Art History/English/Film Studies 111:
Entertainment Arts—Film, Television and the Internet
Professor Gilberto M. Blasini
1st 4-Week Summer Session (May 31st – 25, 2022)
Email address: gblasini@uwm.edu
Course Description: Art History/English/Film Studies 111 offers a general introduction to the critical study of film, television, and the internet. While examining each technology individually we will also work in a state of persistent comparison, endeavoring to comprehend media culture as a larger phenomenon. There are no prerequisites for this course; therefore, you are not expected to have any prior knowledge of media studies. We will begin with the premise that film, television, and new media offer much more than “entertainment” and, accordingly, studying these forms is a serious undertaking requiring rigor and diligence.
This course satisfies the General Education Requirement in the Humanities.
Reading Materials: There are no textbooks or readers to be purchased for this course.
All required readings are available in PDF format at our course’s Canvas site.
Papers: As part of your work for this class, you will write three short papers (4 pages long, double spaced), one for each of the course’s units—that is, one on TV, one on film and one on the internet. These papers will assess how well you can apply the theories, and methods presented to you through lecture notes, readings and screenings.
Discussion Participation: The course relies on the active and engaged participation of all students. We will spend the majority of class time talking about the readings and screenings through asynchronous discussions. Consistent engagement will result in more complete and intelligent understanding of the material, and therefore, greater success in the course. For each unit, you will write an original posting, and four responses to different students.
Grade Breakdown:
Three Critical Papers: 50%
Participation in Discussions: 50%
For more information on the L&S Film Studies program, visit http://uwm.edu/letsci/filmstudies/ or contact Dr. Zach Finch, the advisor for the Film Studies program at: zfinch@uwm.edu
Art History/English/Film Studies 111 is a core course for the Digital Arts and Culture Certificate Program and an intermediate-level course in the Film Studies BA.
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ENG/FILMSTD 291
Introduction to Television Studies
Summer 2022
Online
Professor Elana Levine
ehlevine@uwm.edu
Fulfills major requirements for English major (Plan H and Plan O) as well as Film Studies.
Course Description:
This course introduces students to the central issues and concerns in the field of television studies. While this is a field that recognizes and seeks to understand the pleasures of television in our everyday lives, it also takes a critical perspective on television, questioning why and how the medium functions as it does. Central to this course is the idea that television matters in our international, national, and local societies and in our individual, everyday lives. Although most of our readings and examples will be drawn from US television, we will also take into account the global circulation of television in the 21st century. We will explore three major aspects of television in this course: the television industry, television texts, and television audiences.
Course Objectives:
By the end of this course, you will:
1) Understand the parameters of the field of television studies
2) Understand the key issues surrounding the television industry, television texts, and television audiences
3) Improve your textual analysis skills, both oral and written
4) Improve your ability to read and understand television and media studies scholarship
5) Develop a more critical, sophisticated perspective on your own relationship to television
Required Readings:
Ethan Thompson and Jason Mittell, editors. How to Watch Television, 2nd Edition (New York: New York University Press, 2020), ISBN: 978-1479898817, $30.00
Additional readings will be made available on Canvas
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English/Film Studies
312: Cinema and Digital Culture
Summer 2022
Professor Tami Williams
E-mail: tamiw@uwm.edu
Course Description:
From cinema to smart phones, and more recently, augmented reality games, the multimedia context of contemporary life is rapidly changing. From the late 19th century kinetoscope to the 21st century iPhone, moving image culture has, in fact, never stopped reinventing or creating itself anew. This course provides a general introduction to the study of moving image culture in the digital age. We will examine the nature of the digital from a variety of perspectives: technological, economic, and social. However, our primary approach will be cultural and aesthetic. Namely, we will look at how “new media,” such as digital cinema, virtual reality, video games, and the “World Wide Web,” refashion earlier forms such as film and television, as well as how these latter are, themselves, influenced by emerging media. In addition to studying critical, historical, and theoretical texts on cinema and digital technologies, we will consider the place of the Self within the context of digital media. Class discussions will focus on readings, film and media viewings, and web visits.This class also counts towards the major and minor in Film Studies, as well as the Media, Cinema, and Digital Studies track in English. It also counts towards the new Business of Media and Film Studies and the Digital Arts and Culture certificates.
Texts and Screenings:
There are no required textbooks. All course readings will be available on Canvas. A students will be able to choose from a wide variety of screening titles (films, TV shows) available through Streaming sites like Amazon Prime, Criterion, Hulu, Netflix, YouTube or UWM Media Library.
Online Schedule Format – The course is largely ‘asynchronous.’ You have the freedom to post at any hour, as long as you meet the weekly deadlines (listed in course schedule).
Weekly Topics:
Unit 1: New Technologies: Production & Culture
Unit 2: Digital Cinema: DV Realism & Special Effects
Unit 3: New Forms: VR & Video Games
Unit 4: Self, Other & Digital Media: from Social Networking to Culture Jamming
Assignments:
Weekly posts, 1 Short Essay, and 1 Final Essay