Entertaining Social Change
AMST 315
Fall 2019 not offered
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| Crosslisting:
ENGL 309, FGSS 315 |
| Certificates: Social, Cultural, and Critical Theory |
| Course Cluster: Social, Cultural, and Critical Theory Certificate |
"Our problem," Tom Frank writes," is that we have a fixed idea of what power is, of how power works, and of how power is to be resisted." This is especially true of "entertainment" as a transformative power. Our aim will be to advance critical entertainment studies. A thread that connects all of our texts will be: how has the systemic critique of social contradictions been popularized as fascinating in modern times? We will consider the diverse strategies that progressive songwriters/performers, radical historians (working with cartoonists), and mainly moviemakers have developed to entertain Americans--to teach, persuade, provoke, seduce, and move them through laughter, tears, and not least of all ideas--so that Americans will be more inclined to entertain social critique that inspires social change. We will explore the popularizing (and sometimes the selling) of social critique in several genres: graphic history (Howard Zinn, Paul Buhle); songs/song lyrics of folk-protest singers (such as Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, and Phil Ochs), of folk-rock stars (such as Jackson Browne, Ani DiFranco, and Father John Misty), and of the developers of hip-hop (such as Gil Scott-Heron, Public Enemy, and NWA); and politically edgy comedy (Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert). We will devote most of our attention to movies (STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON, THE PEOPLE SPEAK, MALCOLM X, MEDIUM COOL, NETWORK, EL NORTE, SMOKE SIGNALS, BEFORE THE FLOOD, THE BLACK PANTHERS: VANGUARD OF THE REVOLUTION, SALT OF THE EARTH, MATEWAN, 99 HOMES, THE WOLF OF WALL STREET, THE BIG SHORT). And we will place special emphasis on self-reflexive movies about entertainment and about labor/social movement organizing. |
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| Credit: 1 |
Gen Ed Area Dept:
SBS AMST |
| Course Format: Seminar | Grading Mode: Graded |
| Level: UGRD |
Prerequisites: None |
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Fulfills a Requirement for: (AMST)(ENGL)(FGSS)(FILM-MN)(HRAD-MN) |
Major Readings:
Movies include:
MALCOLM X, dir. Spike Lee (1992)
LENNY dir. Bob Fosse (1974)
STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON, dir. F. Gary Gray (2015)
CSNY DÉJÀ VU, dir. Bernard Shakey [Neil Young] (2008)
NO, dir. Pablo Larraín (2012)
NETWORK, dir. Sidney Lumet (1976)
MATEWAN, dir. John Sayles (1987)
99 HOMES, dir. Ramon Bahrain (2014)
WALL STREET, dir. Oliver Stone (1987)
THE BIG SHORT, dir. Adam McKay (2015)
Other texts include (others TBA):
Barbara Kruger, selected artwork
Howard Zinn, Mike Konopacki, and Paul Buhle, A PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF AMERICAN EMPIRE (2008) (graphic history)
Paul Buhle and David Berger, BOHEMIANS: A GRAPHIC HISTORY (2014)
Lenny Bruce, selected writings
Woody Guthrie lyrics, Pete Seeger lyrics, Jackson Browne lyrics, Ani DiFranco lyrics, Father John Misty lyrics, Gil Scott-Heron lyrics, Public Enemy lyrics, NWA lyrics
Thomas Frank, "Alternative to What?" (1997)
Malcolm X, THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MALCOLM X (1965)
George Saunders, "Exhortation," in THE TENTH OF DECEMBER (2012)
Jake Rosenfeld,"Little Labor" (2010)
Thomas Geoghegan, WERE YOU BORN ON THE WRONG CONTINENT? HOW THE EUROPEAN MODEL CAN HELP YOU GET A LIFE (2010)
Thomas Frank, PITY THE BILLIONAIRE: THE HARD-TIMES SWINDLE AND THE UNLIKELY COMEBACK OF THE RIGHT (2012)
Matthew Desmond, EVICTED: POVERTY AND PROFIT IN THE AMERICAN CITY (2015)
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Examinations and Assignments:
Each student will write a brief "book": title page, contents page, 2-page introduction, chapter 1 (first 7- 10 page essay), chapter 2 (second 7-10 page essay), chapter 3 (third 7-10 page essay), 2 page afterword. |
Additional Requirements and/or Comments:
Each student will team up with another student a couple of times during the term to raise questions about the texts we are unpacking together. Most films will be streamed, but we may be viewing some that cannot be streamed on Sundays. |
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