Saving America from Itself? Movie Interventions (Moore, Lee, DuVernay, Kopple): Junior Colloquium
AMST 204
Spring 2024
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01
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We will convene four interventionist filmmakers--Michael Moore, Spike Lee, Ava DuVernay, Barbara Kopple--in a strategic dialogue to consider the American studies whistleblowing and anti-bamboozling potential of movies. Their movies have tried to sway elections, empower social movements, inspire protest, popularize national self-critique, study the tactics of top-down power (including scapegoating) and bottom-up resistance, and, perhaps, save America from itself. The many cultural-theoretical payoffs of their movies include moving us beyond any oversimple checklist tendency simply to observe representations of gender, race, and class. They help us question why these categories were produced in particular ways and help us interrogate (intersectionally and dialectically) how they interact with, rely on, and sometimes mask one another. Our four independent filmmakers--in trying to be changemakers--dare us not only to take a hard look at what kind of an America we have had and now have, but prod us, at times seduce us, to imagine more expansively what kind of America we might want to create. We will also put their movies in dialogue with related movies by D. W. Griffith, Boots Riley, Robert Reich, and others. And to establish a longue durée historical perspective, we will read Howard Zinn's epic classic A People's History of the United States. In terms of fields, our colloquium integrates movie studies, cultural studies, premises studies, resistance studies, and social transformation studies. |
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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) |
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Past Enrollment Probability: 75% - 89% |
| SECTION 01 |
Major Readings: Wesleyan RJ Julia Bookstore
--The James Baldwin vs. William F. Buckley, Jr. Debate, The Cambridge [University] Union (video) (1965)
--A HUEY P. NEWTON STORY (2001, Spike Lee)
--BLACKkKLANSMAN (2018, Spike Lee)
--Michael Nordine, Boots Riley Criticizes Lee's Portrayal of Cops in BLACKkKLANSMAN, Calls the Real Ron Stallworth a Villain (article) (2018)
--Judie Dry, Spike Lee Responds to Boots Riley's Criticism of BLACKkKLANSMAN: Black People Are Not a Monolithic Group (article) (2018)
--MALCOLM X (1992, Spike Lee)
--Clayborne Carson, MALCOLM X (essay) (1995)
--BAMBOOZLED (2000, Spike Lee)
--Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, How Do We Change America? The Quest to Transform this Country Cannot Be Limited to Challenging Its Brutal Police (article) (2020)
--ROGER AND ME (1989, Michael Moore)
--PETS OR MEAT: THE RETURN TO FLINT (short film) (1992, Michael Moore)
--BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE (2002, Michael Moore)
--Michael Moore, Tribeca Film Festival Interviews about COLUMBINE (video) (2019)
--James McEnteer, MICHAEL MOORE: AMBUSH ARTIST (essay) (2006)
--FAHRENHEIT 9/11 (2004, Michael Moore)
--FAHRENHEIT 11/9 (2018, Michael Moore)
--SELMA (2014, Ava DuVernay)
--Martin Luther King, Jr. THE OTHER AMERICA (video of speech) (1968)
--Harry Belafonte and Martin Luther King, Jr. TONIGHT SHOW (short clip of the interview) (1965)
--Cornel West, "The Radical King" (short video) (2015)
--13TH (2016, Ava DuVernay)
--13TH: A CONVERSATION WITH OPRAH AND AVA DUVERNAY (video) (2017)
--WHEN THEY SEE US (2019, Ava DuVernay)
--OPRAH WINFREY PRESENTS: WHEN THEY SEE US NOW (video) (2019, Mark Ritchie)
--HARLAN COUNTY, USA (1976, Barbara Kopple)
--Jake Rosenfeld, Little Labor: How Union Decline Is Changing The American Landscape (article) (2010)
--DIXIE CHICKS: SHUT UP AND SING (2006, Barbara Kopple, Cecilia Peck)
--SEXISM IN COUNTRY MUSIC (FULL FRONTAL WITH SAMANTHA BEE) (video) (2020)
--The Chicks, MARCH, MARCH (video of their hit song) (2020)
--Howard Zinn, A PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES (2009)
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Examinations and Assignments:
Assignments TBA. Most movies we'll unpack will be streamed (for free), but some will be available only on Netflix and students will have to have access to a Netflix account. |
Additional Requirements and/or Comments:
: Contributes to fulfillment of ENGL major requirements: Literary History 3 and American Literature, elective |
| Instructor(s): Pfister,Joel Times: ..T.... 01:20PM-04:10PM; Location: RUSSMILLET; |
| Total Enrollment Limit: 15 | | SR major: 3 | JR major: 7 | | |
| Seats Available: 3 | GRAD: X | SR non-major: 0 | JR non-major: 1 | SO: 4 | FR: 0 |
| Drop/Add Enrollment Requests | | | | | |
| Total Submitted Requests: 0 | 1st Ranked: 0 | 2nd Ranked: 0 | 3rd Ranked: 0 | 4th Ranked: 0 | Unranked: 0 |
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