, Michael Kozoll)<br />
reading: Douglas Hell, <i>Prime-Time Authorship</i>, pp. 315-69<br />
Michael Kozoll and Steven Bocho, Hill Street Blues, “Dressed to Kill,” script, <i>Prime-</i><br />
<i>Time Authorship</i><br />
Optional: interview with Michael Kozoll, <i>Prime-Time Authorship</i>, pp. 281-309<br />
Michael Kozoll and Steven Bocho, <i>Hill Street Blues,</i> “Presidential Fever,” script<br />
<br />
<b>Complex Television: Narrative Complexity and Long-Form Seriality</b><br />
<i>Atlanta</i>, Season 1, episodes 4-7 (2016, showrunner/writer: Donald Glover)<br />
reading: Jason Mittell, from <i>Complex TV</i><br />
Miranda Banks, from <i>The Writers</i> <br />
optional: Michael Newman and Elena Levine, “The Showrunner as Auteur”<br />
<br />
<b>Narrative Complexity in Contemporary Cinema</b><br />
<i>Edge of Heaven</i> (Fatih Akin, 2007, screenplay: Fatih Akin)<br />
reading: Charles Ramírez Berg, “A Taxonomy of Alternative Plots in Recent Films: Classifying the 'Tarantino Effect'”<br />
Steven Price, ch. 11: “Screenwriting Today and Tomorrow”<br />
<br />
<br /></div>
</div>
Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-36116467450940388732019-10-11T04:22:00.002-07:002019-10-13T19:14:28.455-07:00Teaching the History of Film Craft (pt. 6)<b>Teaching the History of Film Craft:</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Limitations</b><br />
<br />
Sixth in a series of posts about teaching the history of below-the-line film artists (cinematographers, sound designers, etc.) and of screenwriting.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-1.html">Part 1 introductory post</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-2.html">Part 2 scholarly books </a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-3.html">Part 3 video resources</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-4.html">Part 4 student research projects</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-5.html">Part 5 the theory of craft</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-6.html">Part 6 limitations</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-7.html">Part 7 Syllabi </a><br />
<br />
I've written this series of posts because I believe this kind of course can be a valuable addition to a curriculum, particularly in a production department. I see real benefits to teaching a deeper history of cinematography or film sound of screenwriting. It can engage students in film history, even those who might not have thought of themselves as interested in history.<br />
<br />
But there are some limitations to such a course:<br />
<br />
<i><u>Cinema Outside the US</u></i><br />
Craft is equally important to other national cinemas (or maybe almost as important - Hollywood's capital intensive production does engender development of craft), but the English-language historical scholarship on non-Hollywood areas of craft is less prevalent. Outside of US, Europe, and Japan, it gets even sparser. The reasons for this are multiple. Hopefully the wave of scholarship on the history of cinematography or sound or editing, etc. expand in other contexts. For now, it's a fact that a course on the history of one of these crafts will tend to be Hollywood specific, at least to the extent one integrates scholarship into the syllabus.<br />
<br />
Moreover, since the readily available trade press resources in English are mostly Hollywood or American indie sources, research projects are harder for students outside of these contexts.<br />
<br />
That said, there is some terrific scholarship for non-US craft, including transnational studies, and I do believe it's possible to strike a balance between a course which charts how craft has developed in the studio system and how it develops in other industrial and aesthetic contexts - whether classical Japanese cinema, European art cinema, experimental cinema, or contemporary global cinema. Other instructors will have a different balance, surely, but it can be productive to have students approach craft in a comparative manner.<br />
<br />
<i><u>Formalist bias</u></i><br />
I certainly see nothing wrong per se with a focused look at film aesthetics, but formal choices aren't all that most of us want to examine in cinema, or to teach. To the extent one is organizing a course around artistic practice, it's not organizing around the deep historical/political context of cinema.<br />
<br />
But I do think multi-tasking is possible. With each discussion, I like to guide discussion along multiple lines, from close reading to historical-political context.<br />
<u><i><br /></i></u>
<u><i>Women and non-white filmmakers</i></u><br />
Some fields, notably cinematography, have been historically dominated by men, whereas others instituted a hierarchy between male supervisors and women workers. And, to my knowledge, the major craft practitioners in the Hollywood commercial film industry up until the 1980s - with the sole exception of James Wong Howe - were white. So a syllabus on the history of craft may have a bias toward mostly men or mostly white artists. It's an issue familiar to those teaching the history of Hollywood or European cinema in the studio era, but perhaps exasperated.<br />
<br />
I find the balance harder to strike here, but it has made it imperative for me to put more emphasis on the contemporary moment than I might otherwise and to make a point of including a broad selection of film artists. Including documentary and experiemental work may be a way of expanding the social purview of the field, too.<br />
<br />
There are areas in which craft helps address the eclipsing of women's talent in Hollywood history. Editing and screenwriting, for instance, have both substantially involved women artists, and this history helps supplement the common male-directorial auteurism. I had one screenwriting student who was working on a paper that had premised the male dominance of screenwriting and was pleasantly surprised to find that women screenwriters were common in classical Hollywood.<br />
<br />
<i><u>Obsolete technology</u></i><br />
There's a tension at play in some of the courses I've taught. On the one hand, it's worth learning about the development of film technology in order to better understand how movies were made. On the other hand, many of the technologies are now obsolete. Students won't be shooting black and white films with the same celluloid constraints or dealing with optical soundtracks. The basics are important to learn, certainly, but I wrestle with how to strike the balance. Certainly, I've increasingly put more representation of digital cinema in my syllabi. I've tried to think about how to frame older technologies for conceptual lessons.<br />
<br />Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-33444858924892508932019-10-10T08:26:00.000-07:002019-10-13T19:14:43.735-07:00Teaching the History of Film Craft (pt. 5)<b>Teaching the History of Film Craft:</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Theorizing Craft</b><br />
<br />
Fifth in a series of posts about teaching the history of below-the-line film artists (cinematographers, sound designers, etc.) and of screenwriting.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-1.html">Part 1 introductory post</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-2.html">Part 2 scholarly books </a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-3.html">Part 3 video resources</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-4.html">Part 4 student research projects</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-5.html">Part 5 the theory of craft</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-6.html">Part 6 limitations</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-7.html">Part 7 Syllabi </a><br />
<br />
<br />
One doesn't need a theoretical rationale for a class, but teaching about film craft has raised some important issues for me - issues that come back into my scholarship and that impact how I teach the subject.<br />
<br />
To teach craft is to step back from the assumptions of film studies as an interpretive discipline. The differences between how film scholars describe things and how practitioners describe thins are sometimes fundamental. For instance, from every intro textbook on, "cinematography" for film scholars means camera movement, framing, and composition and "mise-en-scene" is the category which includes lighting. But for professional cinematographers working with in an industrial context, lighting is the job of cinematography first and foremost. Camera movements are almost always decided by the director (though how to execute them is for the cinematographer), whereas general framing and composition decisions may be a collaboration led by the director. So, to take seriously the perspective of craft practitioners is immediately to shift some terms and concepts.<br />
<br />
I don't believe this means jettisoning the role of interpretation and theory in favor of adopting the practitioners perspective. I don't teach how-to courses in film craft but rather the history of craft. They're two different things, precisely because of the perspective that film studies offers. But there is something complicated and productive in the dialogue between the two perspectives.<br />
<br />
There's a real advantage in stepping away from the focus on directorial choices. For instance, even film studies scholarship attuned to sound sometimes focus on directorial choices of sound - the juxtaposition of sound-image or the development of sonic motifs. These are important, of course, but there are so many other important aspects to sound design - the mixing of elements, the invocation of environment, the role of Foley and ADR, and the invocation of sonic space. It's not the discipline is ignorant of these - and there are some great sound studies scholars focusing on these very things. This scholarship in fact shows that once we take these craft decisions as the starting point, we look at films differently.<br />
<br />
I call this the <i>granularity</i> of textual analysis. It's somewhere beneath the level of broad patterns but above the base line of technical rendering. After all, it's useful to a point to learn how a technological innovation led to fidelity in sound recording, but if every film afterward uses that innovation then it doesn't help illuminate a given text. Rather, we can look at the ways that practitioners activate the technology to aesthetic ends, but also how their aesthetic expression is a problem solving around the constraints of the technology.<br />
<br />
This is an idea that I'm developing in my research, but it's also a principle in how I guide student engagement with the films. My students can be very knowledgeable about their medium, and I learn about sound technology or digital cameras or creative process from them. I think they feel a tension between the auteurist focus on the director and the execution-model of below-the-line work.<br />
<br />Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-37177516369498199042019-10-09T12:09:00.000-07:002019-11-15T01:55:20.097-08:00Conference Roundup Winter 19-20Here is my current list of English-language conferences of interest to those in film studies (and some for TV and media studies). Upcoming conferences are listed in order by date or, for open calls, by abstract due date. Please let me know if I should add anything.<br />
<br />
<b>Current calls:</b><br />
due date: 11 October 2019 <b>Doing Women's Film & Television History V </b>conference - Maynooth University, Ireland, 20-22 May 2020 [<a href="https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/doingwomensfilmandtvhistoryV/call-papers">call</a>]<br />
due date: 15 October 2019 <b>International Society for the Study of Narrative</b> - New Orleans, 5-8 March 2020 [<a href="https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5ba7cc4ef8135a1d5292f58e/t/5c9e3cabe5e5f0ada728e497/1553874127643/Narrative+2020+CFP.pdf">call</a>]<br />
due date: 22 October 2019 <b>Reframing Film Festivals: Histories, Economies, Cultures</b> - Venice, 11-12 February 2020 (history strand) / Bari, 25-26 March 2020 (economy strand) [<a href="http://www.filmfestivalresearch.org/index.php/cfp-reframing-film-festivals-histories-economies-cultures/">call</a>]<br />
due date: 1 November 2019 <b>ICA</b> Gold Coast, Australia, 21-25 May 2020 [<a href="https://cdn.ymaws.com/www.icahdq.org/resource/resmgr/conference/2020/2020theme.pdf">call</a>]<br />
due date: 29 November 2019 <b>HoMER Network</b> - Dublin (sponsor: Maynooth University) 25-27 May 2020 [<a href="http://homernetwork.org/2020-conference-cfp/">call</a>]<br />
<div>
due date: 19 November 2019 <b>Orphan Film Symposium</b> - EYE Filmmuseum, Amsterdam, 23-27 May 2020, topic: "Water, Climate, & Migration" [<a href="https://wp.nyu.edu/orphanfilm/2019/09/04/cfp/">call</a>]</div>
<div>
due date: 15 December 2019<b> Screenwriting Research Network</b> conference - Oxford Brookes University (UK), 9-12 September 2020 [<a href="https://screenwritingresearch.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2019/10/SRN2020-Call-for-Papers.pdf">call</a>]</div>
<div>
due date: 15 December 2019<b> Society for Cognitive Studies of the Moving Image (SCSMI)</b> - Grand Rapids, Michigan, 17-20 June 2020 [<a href="http://scsmi-online.org/conference">call</a>]</div>
<div>
due date: 5 January 2020 <b>Screen</b> - Univ of Glasgow, 26-28 June 2020, theme: decolonising, de-centring, or de-Westernising established creative canons [<a href="https://www.gla.ac.uk/research/az/screen/conference/">website</a>]</div>
<div>
due date: 31 January 2020 <b>NECS</b> - Palermo, Italy, 18-20 June 2020 [<a href="https://necs.org/">website</a>]<br />
due date: 3 February 2020 <b>Humor in America Conference</b> - University of Texas at Austin, 18-20 June 2020 [<a href="https://humorinamericaconference.wordpress.com/">call</a>] </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<b>Closed calls:</b><br />
<b>SCMS</b> - Denver, April 1-5, 2020 [<a href="https://www.cmstudies.org/page/conference">website</a>]<br />
<b>MLA </b>2020 - Seattle [<a href="https://www.mla.org/">website</a>]<br />
<div>
<b>American Comparative Literature Association - </b>Chicago, 19-22 March 2020</div>
<div>
<b>Film and History conference</b> - Madison, Wisconsin, 13-17 November 2019</div>
<b>Literature/Film Association</b> conference - Portland State University, Oregon, 12-14 September 2019<br />
<b>Celebrity Studies conference</b> - University of Winchester (UK), 18-20 June 2020<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Upcoming calls:</b><br />
<b>UFVA </b>- Florida State University, Tallahassee, 27-30 July 2020 [<a href="https://spark.adobe.com/page/48MhkYxIE5Nem/">website</a>]<br />
<div>
<b>Visible Evidence XXVII</b> - Frankfurt, 15-19 December 2020 [<a href="https://www.visibleevidence.org/">website</a>]</div>
<div>
<b>Visible Evidence XXVIII </b>- Gdansk, Poland, summer 2021<br />
<b>International Society for the Study of Narrative</b> - University of Chichester (UK), 16-19 June 2021 March [<a href="http://narrative.georgetown.edu/conferences/index.php#future">website</a>]</div>
Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-1965188566486424952019-10-09T06:53:00.001-07:002019-10-13T19:14:58.491-07:00Teaching the History of Film Craft (pt. 4)<b>Teaching the History of Film Craft:</b><br />
<b><br />The Craft Auteur Research Project</b><br />
<br />
Fourth in a series of posts about teaching the history of below-the-line film artists (cinematographers, sound designers, etc.) and of screenwriting.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-1.html">Part 1 introductory post</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-2.html">Part 2 scholarly books </a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-3.html">Part 3 video resources</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-4.html">Part 4 student research projects</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-5.html">Part 5 the theory of craft</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-6.html">Part 6 limitations</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-7.html">Part 7 Syllabi </a><br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
Since I teach the history of film craft courses as upper-level undergraduate writing seminars, the students' research projects form a major part of my pedagogy.<br />
<br />
Each semester I have students pick one practitioner of their choice (cinematographer, sound designer, or screenwriter) and develop an extended research project that examines trade press coverage, relevant secondary scholarship, and at least three films of the artist to provide context for her/his work.<br />
<br />
Students share their research, either in paper workshops or in class presentations, so the studies become a way for the class as a whole (including me) can learn more about the history of the given craft.<br />
<br />
I'm generally not an auteurist, and there are definitely some problems with picking out one individual for cinematography, sound, etc. But focusing on one practitioner asks students - and us as a class - tor reflect on how others beyond the directors may be responsible for a film's artistic vision and final product. "Craft" is often juxtaposed to "art" but the research projects show the interconnection of these ideas in a studio system.<br />
<br />
I may impose restrictions on their choice - for instance, only one student per artist, no uber-famous people like Walter Murch, or no screenwriters who also direct their screenplays - but I do want them to follow their own interests and find a project that will be useful for their own development as filmmakers.<br />
<br />
Partly because of the specific context of our writing-intensive classes, this larger project may entail smaller assignments: an annotated bibliography, a précis, or a shorter paper responding to primary or secondary research.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.mediahistoryproject.org/">The Media History Project</a> is an invaluable first stop for trade press materials prior to 1965. It compiles links to publicly available digitized trade press periodicals, from general news like <i>Variety</i> to technical journals. The runs of <i>American Cinematographer </i>and <i>Journal of the Society of Motion Picture Engineers</i> are particularly useful. Additionally, The Media History Project provides data visualization tools (Arclight and Lantern) that can help students make new discoveries in the resources.<br />
<br />
Screenwriting is not a technical area, but I direct students to production memos where available. (To my knowledge, Rudy Behlmer's compilations of 20th-Fox, WB, and Selznick memos are the main book compilations.) Many of the <a href="http://digitalcollections.oscars.org/cdm/landingpage/collection/p15759coll30">Production Code Administration files</a> are not digitized and online. These alone would make the good basis for a research assignment. For the original screenplays, my library subscribes to <a href="https://alexanderstreet.com/products/film-scripts-online-series">Alexander Street Press's collection</a>, which I use to find scripts for the syllabus, too. <a href="http://www.script-o-rama.com/snazzy/dircut.html">Drew's Script-O-Rama</a> provides a great database of more recent film and TV scripts.<br />
<br />
There are a few websites helpful for bibliographic research:<br />
<br />
- <a href="http://filmsound.org/">FilmSound.org</a><br />
- <a href="https://screenwritingresearch.com/">Screenwriting Research Network</a><br />
<br />
These can serve as as the springboard for students' research projects, too.<br />
<br />
One challenge students face is that unless they pick a particularly famous artist, like James Wong Howe or Alan Splet, they won't find too much scholarly material on their person. Pre-1965, even non-scholarly material on below-the-line artists is hard to come by. So I do need to work with them to suggest ways to find material that helps with their project even if it's not about X or Y person. (This <a href="https://medium.com/@tonyszhou/postmortem-1b338537fabc">Tony Zhou and Taylor Ramos essay</a> on their video essay process is a nice argument for old fashioned research, even for production.)<br />
<br />
For students working on non-US artists, it's trickier. I often let them do primary research on some aspect of the American context, since the trade press resources will be there for this - and to use secondary sources for their artist.<br />
<br />
I want to develop/strengthen research skills, so I do not wish to spoon feed students sources. But I do find that providing a working list of possible sources helps them and produces a better final paper.<br />
<br />
History is important to me. The premise of the course is that we gain a deeper knowledge of the medium by looking at its history, but students' natural inclination, for the most part, is to pick a recent or contemporary practitioner. So I may have two assignments, one pre-1970 and one post-1970 (other dates would work of course). One will be the larger research project, but they are still engaging with some material from the studio era.Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-22203480637851258092019-10-08T04:18:00.002-07:002019-10-13T19:15:09.025-07:00Teaching the History of Film Craft (pt. 3)<b>Teaching the History of Film Craft:</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Video Resources</b><br />
<br />
Third part in a series of posts about teaching the history of below-the-line film artists (cinematographers, sound designers, etc.) and of screenwriting.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-1.html">Part 1 introductory post</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-2.html">Part 2 scholarly books </a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-3.html">Part 3 video resources</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-4.html">Part 4 student research projects</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-5.html">Part 5 the theory of craft</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-6.html">Part 6 limitations</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-7.html">Part 7 Syllabi </a><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
I generally don't like outsourcing my teaching to videos, but when it comes to craft, audiovisual materials provide a valuable supplement.<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Special Recommendation</b><br />
<a href="https://www.cinema.ucla.edu/support/century-of-sound-1">Century of Sound</a>: This is a historically rigorous compendium of (often rare) sound cinema clips with explanation about the development of sound technology for cinema. A DVD set covers 1876-1932, and a Blu Ray set covers 1933-1975. They're not available commercially because of rights issues, but educators can write to request a copy. Even those teaching a general film history class will find the set worth getting alone for parts covering the development of talking pictures.<br />
<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Pedagogical and Historical Documentaries</b><br />
There are a number of documentaries about film craft, often made for a general audience. They can adopt popular history narratives, which scholars may at times find limiting, or worse. But they can be useful to introduce students to the topic or to raise historiographic issues about popular history.<br />
<br />
<u>Cinematography</u><br />
<i>Visions of Light</i><br />
<i>Cinematographer Style </i>[largely interviews]<br />
<i>Side by Side </i>[on digital cinema]<br />
<i>Women Behind the Camera</i><br />
<i>James Wong Howe: Cinematographer</i><br />
<i>Cameraman: The Life and Work of Jack Cardiff </i><br />
<i>Writing with Light: Vittorio Storaro</i><br />
<i>Light Keeps Me Company </i>[on Sven Nykvist]<br />
<i>In the Mood for Doyle</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<u>Screenwriting</u><br />
<i>Tales from the Script</i><br />
<i>Showrunners: The Art of Running a TV Show</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<u>Editing</u><br />
<i>The Cutting Edge - The Magic of Movie Editing</i><br />
<i>Off the Tracks </i>[on nonlinear editing]<br />
<i>Jill Bilcock: Dancing The Invisible</i><br />
<i>Murch: Walter Murch on Editing</i><br />
<br />
<u>Production Design</u><br />
<i>Masters of Production: The Hidden Art of Hollywood</i><br />
<br />
<u>Film Music</u><br />
<i>Sound of Cinema: The Music That Made the Movies </i><br />
<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Essay Films</b><br />
There are some films that essayistic or experimental methods to comment specifically on film craft.<br />
<br />
<i>Cameraperson </i>- Kirsten Johnson's theoretical reflection on documentary camerawork<br />
<i>Interface</i>/<i>Schnittstelle</i> - Harun Farocki's essay film on editing<br />
<i>Where Does Your Hidden Smile Lie? </i>- Pedro Costa portrait of Straub and Huillet's editing<br />
<i>Man With a Movie Camera</i> - needs no explanation, but useful as meta essay on film editing<br />
<i>Los Angeles Plays Itself </i>- little about craft but a sustained examination of shooting location<br />
<i>Hacked Circuit </i>- Deborah Stratman's short experimental piece about Foley and <i>The Conversation</i><br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Video Essays</b><br />
Videographic criticism has developed as a popular and academic form. I've barely dipped my toes into the waters here, but a lot of video essays deal with material relevant for a film craft course.<br />
<br />
Tony Zhou and Taylor Ramos's <a href="https://vimeo.com/channels/everyframeapainting/page:5">Every Frame a Painting</a> series is well researched and engaging. Relevant videos include<br />
<ul>
<li>Hollywood Scores and Soundtracks</li>
<li>How Does an Editor Think?</li>
<li>Satoshi Kon - Editing Time and Space</li>
</ul>
<a href="https://vimeo.com/user41751682">Patrick Keating</a> has excellent essays, including on <a href="https://vimeo.com/148305036">1920s camera movement</a>, <a href="https://vimeo.com/275646845">neorealist lighting</a>, and <a href="https://vimeo.com/268916255">Marlene Dietrich's star lighting</a>.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://vimeo.com/user5964895">Liz Greene's essays</a> are astute on sound design.<br />
<br />
David Bordwell's <a href="https://vimeo.com/64644113">video lecture on widescreen</a> is probably too long (50+ minutes) for easy classroom use without excerpting, but it contains good technical explanation and examination of film examples.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://mediacommons.org/intransition/">InTransition journal </a>has a number of relevant videos, including<br />
<a href="http://mediacommons.org/intransition/2018/05/02/suffering-rhythm">Padraic Killeen</a> on melody in film noir<br />
<a href="http://mediacommons.org/intransition/sound-hanna-barbera">Patrick Sullivan</a> on sound in Hanna Barbera animation<br />
<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Other</b><br />
I have not begun to catalog these, but practitioner interviews may be available beyond the compilation documentaries above. Additionally YouTube has video lectures from practitioners.<br />
<br />
Similarly, DVD commentary tracks often include commentary from editors, sound designers, or cinematographers.Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-80188598082188549172019-10-07T11:28:00.000-07:002019-10-13T19:15:22.406-07:00Teaching the History of Film Craft (pt. 2)<b>Teaching the History of Film Craft:</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>The Scholarship</b><br />
<br />
Second in a series of posts<br />
<br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-1.html">Part 1 introductory post</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-2.html">Part 2 scholarly books </a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-3.html">Part 3 video resources</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-4.html">Part 4 student research projects</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-5.html">Part 5 the theory of craft</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-6.html">Part 6 limitations</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-7.html">Part 7 Syllabi </a><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZkGGUeh0b0fbm47yKIXCHs92pkxeOQq580_ikLsXu08IG-ZM1RIrXI1FwI0SzM1Oea4SApcHweqLlYKmcmHdawEMjkMJhZ0PQkuwIwuzFXy6cVaT4Ot55oItk4z7Q4mZwOiCbVw/s1600/book1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="232" data-original-width="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZkGGUeh0b0fbm47yKIXCHs92pkxeOQq580_ikLsXu08IG-ZM1RIrXI1FwI0SzM1Oea4SApcHweqLlYKmcmHdawEMjkMJhZ0PQkuwIwuzFXy6cVaT4Ot55oItk4z7Q4mZwOiCbVw/s1600/book1.jpg" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiP80tUlIOoCDYMhijn2A_o0mJsCyk9QhtD5w5g3aZ62Yp6YN3jYdJoZtWR636TqpqTPRXFmFrvisca4VbxaweWa2bPKweb2H6uKNuorKI1Uj4g4ub10-u4CFCZFZcFHJu7fhAYg/s1600/book2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="231" data-original-width="161" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiP80tUlIOoCDYMhijn2A_o0mJsCyk9QhtD5w5g3aZ62Yp6YN3jYdJoZtWR636TqpqTPRXFmFrvisca4VbxaweWa2bPKweb2H6uKNuorKI1Uj4g4ub10-u4CFCZFZcFHJu7fhAYg/s1600/book2.jpg" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVuw6oxcEDvsovgcUU40kP9EpGrb3ADAhAoToqNBFwlyCvWlOY4m_ZiueTuEZoM7KLsAhOurLwxaQCY96otrRASagN1x57sXHLIsxEEZBEhLGoWysv4drHL-iaT1ecm6w8m_6zBQ/s1600/book3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="231" data-original-width="154" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVuw6oxcEDvsovgcUU40kP9EpGrb3ADAhAoToqNBFwlyCvWlOY4m_ZiueTuEZoM7KLsAhOurLwxaQCY96otrRASagN1x57sXHLIsxEEZBEhLGoWysv4drHL-iaT1ecm6w8m_6zBQ/s1600/book3.jpg" /></a></div>
<br />
As I mentioned in my first post, my main inspiration for teaching film craft has been the terrific scholarship in areas that I've been interested in. Not to take away from foundational studies, but over the last decade there has been a wave of good monographs on film craft.<br />
<br />
I don't have the time or space to compile full bibliographies here, and I've left off essays, unfortunately. Rather, I wish to suggest books that may serve as building blocks for a course syllabus or that could inspire a course. The list can also serve as a kernel for a bibliography for students in film history courses.<br />
<br />
The list below focuses on scholarly histories on film craft. I've bracketed theory (or related topics like star studies) for the moment, even though something like Michel Chion's work on sound could be an important addition to a sound course. Also, I'm omitting interviews, popular histories, trade press sources, and production-oriented books, though these are important for research projects.<br />
<br />
The ones with an asterisk are ones I've used in a class, either in part or whole.<br />
<br />
<b><a href="https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/search-list?series=behind-the-silver-screen-series">Behind the Silver Screen Series</a> </b>(Rutgers UP)<br />
I'd particularly recommend this series as a starting point. They're all organized chronologically with each essay tackling a different part of Hollywood history. The bibliography of each also points to useful resources. (And I'm in one of them, as disclosure.)<br />
<br />
<i>Acting</i> - Claudia Springer, Julie Levinson, eds.<br />
<i>Animation</i> - Scott Curtis, ed.<br />
<i>Art Direction and Production Design</i> - Lucy Fischer, ed.<br />
<i>Cinematography</i> - Patrick Keating, ed. *<br />
<i>Costume, Makeup, and Hair</i> - Adrienne L. McLean, ed.<br />
<i>Directing</i> - Virginia Wright Wexman, ed.<br />
<i>Editing and Special/Visual Effects</i> - Charlie Keil, Kristen Whissel, eds.<br />
<i>Producing </i>- Jon Lewis, ed.<br />
<i>Sound: Dialogue, Music, and Effect</i>s - Kathryn Kalinak, ed. *<br />
<i>Screenwriting</i> - Andrew Horton, Julian Hoxter, ed. *<br />
<br />
<b>General books</b><br />
Barry Salt, <i>Film Style and Technology *</i><br />
David Bordwell, Janet Staiger and Kristin Thompson, <i>Classical Hollywood Cinema *</i><br />
Steve Neale, ed., <i>The Classical Hollywood Reader *</i><br />
Erin Hill, <i>Never Done: A History of Women's Work in Media Production </i><br />
John Gibbs and Douglas Pye, eds. <i>Style and Meaning: Studies in the Detailed Analysis of Film</i><br />
<br />
<b>Cinematography</b><br />
Patrick Keating, <i>Hollywood Lighting from the Silent Era to Film Noir *</i><br />
Patrick Keating, <i>The Dynamic Frame: Camera Movement in Classical Hollywood Cinema</i><br />
Lindsay Coleman; Daisuke Miyao; Roberto Schaefer, eds. <i>Transnational Cinematography Studies *</i><br />
Joshua Yumibe, <i>Moving Color: Early Film, Mass Culture, Modernism</i><br />
Scott Higgins, <i>Harnessing the Technicolor Rainbow *</i><br />
Richard Misek, <i>Chromatic Cinema *</i><br />
Christopher Beach, <i>A Hidden History of Film Style</i><br />
Frances Guerin, <i>A Culture of Light: Cinema and Technology in 1920s Germany</i><br />
Daisuke Miyao, <i>The Aesthetics of Shadow: Lighting and Japanese Cinema *</i><br />
John Belton , Sheldon Hall, et al. <i>Widescreen Worldwide *</i><br />
Nick Hall, <i>The Zoom: Drama at the Touch of a Lever</i><br />
Todd Rainsberger, <i>James Wong Howe *</i><br />
Harper Cossar, <i>Letterboxed: The Evolution of Widescreen Cinema </i><br />
<br />
<b>Sound Design</b><br />
Donald Crafton, <i>The Talkies </i><br />
Helen Hanson, <i>Hollywood Soundscapes: Film Sound Style, Craft and Production in the Classical Era </i><br />
Jay Beck, <i>Designing Sound: Audiovisual Aesthetics in 1970s American Cinema </i><br />
Jay Beck and Tony Grajeda, eds.,<i> Lowering the Boom: Critical Studies in Film Sound</i><br />
Mark Kerins, <i>Beyond Dolby (Stereo): Cinema in the Digital Sound Age *</i><br />
Lilya Kaganovsky and Masha Salazkina, eds., <i>Sound, Speech, Music in Soviet and Post-Soviet Cinema</i><br />
Vlad Dima, <i>Sonic Space in Djibril Diop Mambety's Films</i><br />
<br />
<b>Screenwriting</b><br />
Steven Price, <i>A History of the Screenplay *</i><br />
Miranda Banks,<i> The Writers: A History of American Screenwriters and Their Guild</i><br />
Douglas Hell, <i>Prime-Time Authorship: Works about and by Three TV Dramatists *</i><br />
Rosanne Welch, <i>When Women Wrote Hollywood: Essays on Female Screenwriters in the Early Film Industry</i><br />
<br />
<b>Film Music</b><br />
Claudia Gorbman, <i>Unheard Melodies: Narrative Film Music</i><br />
Jeff Smith, <i>The Sounds of Commerce</i><br />
Kathryn Kalinak, <i>Film Music: A Very Short Introduction</i><br />
David Neumeyer, <i>The Oxford Handbook of Film Music Studies</i><br />
Kevin Donnelly, <i>The Spectre of Sound: Music in Film and Television</i><br />
David Schroeder, <i>Hitchcock's Ear: Music and the Director's Art</i><br />
<br />
<b>Acting</b><br />
James Naremore, <i>Acting in the Cinema</i><br />
Scott Balcerzack, <i>Beyond Method: Stella Adler and the Male Actor</i><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Special Effects</b><br />
Lisa Bode,<i> Making Believe: Screen Performance and Special Effects in Popular Cinema</i><br />
Julie Turnock, <i>Plastic Reality: Special Effects, Technology, and the Emergence of 1970s Blockbuster Aesthetics</i><br />
<br />
<b>Production Design/Location</b><br />
Joshua Gleich, Lawrence Webb, eds. <i>Hollywood on Location: An Industry History</i><br />
R. Barton Palmer, <i>Shot on Location: Postwar American Cinema and the Exploration of Real Place</i><br />
Daniel Steinhart, <i>Runaway Hollywood: Internationalizing Postwar Production and Location Shooting</i><br />
<br />
Unfortunately some areas like editing and art direction are still underrepresented. And the scholarship is <b>much</b> stronger on Hollywood cinema than on other cinemas. But it's exciting to see so much great scholarship emerging in these areas of film history.Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-86706823329246545072019-10-07T08:11:00.001-07:002019-10-13T19:15:34.072-07:00Teaching the History of Film Craft (pt. 1)<div>
First in a series of posts:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-1.html">Part 1 introductory post</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-2.html">Part 2 scholarly books </a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-3.html">Part 3 video resources</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-4.html">Part 4 student research projects</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-5.html">Part 5 the theory of craft</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-6.html">Part 6 limitations</a><br />
<a href="https://categoryd.blogspot.com/2019/10/teaching-history-of-film-craft-pt-7.html">Part 7 Syllabi </a><br />
<br />
<br />
This blog has lain fallow as I've put more time and focus into my <a href="http://festivaldocumentary.com/">documentary blogging</a>. But I do plan to keep posting conference updates and calls for papers and to post on broader disciplinary issues.<br />
<br />
One topic I've been meaning to write on is my experience teaching on the history of film craft. I've been teaching a series of upper-level undergraduate courses along these lines: History of Cinematography, History of Sound Design, and History of Screenwriting.<br />
<br />
I've been lucky enough to have students - majors who are (mostly) filmmakers and mediamakers - with a fairly deep knowledge of the medium. The courses are meant to bridge historical and theoretical scholarship with their practical concerns as makers. This is certainly not the only pedagogical approach in a production-oriented film department, but I do think it can be an effective one. I have students who are aspiring cinematographers, editors, sound workers, screenwriters, etc. but who lack a deep history of their chosen profession. I have found they really appreciate gaining this knowledge. And I've been able to get curricular space for these specialized courses as part of our junior/senior writing seminar requirement.<br />
<br />
The topics are self-explanatory, and I think at a fundamental level it's simply worth going through the history of cinema over a semester with an eye to a particular aesthetic element, such as sound or narrative construction. Film history surveys introduce some of this but these classes allow us to go more in depth.<br />
<br />
But I approach these classes with a more specific agenda. For me, history of craft engages with a few overlapping questions. First, except for screenwriting, it dives into the history of technology. I don't expect students to know everything about the technology, especially antiquated technologies. I'm not a deep expert myself. But it's vital to know something about film stocks, or magnetic tape developments, to appreciate the craft in question.<br />
<br />
Second, the history of craft examines, at least as much is feasible, examines the industrial developments which foster the craft. This means studio economics (in the case of Hollywood especially) but also the sociology of how crafts function as a trade and production culture.<br />
<br />
Third, craft asks to engage with films differently. I'll discuss more later, but obviously one reason we want to study technology and industry is to understand the art better. And I think we do with a more granular attention to craft.<br />
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This is the schematic chart I often use at the start of the semester. This threeway relationship guides the syllabus.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeN7u_6W7W7EFxNEcyHOH2FN715FyMY_NPZeJbEgchB72De4Krj-39UB3c_OXg7RtnEhwSl9_6_L3H-v7u-PVjaUujwwY5Hn2yv4ues-N_wcD39RS6cge-a_A2qiPt0VTNNWXAjw/s1600/craft.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1117" data-original-width="1600" height="444" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeN7u_6W7W7EFxNEcyHOH2FN715FyMY_NPZeJbEgchB72De4Krj-39UB3c_OXg7RtnEhwSl9_6_L3H-v7u-PVjaUujwwY5Hn2yv4ues-N_wcD39RS6cge-a_A2qiPt0VTNNWXAjw/s640/craft.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
None of this is particularly new for those who are researching these areas. In fact, my inspiration for teaching these classes is the recent wave of scholarship in the history of sound design, cinematography, and screenwriting. I'll cover these books and articles in another post. But suffice to say for now that when I first taught the history of cinematography class, I had to cobble together scholarly sources for the syllabus. Now I would have enough for three semesters worth easily.<br />
<br />
But my pitch for those who are not specialists in the history of craft is how rewarding these courses can be to teach, particularly in the context of a production department. Ultimately I'd like to add a History of Editing class to our offerings, and of course there are other possibilities: acting, art direction, costuming - even direction or producing. A colleague of mine has started a course on special effects.<br />
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In future posts I will continue to reflect on what these courses do and can do - and to share my experience in them. I welcome your feedback and suggestions, especially since I'm always looking for new inspiration.<br />
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Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-29524894557086296052019-02-21T08:28:00.002-08:002019-02-21T08:53:22.669-08:00Conference roundup Spring 2019Spring is the slow season for film studies conferences. Here is my current list of English-language conferences of interest to those in film studies (and some for TV and media studies). Upcoming conferences are listed in order by date or, for open calls, by abstract due date. Please let me know if I should add anything.<br />
<br />
<u>Current calls:</u><br />
due date: 28 February 2019 <b>MLA 2020 </b>- Seattle [<a href="https://www.mla.org/Convention/Planning-a-Convention-Session/Calls-for-Papers">call</a>]<br />
<div>
due date: 1 March 2019 <b>Small Cinemas Conference </b>- Lisbon, 25-27 September 2019 [<a href="https://smallcinemassmallspaces.wordpress.com/cfp/">call</a>]<br />
due date: ?? <span style="font-weight: normal;">UFVA </span>- Augsburg University, Minneapolis, 30 July - 2 August 2019 [<a href="https://ufva.site-ym.com/" style="font-weight: normal;">website</a>]</div>
<u><br /></u>
<u>Closed calls:</u><br />
<b>SCMS </b>- Seattle, 13-17 March 2019<br />
<b>Action Cinema Now</b> - Reading/London, 12-14 April 2019 [<a href="http://categoryd.blogspot.com/2018/09/cfp-action-cinema-now-conference.html">call</a>]<br />
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<b>ICA 2019 </b>Washington, DC, 24-28 May 2019 [<a href="https://www.icahdq.org/page/2019CFP">call</a>]</div>
<div>
<div>
</div>
</div>
<b style="font-family: lora, serif;">HoMER Network</b><span style="font-family: "lora" , serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "lora" , serif;">- University of the Bahamas, Nassau, 26-28 June, 2019 [</span><a href="http://categoryd.blogspot.com/2018/09/cfp-homer-conference-2019.html" style="font-family: lora, serif;">call</a><span style="font-family: "lora" , serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "lora" , serif;">|</span><span style="font-family: "lora" , serif;"> </span><a href="http://homernetwork.org/" style="font-family: lora, serif;">website</a><span style="font-family: "lora" , serif;">]</span><br />
<div>
<b>Visible Evidence XXVI</b> - USC, Los Angeles, 24-28 July 2019 [<a href="http://www.visibleevidence.org/conference/visible-evidence-xxvi/#call_for_proposals">call</a>]<br />
<b>Orphan Film Symposium </b>- Austrian Film Museum, Vienna, 7-8 June 2019, topic: "Radicals" [<a href="http://www.nyu.edu/orphanfilm/">call</a>]<br />
<b>Society for Cognitive Studies of the Moving Image (SCSMI)</b> - Universität Hamburg, 12-15 June 2019 [<a href="http://scsmi-online.org/conference">call</a>]<br />
<b>NECS</b> - Gdansk, Poland, 13-15 June, 2019 [<a href="http://necs.org/">website</a>]<br />
<b>Screen</b> - Univ of Glasgow, 28-30 June 2019, topic: "Screen Studies Beyond the Field" [<a href="https://www.gla.ac.uk/research/az/screen/conference/">website</a>]<br />
<b>Global Colour and the Moving Image</b> conference - Univ of Bristol, 10-12 July 2019 [<a href="https://eastmancolor.info/conference/">call</a>]<br />
<b>American Comparative Literature Association</b>, Georgetown Univ, Washington DC, March 7th-10th, 2019<br />
<b>Screenwriting Research Network</b> conference, Porto, 12-14 September 2019 [<a href="https://screenwritingresearch.com/">website</a>]</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<u>Upcoming calls:</u><br />
<b>Orphan Film Symposium</b> - EYE Netherlands Filmmuseum, Amsterdam, 23-26 May 2020<br />
<div>
<b>SCMS </b>- Denver, 2020<br />
<b>Visible Evidence XXVII </b>- Frankfurt, December 2020</div>
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</div>
Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-42851472583929289842018-09-29T06:15:00.000-07:002018-09-29T06:15:03.430-07:00CFP: HoMER Conference 2019CALL FOR PAPERS<br />
<br />
<b>HoMER 2019 Conference </b><br />
<b>Anchoring New Cinema History </b><br />
<br />
The University of the Bahamas<br />
Nassau, The Bahamas<br />
26–28 June 2019<br />
<br />
Deadline for proposals, 15 November 2018<br />
Letters of acceptance/rejection, 1 December 2018<br />
<br />
<br />
The <a href="http://homernetwork.org/">HoMER Network</a> (History of Moviegoing, Exhibition and Reception) invites submissions for general paper entries, as well as a designated roundtable, panels, and workshops to be presented at the 2019 conference.<br />
<br />
New Cinema History, as an approach focusing “on the circulation and consumption of film” and examining “cinema as a site of social and cultural exchange" (Richard Maltby, 2011) has turned out to be very productive. It brought together both young and veteran scholars who believed that it was more fruitful writing film history with an eye for the social, economic and geographical aspects of cinema cultures, than merely an art history of the moving image or a critical reading of films. At the last HoMER@NECS conference in Amsterdam, members of the panel ‘New Cinema History: What’s Next?’ called for more theoretical and methodological grounding of our research. In the Homer 2019 conference Anchoring New Cinema History we would like to start answering that call. Presentations are welcome to critically explore the conference theme of Anchoring New Cinema History through the interdisciplinary lens of academic Film and Cinema Studies, Social Geography, Memory Studies and Economic History, etc.<br />
<br />
Since its beginning the HoMER network has been instrumental in bringing together researchers working in the New Cinema History tradition, not just as a platform to present their work but also as place to meet colleagues to collaborate with. In the upcoming HoMER conference we propose to stress the network function of HoMER, both in welcoming young scholars as in creating interdisciplinary opportunities for collaborative work. The 2019 HoMER conference aims to exploit the established strong connections of people, and places the HoMER network can offer, in order to invite new and old members to engage in new collaborative research. This will be articulated in two main streams:<br />
<br />
The SPACES and PLACES stream of the conference (either pre-constituted panels or individual papers) will aim to investigate the geography of cinema. This can be expressed both through the exploration of familiar and new spaces of cinemas, such as cinema theatres but also pop-up cinemas, community cinemas, and virtual cinemas. It will also include both well researched geographical areas and new territories and locations, such as South and Central America, Africa, Central Asia and South-East Asia. These new uncharted territories will be of great value on their own to reconnoitre the position of different countries in relation to cinema practices. They will also provide connections and comparisons with existing body of work on Europe, America, Canada and Australia.<br />
<br />
By looking at this extended geography of cinema, possible topics and questions to explore might include (but are certainly not limited to):<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Environment, space, and place</li>
<li>Cinemas and urban transformations, transition and change</li>
<li>Cinema practices, policies and external bodies (local authorities, communities, self regulating associations)</li>
<li>Memories and topographical references</li>
</ul>
<br />
<br />
The THEORIES AND METHODOLOGIES stream of the HoMER conference (special discussion sessions and presentations) will provide an opportunity to reflect on and discuss some key areas of research within the HoMER network, with the aim of suggesting new directions in the field and developing new theoretical and methodological approaches, or reintroducing and adapting existing approaches that proved to be useful. These key areas can be suggested by members when submitting a paper proposal (or just by emailing the HoMER Co-ordinators). A dedicated session of this stream will include:<br />
<br />
Small group discussion (1 hour) on the key areas, followed by presentations (10 min) to the HoMER participants and a further discussion (20 min). Possible key areas to explore might include (but are certainly not limited to): Cinema and Memory; the Economics and business of film; Programming and film popularity; Paratextual analysis; the Digital challenge; Distribution and spreading of films; Impact of research to non-academic audiences.<br />
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Moreover, in a speed dating session, junior researchers will be given the opportunity to team up with experts to discuss their individual methodological and theoretical concerns. If you are interested in this (both juniors and experts), please email the Co-ordinators.<br />
<br />
Send abstracts of 250 to 300 words, plus 3 or 4 bibliographic entries, and a 50-word academic biography to conference co-ordinators, Clara Pafort-Overduin (c.pafort-overduin@uu.nl) and Daniela Treveri Gennari (dtreveri-gennari@brookes.ac.uk). <br />
<br />Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-46827958922225287772018-09-29T05:59:00.001-07:002018-09-29T05:59:22.901-07:00CFP: Bad ObjectsCALL FOR PAPERS<br />
<br />
<a href="https://utpress.utexas.edu/journals/the-velvet-light-trap">The Velvet Light Trap</a><br />
<br />
85th issue: Bad Objects<br />
submission date 25 January 2019<br />
<br />
The concept of a “bad object” has long been a moving target in media studies. Although the term is rarely defined with any specificity, a “bad object” is typically a text that is used in critical analysis with the implicit or explicit acknowledgement of its perceived violations of “good” taste. Excess, camp, escapism, the abject, and negotiations of the margins of mainstream culture often mark these objects. The concept is important in feminist and psychoanalytic theories, as well as in genre studies, in which it is mobilized to justify the examination of B-horror, exploitation film, or pornography, for example. The term has helped challenge hierarchies of medium specificity. For example, Michele Hilmes has written that television was treated as a “bad object” of media studies, a sentiment echoed by many other scholars. These uses of the term reflect the fact that age, class, gender, and race have often been motivating factors in the construction of evaluative canons.<br />
<br />
Yet the applications of this term have rapidly diversified in the past decade. With the increase in scholarship on new media, social media, video games, and global flows, together with greater attention to diverse identities behind/on/in front of the screen, the conversation on taste cultures has shifted significantly. This issue seeks to expand or question the boundaries and applications of the “bad object” as an analytical framework. We welcome pieces that challenge the foundations of this divide. How can we re-calibrate these and other approaches to address purported bad objects within our contemporary media landscape? Can we approach bad objects beyond the text itself in issues of production cultures, distribution, and consumption?<br />
<br />
This issue welcomes submissions that push beyond the binaries of "good" and "bad," "serious" and "ephemeral," and “high” and “low” culture, exploring some of the following themes:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Malleability of cultural hierarchies through time and place</li>
<li>Consumption of bad objects (hate-watching, “so bad it’s good,” cringe-pop, etc.)</li>
<li>Teaching with bad objects</li>
<li>Discourse as bad objects (trade press, fake news, toxic fandoms, etc.)</li>
<li>Perceptions of formats and genres as bad objects</li>
<li>Diversity of reception contexts (mainstream, cult, fan, subversive, revolutionary, and so on)</li>
<li>Definitions of “bad” in relation to queer media, gender, race, class, and ability</li>
<li>Distribution, exhibition, and transnational flow of bad objects</li>
<li>New takes on paracinema, trash, kitsch, and camp</li>
<li>Afterlife of bad objects (recirculation, remixing, preservation) </li>
</ul>
<br />
Submissions should be between 6,000 and 7,500 words, formatted in Chicago Style. Please submit an electronic copy of the paper, along with a separate one-page abstract, both saved as a Microsoft Word file. Remove any identifying information so that the submission is suitable for anonymous review. Quotations not in English should be accompanied by translations. Send electronic manuscripts and/or any questions to vltcfp@gmail.com by January 25.<br />
<br />
<br />Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-16149993162476064042018-09-26T04:35:00.001-07:002018-09-26T04:35:13.798-07:00CFP: Documentary Now! conferenceCALLS FOR PROVOCATIONS<br />
<br />
<b>Documentary Now!</b><br />
<b>Has documentary failed?</b><br />
<br />
December 15th 2018, 1-5pm <br />
BIMI, Birkbeck, University of London,<br />
<br />
proposals due 22nd October 2018<br />
<br />
Documentary has often been lauded for its ability to educate, transform, provoke, and mobilise. High cultural value and social responsibilities have been attached to documentary film and television because of its supposed real-world impact. However, with a few notable exceptions, history has shown that this promise hasn’t been achieved as hoped. Equally, methods that might have been effective in the past, may not serve in the present. What works in one culture and society might not function in others. So, at a moment when the forms of documentary are expected to intervene in the dominant consensus, it is instead imperiled in a post-truth vortex where faith in visible evidence has plummeted, audiences are increasingly siloed into social media echo chambers, and expert knowledge and the factual are increasingly undermined.<br />
<br />
We ask:<br />
<br />
What is the role of documentary today, as nationalism, authoritarianism, and neoliberalism threaten mainstream reportage? What are its possibilities and obligations when non-fiction funding, exhibition, and distribution seem increasingly oriented towards anodyne, character-driven ‘storytelling’? What is happening in the enquiry and practice of documentary in cultures outside the so-called West that have been overlooked? And what about documentary in the context of art, where the notion of failure is often something positive?<br />
<br />
Further, what are the roles of documentary scholars in this context? After a century of questioning the boundaries between documentary and fiction, of examining authenticity and ethics, of celebrating fakes, mock-documentaries and ecstatic truth, what part does documentary studies play in the normalization of post-truth and ‘alternative facts’? What ideas from philosophy, history, literature, social political sciences, and theory are failing documentary now? What are the obstacles inhibiting meaningful exchange within academia and between the academy and the public on these issues?<br />
<br />
Intentionally provocative and polemical, this focus on failure seeks to stir up urgent questions of documentary ideals, aims, processes and possibilities in the current context. Where does the past cease to serve us and what now? <br />
<br />
Event Schedule<br />
13:00-14:15 Session 1: Has documentary failed?<br />
14:30-15:45 Session 2: Has documentary studies failed?<br />
16:00-17:00 Collective discussion: How can we do better? (Inc. discussion of future events)<br />
17:00— Post-event drinks<br />
<br />
Call for Provocations<br />
Proposals are invited for short position papers for either Session 1 or Session 2 (please specify). For each session, a panel of 6 provocateurs will be chosen to lead the discussion with a 3-5-minute statement of their position (600-word position papers will be circulated in advance). The format is designed to maximise audience interaction and discussion. Keep it short and polemical.<br />
<br />
Please submit a short provocation pitch (150 words max) along with a brief bio (up to 100 words) to DocNow2018@gmail.com by 22nd October 2018.<br />
<br />
About Documentary Now!<br />
Documentary Now! an annual conference held in London between 2008-2014, returns in conjunction with the Documentary Special Interest group of the British Association of Film, Television and Screen Studies to investigate and interrogate contemporary issues in documentary around the world and across platforms. Events will explore traditional and alternative formats of exchange (e.g. conference papers, workshops, roundtables, film screenings and discussions, filmmaker talks) in the pursuit of lively, generative and inclusive discussion.<br />
<br />
Plans for the future of Documentary Now! will be tabled at this first event and all interested parties are invited to join in this discussion.<br />
<br />
Steering Committee: Bella Honess Roe (University of Surrey), Alisa Lebow (University of Sussex), Silke Panse (University for the Creative Arts), Leshu Torchin (St. Andrews), Kiki Tianqi YuChris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-60474473669934059422018-09-26T04:30:00.000-07:002018-09-26T04:30:19.311-07:00CFP: Investigating Contemporary Western Gay Cinema conferenceCALL FOR PAPERS<br />
<br />
<b>Straight to the Front Row: </b><br />
<b>Investigating Contemporary Western Gay Cinema</b><br />
<br />
University of Northampton (UK)<br />
16-17 February 2019<br />
<br />
Abstracts due: Monday 5 November 2018<br />
<br />
Confirmed Keynotes:<br />
Prof. Richard Dyer (King’s College London, UK)<br />
Dr. Andrew Moor (Manchester Metropolitan University, UK)<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<br />
From <i>Weekend</i> (dir. Andrew Haigh, 2011) to <i>Call me By Your Name </i>(dir. Luca Guadagnino, 2017), from <i>God’s Own Country </i>(dir. Francis Lee, 2017) to <i>Moonlight</i> (dir. Barry Jenkins, 2016) and <i>Love, Simon</i> (dir. Greg Berlanti, 2018), contemporary Western gay cinema has endured a shift in both representational strategies and a boom in popularity within both mainstream and independent spheres, since 2010. Prior to 2010, there have been Western gay films that have been significant in either their representations or their popularity (ranging from New Queer Cinema to films such as <i>Brokeback Mountain</i> [dir. Ang Lee, 2005]), however, Western gay films since 2010 have: gained (mass) attention within hegemonic spheres of success such as the Academy Awards and the BAFTAs, infiltrated a plethora of genres from the Teen (Young Adult) Film to the Erotic Thriller and Romantic Drama, adopted realist strategies to try and ‘represent a more visceral and complex experience that queers undergo in the modern world’ (Winterton 2017: 48), and some have begun to (further) investigate intersectionalities of age, class, race and sexuality.<br />
<br />
This two-day conference aims to investigate both independent and mainstream Western gay cinema, and its many facets and iterations. Being an interdisciplinary event, we welcome contributions from postgraduate researchers, early career academics and established scholars, from Film, Media, and Cultural Studies more broadly. For the purpose of this conference, ‘contemporary’ connotes new and modern gay films, and therefore discussion and analysis should focus on films released since 2010. Moreover, while what constitutes ‘Western cinema’ or the ‘Western world’ is a much-debated topic, by ‘Western’ we mean films that are produced and released in Europe and North America.<br />
<br />
<br />
We welcome abstracts that centre on, but are not limited to the following in direct relation to contemporary Western gay cinema:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Representations of gay identity</li>
<li>Space, place, temporalities and time</li>
<li>Genre, ideology and iconography</li>
<li>Representations of sex and/or intimacy</li>
<li>Representations of love and/or romance</li>
<li>Stylistic and narrative techniques (representational strategies)</li>
<li>Analysis of critical and commercial reception of contemporary Western gay films</li>
<li>Gay audiences, fans and fandom</li>
<li>Intersectionality (age, race, class, gender, sexuality etc.)</li>
<li>The relationship between mainstream and independent gay filmmaking practices</li>
<li>The relationship between contemporary Western gay cinema more specifically, and contemporary ‘queer’ cinema more broadly</li>
<li>Contemporary Western gay films and their place in Queer Film Festivals</li>
</ul>
<br />
Please send abstracts of 250 – 300 words, with a supporting bio of no more than 100 words, to both Connor Winterton (Connor.Winterton-AT-mail.bcu.ac.uk) and Anthony Stepniak (Anthony.Stepniak2-AT-northampton.ac.uk).<br />
<br />Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-58347032968715311982018-09-26T04:21:00.002-07:002018-09-26T04:21:33.879-07:00CFP: Action Cinema Now conferenceCALL FOR PAPERS<br />
<br />
<b>Action Cinema Now</b><br />
<br />
International conference,<br />
<br />
12-14 April 2019<br />
Reading and London UK<br />
<br />
abstracts due 28 September 2018<br />
<br />
Keynote speakers:<br />
<br />
Professor Mary Beltrán, Professor Chris Holmlund<br />
Professor Gina Marchetti, Professor Yvonne Tasker<br />
<br />
<br />
At a moment when the relationship between popular culture, politics and society is again being sharply debated, action cinema as a dominant form of mass cultural production demands to be re-examined, as does the critical writing that has documented that form. Action films pose pressing questions about the extent to which a popular form can develop appropriate responses to the ethical dimensions of representation and marginalisation, particularly in a wider context of global multi-platform circulation. At the same time, they remain key sites of technological and aesthetic innovation and market negotiation shaped by complex local and global economic and cultural drivers.<br />
<br />
This conference seeks to bring together scholars from a range of disciplines in a cross-continental, intercultural, intermedial and interdisciplinary examination of this wide-ranging form. To analyse action cinema in its heterogeneity, and in particular to skew away from traditional foci of action scholarship (such as the white cis-gendered male hero), the conference will be organised around four thematic areas: (1) regional exchange, (2) aesthetics, (3) performance, and (4) industry.<br />
<br />
We invite 20-minute papers that consider action cinema in terms of its genre boundaries and outreach, its forms and affect, and its significance within wider fields of representation in contemporary audiovisual culture.<br />
<br />
Please submit your 500 word abstract, 5 bibliographic references, and brief bio, by 5pm UK time on 28 September 2018, to l.v.purse-AT-reading.ac.uk.<br />
<br />
We anticipate issuing acceptance notices on 31 October 2018. An anthology is planned following the conference.<br />
<br />
We look forward to hearing from you.<br />
<br />
Conference organisers:<br />
Dr Lisa Purse, University of Reading, l.v.purse-AT-reading.ac.uk<br />
Professor Yvonne Tasker, University of East Anglia, Y.Tasker-AT-uea.ac.uk<br />
Professor Emerita Chris Holmlund, University of Tennessee-Knoxville, cholmlun-AT-utk.edu<br />
<br />Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-6127284048326873952018-08-26T14:07:00.000-07:002018-11-02T05:58:35.144-07:00Conference Roundup Fall/Winter 2018 Here is my current list of English-language conferences of interest to those in film studies (and some for TV and media studies). Upcoming conferences are listed in order by date or, for open calls, by abstract due date. Please let me know if I should add anything.<br />
<br />
<u>Current calls:</u><br />
due date: 22 October 2018 <b>Documentary Now! </b>- BIMI Birkbeck, London, 15 December 2018 [<a href="http://categoryd.blogspot.com/2018/09/cfp-documentary-now-conference.html">call</a>]<br />
due date: 5 November 2018 <b>Investigating </b><b style="font-family: Lora, serif; font-size: 16px;">Contemporary Western Gay Cinema </b><span style="font-family: "lora" , serif; font-size: 16px;">- </span><span style="font-family: "lora" , serif;">University of Northampton, 16-17 February 2019 [<a href="http://categoryd.blogspot.com/2018/09/cfp-investigating-contemporary-western.html">call</a>]</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "lora" , serif;"><span style="font-family: -webkit-standard;">due date: 15 November 2018 <b>HoMER Network</b> - University of the Bahamas, Nassau, 26-28, 2019 [<a href="http://categoryd.blogspot.com/2018/09/cfp-homer-conference-2019.html">call</a> | <a href="http://homernetwork.org/">website</a>]</span></span><br />
due date: 1 December 2018 <b>Visible Evidence XXVI</b> - USC, Los Angeles, 24-28 July 2019 [<a href="http://www.visibleevidence.org/conference/visible-evidence-xxvi/#call_for_proposals">call</a>]<br />
due date: 7 December 2018 <b>Orphan Film Symposium </b>- Austrian Film Museum, Vienna, 7-8 June 2019, topic: "Radicals" [<a href="http://www.nyu.edu/orphanfilm/">call</a>]<br />
due date: 21 December 2018 <b>Society for Cognitive Studies of the Moving Image (SCSMI)</b> - Universität Hamburg, 12-15 June 2019 [<a href="http://scsmi-online.org/conference">call</a>]<br />
due date: 6 January 2019 <b>Screen</b> - Univ of Glasgow, 28-30 June 2019, topic: "Screen Studies Beyond the Field" [<a href="https://www.gla.ac.uk/research/az/screen/conference/">website</a>]<br />
due date: 31 January 2019 <b>Global Colour and the Moving Image</b> conference - Univ of Bristol, 10-12 July 2019 [<a href="https://eastmancolor.info/conference/">call</a>]<br />
due date: 28 February 2019 <b>MLA 2020 </b>- Seattle [<a href="https://www.mla.org/Convention/Planning-a-Convention-Session/Calls-for-Papers">call</a>]<br />
<div>
due date: 1 March 2019 <b>Small Cinemas Conference </b>- Lisbon, 25-27 September 2019 [<a href="https://smallcinemassmallspaces.wordpress.com/cfp/">call</a>]<br />
<b><br /></b></div>
<u>Closed calls:</u><br />
<div>
"<b>Stars and Screen"</b> Film and Media History Conference - Rowan University (Glassboro, New Jersey), 27-29 September 2018 [<a href="https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2018/05/17/stars-screen-film-media-history-conference-september-27-29-2018-due-june-15">call</a>]<br />
<b>Flow</b> conference - University of Texas, Austin, 27-29 September [<a href="https://www.flowjournal.org/flow-conference-2018-main/">website</a>]<br />
<b>The Cultural Legacies of Bette Davis</b> - Northwestern University, 5-6 October 2018 [<a href="http://cmc-centre.com/bette-davis/">website</a>]<br />
<b>Small Cinemas Conference </b>- Florida Atlantic Univ. (Boca Raton, Fla.), 9-10 November 2018<br />
<b>Film and History </b>conference - Madison, Wisc., 7-11 November 2018 [<a href="http://www.uwosh.edu/filmandhistory/conference/index.php">website</a>]<br />
<b>MLA</b> <b>2019 </b>- Chicago, 3-6 January 2019<br />
<b>American Comparative Literature Association</b>, Georgetown Univ, Washington DC, March 7th-10th, 2019<br />
<b>SCMS </b>- Seattle, 13-17 March 2019<br />
<b>Action Cinema Now</b> - Reading/London, 12-14 April 2019 [<a href="http://categoryd.blogspot.com/2018/09/cfp-action-cinema-now-conference.html">call</a>]<br />
<b>ICA 2019 </b>Washington, DC, 24-28 May 2019 [<a href="https://www.icahdq.org/page/2019CFP">call</a>]</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<u>Upcoming calls:</u><br />
<b>NECS</b> - Gdansk, Poland, 13-15 June, 2019 [<a href="http://necs.org/">website</a>]<br />
<b>UFVA </b>- Augsburg University, Minneapolis, 30 July - 2 August 2019 [<a href="https://ufva.site-ym.com/">website</a>]<br />
<div>
<b>Screenwriting Research Network</b> conference, Porto, dates TBD [<a href="https://screenwritingresearch.com/">website</a>]<br />
<b>Orphan Film Symposium</b> - EYE Netherlands Filmmuseum, Amsterdam, 23-26 May 2020</div>
<div>
</div>
Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-25251548115805607922018-06-08T15:26:00.000-07:002018-06-09T11:33:28.419-07:00Cinephilia and Colonialist Cinema<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
As I noted on Twitter, I was taken aback by the odd phrasing, to put it mildly, of one of Filmstruck's latest series:</div>
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<br /></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYFdITkFiKOTcr6wf10EUxDTC7LOxr3cz65_QSjDg9lPOxw7te-DyXZZ6L1lZX9Mu2mrVqOf6c3xYp-itgriycKmbxnRfeGm2sxpoHNQKMdSN7qGFgG4Ven_033lcTTUCPziIzzg/s1600/filmstruck.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="112" data-original-width="1027" height="69" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYFdITkFiKOTcr6wf10EUxDTC7LOxr3cz65_QSjDg9lPOxw7te-DyXZZ6L1lZX9Mu2mrVqOf6c3xYp-itgriycKmbxnRfeGm2sxpoHNQKMdSN7qGFgG4Ven_033lcTTUCPziIzzg/s640/filmstruck.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
So much is wrong in this of course, from the "right to rule" business to the insidious passive voice. Most charitably, I might chalk it up to a Filmstruck employee being tone deaf in writing up a blurb for a not quite coherent series.<br />
<br />
But this raises a question that I think is broader than this instance: why do nominal attempts at including cinema of the global south sometimes end up highlighting colonialist cinema (or critiques of colonialism from within the colonizer)? I think there are two intersecting reasons.<br />
<br />
First, film libraries run by major distribution companies have historically prioritized Hollywood and (secondarily) European cinema. So when Netflix tries to list African films, many are in fact US films about Africa. I suspect Filmstruck is in a similar situation, in which its film library features many more US and European films about colonialism than those of postcolonial filmmakers.<br />
<br />
Second, it's not happenstance that Filmstuck/Janus/TCM's library is heavy on US-Euro films about colonialism. It's built into the studio-era and postwar art-cinema version of their cinephilia. Those of us who love older movies often have to reconcile that love with the knowledge that these films are colonialist in their outlook (among other problems). I think many feel that tension, between recognizing the vitality of one the of the 20th century's great popular art forms and not wanting to blithely overlook the racist, colonialist, or sexist ideologies it often took.<br />
<br />
There's an overwhelming impulse to want to rehabilitate cinephilia by incorporating a retrospective political critique. Recently, for instance, I heard someone from TIFF Light Box highlight a recent program in which Jacqueline Stewart introduced a screening of <i>Gone with the Wind</i>. I recall having mixed feelings. On the one hand, I'd love to hear Stewart's take on the film, and it's great to open up the cinephilic canon to a more critical lens. On the other hand, unless done in the right spirit, such events can serve as a justification for a continued prioritizing of films like Gone with the Wind in retrospectives.<br />
<br />
I do think one can do a better version of what FilmStruck is trying to do, in juxtaposing colonialist cinema with post-colonial and anti-colonial cinema, or of thinking of the relation between them. But that would mean an ethical self-awareness of what the love of cinema's history can entail.Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-33671705655842340842018-06-08T12:49:00.002-07:002018-06-08T12:49:16.469-07:00Conference Roundup Summer 2018 editionHere is my current list of English-language conferences of interest to those in film studies (and some for TV and media studies). Upcoming conferences are listed in order by date or, for open calls, by abstract due date. Please let me know if I should add anything.<br />
<br />
<u>Current calls:</u><br />
due date: 15 June 2017 "<b>Stars & Screen"</b> Film & Media History Conference - Rowan University (Glassboro, New Jersey), 27-29 September 2018 [<a href="https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2018/05/17/stars-screen-film-media-history-conference-september-27-29-2018-due-june-15">call</a>]<br />
due date: 1 July 2018 <b>Film and History </b>conference - Madison, Wisc., 7-11 November 2018 [<a href="http://www.uwosh.edu/filmandhistory/conference/index.php">website</a>]<br />
due date: 31 August 2018 <b>SCMS </b>- Seattle, 13-17 March 2019<br />
<u><br /></u>
<u>Closed calls:</u><br />
<div>
<b>Domitor</b> (early cinema) - Rochester, 13-16 June 2018 [<a href="http://domitor.org/conference/2018-rochester-conference/">website</a>]<br />
<b>Society for Cognitive Studies of the Moving Image</b> (SCSMI) - Bozeman, Montana, 13- 16 June 2018 [<a href="http://scsmi-online.org/conference">website</a>]<br />
<b>NECS</b> - Amsterdam and Utrecht, 27-29 June 2018 [<a href="http://necs.org/">website</a>]<br />
<b>Screen</b> - Univ of Glasgow, 29 June - 1 July 2018 [<a href="https://www.gla.ac.uk/research/az/screen/conference/">website</a>]<br />
<b>Console-ing Passions</b> - Bournemouth University, 11-13 July 2018 [<a href="https://www1.bournemouth.ac.uk/about/our-faculties/faculty-media-communication/our-departments/department-media-production/console-ing-passions-conference">website</a>]<br />
<b>UFVA - New Mexico State Univ. </b>23-26 July 2018 [<a href="https://ufva.site-ym.com/page/Conference?">website</a>]<br />
<b>Visible Evidence XXV</b> - Bloomington, Indiana, 8-11 August 2018 [<a href="http://www.visibleevidence.org/conference/visible-evidence-xxi/" style="font-weight: normal;">website</a>]<br />
<b>Screenwriting Research Network</b> conference - Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan, 13-15 September 2018<br />
<b>Flow</b> conference - University of Texas, Austin, 27-29 September [<a href="https://www.flowjournal.org/flow-conference-2018-main/">website</a>]<br />
<b>The Cultural Legacies of Bette Davis</b> - Northwestern University, 5-6 October 2018 [<a href="http://cmc-centre.com/bette-davis/">website</a>]<br />
<b>Small Cinemas Conference </b>- Florida Atlantic Univ. (Boca Raton, Fla.), 9-10 November 2018<br />
<b>MLA</b> <b>2019 </b>- Chicago, 3-6 January 2019<br />
<br /></div>
<u>Upcoming calls:</u><br />
<b>ICA 2019 </b>Washington, DC<br />
<div>
<b>MLA 2020 </b>- Seattle</div>
Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-16050461996568802112017-10-26T18:29:00.000-07:002017-10-26T18:29:38.971-07:00Conferences Winter Edition 2017-18Here is my current list of English-language conferences of interest to those in film studies (and some for TV and media studies). Upcoming conferences are listed in order by date or, for open calls, by abstract due date. Please let me know if I should add anything.<br />
<br />
<u>Closed calls:</u><br />
<div>
<b>Film and History </b>conference - Milwaukee, Nov. 1-5, 2017 [<a href="http://www.uwosh.edu/filmandhistory/conference/index.php">website</a>]<br />
<b>MLA</b> - New York, Jan. 2018 [<a href="https://www.mla.org/Convention">website</a>]<br />
<b>SCMS</b> - Toronto, Mar. 14-18, 2018 [<a href="http://www.cmstudies.org/?page=upcoming_conference">website</a>]<br />
<b>Domitor</b> (early cinema) - Rochester, 13-16 June 2018 [<a href="http://domitor.org/conference/2018-rochester-conference/">website</a>]<br />
<br /></div>
<u>Current calls:</u><br />
due date: November 1, 2017 <b>ICA 2018</b> - Prague, 24-28 May 2018 [<a href="http://www.icahdq.org/page/cfp2018">website</a>]<br />
<br />
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due date: November 15, 2017 <b>Visible Evidence XXV</b> - Bloomington, Indiana, 8-11 August, 2018 [<a href="http://www.visibleevidence.org/conference/visible-evidence-xxi/" style="font-weight: normal;">website</a>]</div>
due date: December 15, 2017 <b>Screenwriting Research Network</b> conference - Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan, 13-15 September 2018 [<a href="http://apps.unicatt.it/formazione_permanente/milano_scheda_corso.asp?id=11862">call</a>]<br />
due date: December 22, 2017 <b>Society for Cognitive Studies of the Moving Image</b> (SCSMI) - Bozeman, Montana, 13- 16 June 2018 [<a href="http://scsmi-online.org/conference">website</a>]</div>
due date: January 7, 2018 <b>Screen</b> - Univ of Glasgow, 29 June - 1 July, 2018 [<a href="https://www.gla.ac.uk/research/az/screen/conference/">website</a>]<br />
<div>
</div>
due date: January 15, 2018 <b>Console-ing Passions</b> - Bournemouth University, 11-13 July 2018 [<a href="https://www1.bournemouth.ac.uk/about/our-faculties/faculty-media-communication/our-departments/department-media-production/console-ing-passions-conference">call</a>]<br />
due date: TBA <b>NECS</b> - Amsterdam and Utrecht, 27-29 June 2018 [<a href="http://necs.org/">website</a> | <a href="https://necs.org/conferences#/node/111781">call</a>]<br />
<br />
<u>Upcoming calls:</u><br />
<b>UFVA</b><br />
<b><br /></b>Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-83266447301170329992017-10-20T05:00:00.001-07:002017-10-20T05:00:03.542-07:00CFP: 11th Screenwriting Research Network conferenceCALL FOR PAPERS<br />
<br />
<b>11th Screenwriting Research Network (SRN) International Conference </b><br />
Topic: <b>Writing for cinema. Writing for TV </b><br />
<br />
Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan.<br />
Thursday, September 13th to Saturday, September 15th, 2018.<br />
<br />
Abstracts due December 15, 2017<br />
<br />
The main theme of the 2018 <a href="http://screenwritingresearch.com/">Screenwriting Research Network</a> conference is the relationship between cinema and television storytelling. Once two separate worlds, cinema and television narratives are progressively becoming overlapping domains in terms of screenwriting techniques, development methods, careers, contents and audiences.<br />
<br />
If authorship, sophisticated drama, address to educated viewers, consideration by the critics had been for long the exclusive marks of stories written for the big screen, this is much less the case today. The cable channels and nowadays the streaming platforms revolution have led to series that have zeroed the distance from cinema artistic quality. Walls between careers have fallen, with prominent screenwriters like Aaron Sorkin, Paul Haggis, Stephen Knight and Steven Zaillian crossing borders between the two industries, writing for both media. Besides, the collaboration of a team of writers/authors in the development of a narrative idea — which is typical of the TV industry writers’ rooms — has started to become a valuable method also in the cinema industry, for example at Pixar, or when narrative potential of comic universes and properties are explored at a studio department as a possible material for franchises.<br />
<br />
Yet, differences still exist — cinema is still a director’s medium, whilst TV is a writer’s medium, especially in the American industry that still has a very high share of the markets in any countries — and new ones have emerged — for example the specialization of cinema and TV storytelling in different kind of characters, with heroes and superheroes dominating the big screen, and so called “antiheroes” the TV series.<br />
<br />
The conference intends to tackle these issues, discussing them from the wide range of theoretical approaches and professional angles related to the craft of screenwriting.<br />
<br />
For a list of suggested topics and details for submission, see the <a href="http://apps.unicatt.it/formazione_permanente/milano_scheda_corso.asp?id=11862">conference website</a>. The organising committee plans to notify acceptances/rejections by January 31, 2018.Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-22969999693138229382017-07-11T16:23:00.003-07:002017-07-11T16:23:40.580-07:00Documentary Symposium: Documentary After Farocki<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-vbnStgiqq-y0qOj9PFKuIg7UqotCpn6EXLF6vrCpEEUvMQFo7cQqfc0fwDSMAwCUUdcpCrxZOIs92n_X2tsrccmXZ5gkfVb6z_3NxAakYS9RTaccgD7VwX4nsGHT5GIjpENzWg/s1600/Harun_Farock_Immersion.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="266" data-original-width="700" height="242" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-vbnStgiqq-y0qOj9PFKuIg7UqotCpn6EXLF6vrCpEEUvMQFo7cQqfc0fwDSMAwCUUdcpCrxZOIs92n_X2tsrccmXZ5gkfVb6z_3NxAakYS9RTaccgD7VwX4nsGHT5GIjpENzWg/s640/Harun_Farock_Immersion.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS<br />
<br />
Temple University’s Film and Media Arts Department invites proposals for its<br />
3rd Annual Documentary Theory-Practice Symposium<br />
<br />
on the topic of "<b>Documentary After Farocki</b>"<br />
<br />
One-day symposium, <b>Friday, September 22, 2017</b><br />
Temple Performing Arts Center<br />
Temple University, Philadelphia<br />
<br />
Speakers to include Thomas Y. Levin (Princeton) and video-essayist and critic Kevin B. Lee.<br />
<br />
This one-day symposium will bring together mediamakers, critics, and scholars to examine the legacy and continuing influence of late essay filmmaker and artist, Harun Farocki. Farocki’s career spans roughly fifty years during which time worked in 16mm, 35mm, video, and digital production, He was a writer, a critical theorist, a filmmaker, and an artist. His work was exhibited in alternative spaces, on network television and in the most prestigious international art exhibitions. What remained constant throughout his engagement with moving images was his unrelenting investigation and critique of image production.<br />
<br />
We encourage scholarly papers as well as talks by critics, filmmakers, and media artists that engage with this legacy and explore what documentary film and nonfiction media can be after Farocki. The symposium seeks to include papers and presentations that not only that engage directly with Farocki’s oeuvre but also follow and expand on Farocki’s working methodology -- for example his use of multiple screens and platforms, soft montage, operational images, and different media formats to generate new systems of thought.<br />
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Please send a précis or abstract (300 words max.) and a brief bio to Nora Alter (nalter@temple.edu) and Chris Cagle (ccagle@temple.edu) by Friday, Aug. 4. Notification of accepted proposals will go out mid-August.<br />
<br />Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-74504075173605240772017-05-18T18:11:00.000-07:002017-05-18T18:11:55.969-07:00New Venture: Festival Documentary blogI want to announce that I've compiled my blog writing and ongoing work on contemporary documentary at a new website, titled simply <a href="http://festivaldocumentary.com/">The Festival Documentary</a>. I expect this to serve as an online companion to my book project of the same title. I will continue to cross-post content here at Category D.<br />
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By "festival documentary," I mean a distinct style of documentary geared toward film festival exhibition. The more I watch documentaries that play on the festival circuit, the more I am convinced that they comprise distinct genres, from the poetic and observational to the character-driven documentary. These genres labels are still not widely used among documentary scholars, and I hope to make the case for their utility.<br />
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The website will feature blog of reflections on contemporary documentaries, a filmography of films I've watched for the project, and a collection of relevant reviews. Currently, the filmography is a work in progress, which I will continue to flesh out, but ultimately it will allow for a more dynamic sorting of documentaries by genre, year, and possibly country or festival.<br />
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Finally, one goal I have in writing on these films is to bring a bigger audience to films that sometimes have a short exhibition life on the festival circuit. The more attention I can bring to these works, the better.<br />
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As always, I welcome feedback and suggestions for viewing.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU35ONksALSEU8nSVJaHkG0uosy8D2KWFZRgEovzeapf4wCZ8qH7hR3q0gLfCcTLLjFbZEKFSMobR1Egvy5HzNR_7BBXoSAOvjYmgbyhdwNKEKWD8ehUmQy9aQ2oXQhL-NyCDuKg/s1600/FestivalDocHeader_100.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="103" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU35ONksALSEU8nSVJaHkG0uosy8D2KWFZRgEovzeapf4wCZ8qH7hR3q0gLfCcTLLjFbZEKFSMobR1Egvy5HzNR_7BBXoSAOvjYmgbyhdwNKEKWD8ehUmQy9aQ2oXQhL-NyCDuKg/s640/FestivalDocHeader_100.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-4948753959578821422017-05-18T16:59:00.001-07:002017-05-18T16:59:42.917-07:00Making the Case for Socially Conscious Doc<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr2DF_xoYy-4nZy2yIx5a0sqyNGrEZx2GfKEnX5topan2okBDoXy5ZgnJrq9xZy8L3qMdeTfQS36adgxr1EzVv3gDSRtEvnmf-1nT2k0RZMMsjRVeP06z-MLoJG9qyTJkLGMtxKA/s1600/Cameraperson.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr2DF_xoYy-4nZy2yIx5a0sqyNGrEZx2GfKEnX5topan2okBDoXy5ZgnJrq9xZy8L3qMdeTfQS36adgxr1EzVv3gDSRtEvnmf-1nT2k0RZMMsjRVeP06z-MLoJG9qyTJkLGMtxKA/s640/Cameraperson.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<i>cross-posted to <a href="http://festivaldocumentary.com/making-the-case-for-socially-conscious-doc/">Festival Film blog</a></i><br />
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<i>Cameraperson</i><br />
Kirsten Johnson, 2016<br />
USA<br />
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Genre: Essay film<br />
102m | on DVD, Blu-Ray, and VOD<br />
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There’s a lot one can say about <i>Cameraperson</i>. The two posts I might be initially inclined to write are one dealing with the Bazinian real of the documentary shot and one dealing with the craft of documentary cinematography (<i>Cameraperson </i>as an intervention in both the auteur bias of criticism and the elision of documentary from industry cinematographic trade discourse.) Both of these would be very much with the grain of the film.<br />
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But another motif occurred to me watching the film. So many of the films that Kirsten Johnson worked on belong to a traditional of observational-style socially conscious documentary. I’ve seen few of them. That’s my own failing, to be clear, and one of the strengths of <i>Cameraperson</i> is that it excites me to begin tracking down some of Johnson’s films to watch in their entirety.<br />
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I suspect I’m not alone. I think it’s fair to say that this strain of socially conscious documentary has declined in prestige, or at least stalled as more popular forms (even with political cinema) have gained new audiences and as aestheticized documentary has gained more favor with critics. In fact, as a self-reflexive essay film, <i>Cameraperson</i>, has tapped into the critical attention (top-tier film festivals, glowing reviews, and a Criterion release) that has eluded many of the films Johnson has worked on (admittedly not as director).<br />
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This praise, in my opinion, is deserved, but the mismatch between the reading formation of <i>Cameraperson</i> and that of the documentaries it includes is noteworthy. On the one hand, I don’t think this mismatch will be fully reconciled. For instance, I don’t see the Criterion Collection championing independent-television character-driven documentaries any time soon. On the other hand, the film does an admirable job of making the case for the continued vitality of traditional observational and character-driven forms.Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-9009478578124325082017-05-17T11:07:00.000-07:002017-05-17T11:07:18.691-07:00Prestige Cinematography, 1950s style<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkWeT3wYrUk40ZRIA1q2j4YGseAQFglgRZrn7IMPCplxhhi_AgJtI0iVYaiIHZrAfvmOkatLB7r5nvM8PZ5maCjQTRNciV1wTjeBzLEPKsUTHDJjEYXAkdjDaeDfguOAqGotf7Kg/s1600/projecting-world-88821.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkWeT3wYrUk40ZRIA1q2j4YGseAQFglgRZrn7IMPCplxhhi_AgJtI0iVYaiIHZrAfvmOkatLB7r5nvM8PZ5maCjQTRNciV1wTjeBzLEPKsUTHDJjEYXAkdjDaeDfguOAqGotf7Kg/s320/projecting-world-88821.jpg" width="213" /></a>I'm pleased to note that I have an essay in the newly published volume, <i>Projecting the World: </i><i>Representing the "Foreign" in Classical Hollywood</i>, <a href="http://www.wsupress.wayne.edu/books/detail/projecting-world">now ou</a>t from Wayne State University Press. Thanks to editors Anna Cooper and Russell Meeuf for including me and for their editorial guidance as I revised what was initially an outcast from my book into a stand-alone article. And I'm eager to read the other essays in the book, all exploring the still underexamined transnational dimensions of Hollywood in the studio years.<br />
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My essay reads Kramer's <i>On the Beach</i> and Preminger's <i>Bonjour Tristesse</i> as comparable cosmopolitan texts offering a "Europeanized" spin on prestige film aesthetics.<br />
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My project initially started as I came across pressbooks in my research of Stanley Kramer. I'd initially looked at Kramer's work as a social problem film auteur, and <i>On the Beach</i> fit that mold, in part, but it also seemed to foreground an international cosmopolitanism in its marketing.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMOuAJT_PKNWNBQLg-4H1FEPU0iA8ETKzfdo9Ggh7M2GYPWdLP8k2WZQtbPVaLQacLVRqzE0BQiPkI3xwpH05TRlM68L4-hpfNEGsgtucLC6S4T7V9oNE20XR0DGHmw1rcVm6Ang/s1600/OTB2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMOuAJT_PKNWNBQLg-4H1FEPU0iA8ETKzfdo9Ggh7M2GYPWdLP8k2WZQtbPVaLQacLVRqzE0BQiPkI3xwpH05TRlM68L4-hpfNEGsgtucLC6S4T7V9oNE20XR0DGHmw1rcVm6Ang/s320/OTB2.jpg" width="231" /></a>This cosmopolitanism doubled the film's theme (an adaptation of an Australian novel, shot in Australia, about the geopolitical fall out of a nuclear war) and the film's own production history, showing the impact of runaway production and transnational labor.<br />
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And, perhaps, most of all the cinematography, headed by DP <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=3&ved=0ahUKEwiJosGrv_fTAhWGQCYKHbaXCnQQFggvMAI&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cinematographers.nl%2FGreatDoPh%2Frotunno.htm&usg=AFQjCNF5iGiS53rUW5ZGJQOgNLtQODrI4g&sig2=hFX0wBI2lSpvskSIufNZiw">Guiseppe Rotunno</a>. In his book on classical Hollywood lighting, Patrick Keating makes the useful distinction between classicist cinematographers and mannerists. Rotunno was neither but rather a heterodox DP importing the modernist sensibility of Italian art cinema. He has some striking lighting setups in the film, and other instances of playing with shadow. But just as striking for me is the way he could transform a figure lighting setup into something offbeat, but beautiful.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL_Vkur3EY0LfeOtolvKJmMY07DEJtrY65yukPdqqr0gWboM4Eij94-dzMEAlZWkHUNhwrct_v7QFtN2QlpfpFd6_n6wWP3jQPkQwbrKDE3F3DnVJzDlxkfy3OhpN6O1DpsbjjAw/s1600/OTB1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="195" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL_Vkur3EY0LfeOtolvKJmMY07DEJtrY65yukPdqqr0gWboM4Eij94-dzMEAlZWkHUNhwrct_v7QFtN2QlpfpFd6_n6wWP3jQPkQwbrKDE3F3DnVJzDlxkfy3OhpN6O1DpsbjjAw/s320/OTB1.jpg" width="320" /></a>Admittedly, <i>Bonjour Tristesse </i>was an add-on but one that made sense the more I explored the odd fit between Preminger's runaway productions and his reputation as a classical Hollywood auteur.<br />
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<br />Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-66506283402673119022017-01-12T06:00:00.001-08:002017-01-15T07:19:57.860-08:00Conferences Winter 2017 EditionHere is my current list of English-language conferences of interest to those in film studies (and some for TV and media studies). Upcoming conferences are listed in order by date or, for open calls, by abstract due date. Please let me know if I should add anything.<br />
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<u>Closed calls:</u><br />
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<b>SCMS</b> - Chicago, Mar. 22-26, 2017 [<a href="http://www.cmstudies.org/?page=upcoming_conference">website</a>]<br />
<b>ICA 2017</b> - San Diego, California, 25-29 May 2017 [<a href="https://www.icahdq.org/conf/2017/2017cfptheme.pdf">call</a>]<br />
<b>Society for Cognitive Studies of the Moving Image</b> (SCSMI) - Helsinki, June 11-14, 2017 [<a href="http://scsmi-online.org/conference">website</a>]<br />
<b>Women and the Silent Screen</b> - Shanghai, June 16-18, 2017 [<a href="http://www.wfhi.org/?p=473">website</a>]<br />
<b>Circuits of Cinema</b> (Histories of Movie/Media Distribution) - Ryerson Univ., June 22-24, 2017 [<a href="http://psmoore.ca/circuits-of-cinema/">website</a>]<br />
<b>Visible Evidence XXIV</b> - Buenos Aires, Aug. 2-5, 2017 [<a href="http://ve2017.cinedocumental.com.ar/">website</a>]</div>
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<u>Current calls:</u><br />
due date: January 15, 2017 <b>Screen</b> - Univ of Glasgow, June 23-25, 2017 [<a href="http://www.gla.ac.uk/services/screen/conference2017/">website</a>]<br />
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due date: January 16, 2017 <b>Console-ing Passions</b> - East Carolina Univ., July 27-29, 2017 [<a href="http://www.console-ingpassions.org/cp-conference-2017/">call</a>]<br />
due date: January 31, 2017 <b>NECS</b> - Université Sorbonne Nouvelle and Université Paris Diderot, Paris, June 29 - July 1, 2017 [<a href="http://necs.org/">website</a> | <a href="https://necs.org/node/110025">call</a>]<br />
due date: January 31, 2017 (revised) <b>Poetics and Politics of Documentary</b> - Univ. of Sussex, Brighton, June 2-4, 2017 [<a href="http://reframe.sussex.ac.uk/poetics-and-politics-symposium/">call</a>]<br />
due date: February 1, 2017 <b>UFVA</b> - California State Univ. Los Angeles, July 30-Aug. 2, 2017 [<a href="http://www.ufva.org/?page=Conference">website</a>]<br />
due date: February 3, 2017 <b>Black Film British Cinema Conference 2017</b> - Goldsmiths & Institute of Contemporary Art, London, May 17-18, 2017 [<a href="https://www.gre.ac.uk/ach/events/bfbc2017">call</a>]<br />
due date: February 28, 2017. <b>MLA</b> - New York, Jan. 2018 [<a href="https://www.mla.org/Convention">website</a> | <a href="https://www.mla.org/Convention/Planning-a-Convention-Session/Calls-for-Papers">call</a>]<br />
due date: April 15, 2017 <b>Rethinking Film Genres: East Asian Cinema and Beyond </b>- Univ. of Hull, Sept. 14-16, 2017 [<a href="http://categoryd.blogspot.com/2017/01/cfp-rethinking-film-genres-east-asian.html">call</a>]<br />
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<u>Upcoming calls:</u><br />
<b>Domitor</b> (early cinema) - Rochester, June 13-16, 2018 [<a href="http://domitor.org/conference/2018-rochester-conference/">website</a>]<br />
<b>Film and History </b>conference - Milwaukee, Nov. 1-5, 2017 [<a href="http://www.uwosh.edu/filmandhistory/conference/index.php">website</a>]<br />
<b>ICA 2018 </b>- Prague, May 24-28, 2018 [<a href="http://www.icahdq.org/page/PastFuture">website</a>]<br />
<b>Visible Evidence XXV</b> - Bloomington, Indiana, second week of August 2018<br />
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<u>Graduate student conferences:</u><br />
due date: January 31, 2017 <b>Trauma & Melodrama</b> - Univ. of Chicago, April 21-22, 2017 [<a href="https://traumamelodrama.wordpress.com/">call</a>]Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30690257.post-54780287331225940352017-01-12T05:21:00.002-08:002017-01-12T05:21:45.684-08:00CFP: Black Film British Cinema Conference 2017CALL FOR PAPERS<br />
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<b>Black Film British Cinema Conference 2017</b><br />
The Politics of Race in Contemporary Film and Digital Practice<br />
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Goldsmiths, University of London (Day One)<br />
& Institute of Contemporary Arts (Day Two)<br />
17-18 May 2017<br />
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abstracts due 3rd February 2017</div>
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CONFIRMED SPEAKERS<br />
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Professor Sarita Malik, Brunel University<br />
Dr Kara Keeling, University of Southern California<br />
June Givanni, Pan African Cinema Archives<br />
Additional speakers will be announced as they are confirmed.<br />
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THEMES<br />
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Whether we consider the rise of the concept of diversity, the on-screen representation of identities, the off-screen workforce, the production trends of film institutions, new forms of independent production opened up by new media, or film education and talent development, questions of race and ethnicity remain central to contemporary British film.<br />
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This conference will mark nearly 30 years since the original Black Film, British Cinema conference at the ICA and its subsequent publication, which has been a huge influence on scholars exploring race, culture and the politics of representation. Some of its core thinking by Kobena Mercer, Stuart Hall, Paul Gilroy and others remains an excellent point to consider what has, and has not, become of black and Asian film and TV production in the UK.<br />
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The aim of this two-day conference is to consider the politics of race in contemporary British cinema and visual practice and reflect on almost 30 years of black film production vis-a-vis the institutional, technological, textual, cultural and political shifts that have occurred during this period. We invite scholars, early career researchers, postgraduate students and practitioners working at the intersection of film, TV, Moving Image, Media and Communication studies, Sociology, Politics and Cultural Studies. We would encourage contributors to reflect on themes, challenges and questions central to race and British film in terms of governance, production, representation, exhibition and spectatorship. These include (but are not limited to):<br />
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The politics of representation in contemporary film and digital practice<br />
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<ul>
<li>Diversity and film policy</li>
<li>The representation/politics of race in new digital platforms</li>
<li>Understandings of 'Black film' in the context of recent social, political and cultural change</li>
<li>The politics of gender and sexuality and intersectional approaches to black and Asian film and visual practice</li>
<li>The political economy of 'Black film'</li>
<li>The cultural, geographical and political contexts of black and Asian film production</li>
<li>Participatory film cultures and movements</li>
<li>Methodologies for understanding contemporary film, representation and access.</li>
<li>Film in postcolonial and race critical theory</li>
<li>The relevance and cohesiveness of 'black' as an ethnic category in film production, policy and criticism</li>
<li>New Ethnicities, the Black intelligentsia and film and TV production</li>
<li>The emergence of new sub genres (i.e Urban Film)</li>
<li>Higher Education, film studies and race, and approaches to Black film pedagogy</li>
<li>Race and diaspora in international cinema</li>
<li>Representation, identity and the ideology of race and ethnicity </li>
</ul>
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Abstract Deadlines and Submission Process:<br />
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3rd February 2017. Deadline for paper submission. Please submit proposals for 15 minute papers here. The submission should include the following: title and name, institutional affiliation and address, and email address, together with a paper title and abstract of not more than 300 words.<br />
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27th February 2017 Paper proposers notified of decision by conference committee. Conference registration opens.<br />
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Thursday 17th May 2017. Conference starts in London.<br />
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Conference Organisers: Dr Clive James Nwonka (University of Greenwich), Dr Anamik Saha (Goldsmiths, University of London)<br />
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Website: <a href="https://www.gre.ac.uk/ach/events/bfbc2017">https://www.gre.ac.uk/ach/events/bfbc2017</a>Chris Caglehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11896423565458620046noreply@blogger.com0