Contacts | Program of Study | Program Requirements | Summary of Requirements | Grading | Honors | Advising | Minor Program in Cinema and Media Studies | Courses
Department Website: http://cms.uchicago.edu
Program of Study
For more than a century, and across widely different cultures, film has been a primary medium for storytelling; it has served to depict and explore the world, to engage and shape the human senses and emotions, memory, and imagination. We live in a time in which the theatrical exhibition of films to a paying public is no longer the primary venue in which motion pictures are consumed. But cinema seems to survive, even as it is being transformed by television, video, and digital media; these media, in turn, are giving rise to new forms of moving image culture.
The major in Cinema and Media Studies provides a framework within which students can approach the history of film and related media from a variety of historical, critical, and theoretical perspectives. Focusing on the study of the moving image, as well as sound, the program enables students to analyze how cinema creates meanings through particular forms, techniques, and styles; how industrial organization affects the way films are produced and received; and how the social context in which they are made and circulated influences our understanding of the medium.
At the same time, the goal is to situate the cinema and related media in broader contexts: modernity, modernism, and the avant-garde; narrative theory, poetics, and rhetoric; commercial entertainment forms and consumer culture; sexuality and gender; constructions of ethnic, racial, and national identities; and international media production and circulation.
Students graduating with a Cinema and Media Studies major will be trained in critical, formal, theoretical, and historical thinking and analysis. The program thus fosters discussion and writing skills. Students will gain the tools to approach film history as well as today's media environment within specific cultural contexts and broad transnational perspectives.
Students wishing to enter the program should consult with the Director of Undergraduate Studies no later than Spring Quarter of their second year. Participation in the program must be declared to the Director of Undergraduate Studies before registration.
Program Requirements
The major consists of twelve courses (four required courses and eight elective courses) and a BA research paper.
Required Courses
The following five courses are required:
CMST 10100 Introduction to Film Analysis: This course provides an introduction to the basic concepts of film analysis. It should be completed before other Cinema and Media Studies courses; it must be completed before other required courses. It should be completed as early as possible; it must be completed by the end of the third year.
History of International Cinema sequence CMST 28500 and 28600: This required two-quarter sequence covers the silent era (CMST 28500 History of International Cinema I: Silent Era) and the sound era to 1960 (CMST 28600 History of International Cinema II: Sound Era to 1960), as well as major characteristics and developments of each. It is typically taught in Autumn and Winter Quarters. It should be completed by the end of the third year.
CMST 29800 Senior Colloquium: In Autumn Quarter of their fourth year, students must participate in a Senior Colloquium that helps them conceptualize their BA research paper and address more advanced questions of methodology and theory.
CMST 29900 BA Research Paper: Students are required to register for CMST 29900 BA Research Paper during the term in which they plan to graduate from the College. CMST 29900 BA Research Paper is a zero credit course. Registration for CMST 29900 ensures that a thesis grade will appear on the student's transcript. While students who entered the College before Autumn Quarter 2011 are not required to register for CMST 29900 as part of the major, they are strongly urged to do so to ensure that a thesis grade appears on the transcript. Whether or not these students choose to register for CMST 29900, they must complete the BA thesis as part of the program requirements.
Elective Courses
Of the eight remaining courses, five must either originate in or be cross-listed with Cinema and Media Studies. Students must receive prior approval of the five courses that they choose, and they are encouraged to consider broad survey courses as well as those with more focused topics (e.g., courses devoted to a single genre, director, or national cinema). Members of the affiliated faculty often teach courses that meet requirements for the three elective courses; students are encouraged to consult with them when making their selections. A course agreement form to be signed by the Director of Undergraduate Studies by fourth week of Autumn Quarter of the student's third year is available on the CMS website.
Although the other three courses may be taken outside Cinema and Media Studies, students must demonstrate their relevance to the study of cinema. For example, a group of courses could focus on: traditional disciplines (e.g., history, anthropology/ethnography, philosophy, psychology, linguistics, sociology, political economy); subfields within area studies (e.g., East Asian, South Asian, African American, Jewish studies); art forms and media other than film, photography, and video (e.g., art history, architecture, literature, theater, opera, dance); or cross-disciplinary topics or sets of problems (e.g., the urban environment, violence and pornography, censorship, copyright and industry regulation, concepts of the public sphere, globalization). A form listing and explaining the choice of outside electives must be submitted to the Director of Undergraduate Studies by fourth week of Winter Quarter of the student's third year is available on the CMS website.
BA Research Paper
Before seventh week of Spring Quarter of their third year, students meet with the Director of Undergraduate Studies to discuss the focus of their required BA project. Students begin reading and research during the summer. By the end of fourth week of the Autumn Quarter of their fourth year, students select a project adviser and prepare to present an outline of their project to the Senior Colloquium. Writing and revising take place during Winter Quarter. The final version is due by fourth week of the quarter in which the student plans to graduate.
The BA research paper typically consists of a substantial essay that engages a research topic in the history, theory, and criticism of film and/or other media. A creative project in film or video production supplemented by an essay is sometimes an option, contingent on the approval of the faculty.
To be considered for this option, the student will submit a written proposal to the Director of Undergraduate Studies by the seventh week of Spring Quarter of the third year. Priority will be given to students who have completed three production classes (2 must originate in CMST) by the end of Autumn Quarter of their fourth year.
In addition to enrollment in CMST 29800 Senior Colloquium during the Autumn Quarter of the fourth year, students who supplement their BA thesis project with film or video work are required to enroll in the Senior Creative Thesis Workshop during the Winter Quarter of their fourth year. The Senior Creative Thesis Workshop may not be counted toward distribution requirements for the major. All students are required to register for CMST 29900 BA Research Paper during the term in which they plan to graduate from the College.
Summary of Requirements
| CMST 10100 | Introduction to Film Analysis | 100 |
| CMST 28500-28600 | History of International Cinema I-II | 200 |
| CMST 29800 | Senior Colloquium | 100 |
| 5 elective courses in Cinema and Media Studies (courses originating in or cross listed with Cinema and Media Studies) * | 500 | |
| 3 elective courses (courses originating in Cinema and Media Studies or elsewhere that are relevant to the study of cinema) ** | 300 | |
| CMST 29900 | BA Research Paper † | 000 |
| Total Units | 1200 | |
| * | A course agreement form to be signed by the Director of Undergraduate Studies by fourth week of Autumn Quarter of a student's third year is required to obtain approval of these courses. |
| ** | A form to be signed by the Director of Undergraduate Studies by fourth week of Winter Quarter of a student's third year is required to obtain approval of these courses. |
| † | Students are required to register for CMST 29900 BA Research Paper, although it carries no course credit. Students must register for CMST 29900 during the term in which they graduate from the College. |
Grading
Students majoring in Cinema and Media Studies must receive a quality grade in all courses required for the major. With prior consent of instructor, non-majors may take Cinema and Media Studies courses for P/F grading.
Honors
Students who have earned an overall GPA of 3.25 or higher and a GPA of 3.5 or higher in Cinema and Media Studies courses are eligible for honors. To receive honors, students must also write a BA research paper that shows exceptional intellectual and/or creative merit in the judgment of the first and the second readers, the Director of Undergraduate Studies, and the Master of the Humanities Collegiate Division.
Advising
A course agreement form to be signed by the Director of Undergraduate Studies by fourth week of Autumn Quarter of the student's third year is required to obtain approval of the five elective courses that must either originate in or be cross listed with Cinema and Media Studies. A form to be signed by the Director of Undergraduate Studies by fourth week of Winter Quarter of the student's fourth year is required to obtain approval of the three additional elective courses. Both forms are available on the CMS website.
Minor Program in Cinema and Media Studies
The minor in Cinema and Media Studies requires the completion of six courses:
| CMST 10100 | Introduction to Film Analysis | 100 |
| CMST 28500-28600 | History of International Cinema I-II | 200 |
| Three courses numbered 20000 or above | 300 | |
| Total Units | 600 | |
Students are encouraged to take CMST 10100 Introduction to Film Analysis early in their undergraduate career, or at the beginning of their minor course of study. It must be taken no later than Spring Quarter of a student's third year.
Students who elect the minor program in Cinema and Media Studies must meet with the Director of Undergraduate Studies before the end of the Winter Quarter of their third year to declare their intention to complete the minor and to select courses. The Director's approval of the minor program should be submitted to a student's College adviser no later than the end of Spring Quarter of a student's third year. Approval forms are obtained from the Director of Undergraduate Studies, the department website, or the College adviser.
Courses in the minor (1) may not be double-counted with the student's major(s) or with other minors; and (2) may not be counted toward general education requirements. All classes toward the minor must be taken for quality grades, and more than half of the requirements for the minor must be met by registering for courses bearing University of Chicago course numbers.
Sample Minor Program in Cinema and Media Studies
| CMST 10100 | Introduction to Film Analysis | 100 |
| CMST 28500 | History of International Cinema I: Silent Era | 100 |
| CMST 28600 | History of International Cinema II: Sound Era to 1960 | 100 |
and | ||
| CMST 23404 | French Cinema of the '20s and '30s | 100 |
| CMST 24701 | Left-Wing Art and Soviet Film Culture of the 1920s | 100 |
| CMST 25201 | Cinema and the First Avant-Garde, 1890-1933 | 100 |
For the most up-to-date listing of Cinema and Media Studies courses, please visit the department's website.
Cinema and Media Studies Courses
CMST 10100. Introduction to Film Analysis. 100 Units.
This course introduces basic concepts of film analysis, which are discussed through examples from different national cinemas, genres, and directorial oeuvres. Along with questions of film technique and style, we consider the notion of the cinema as an institution that comprises an industrial system of production, social and aesthetic norms and codes, and particular modes of reception. Films discussed include works by Hitchcock, Porter, Griffith, Eisenstein, Lang, Renoir, Sternberg, and Welles.
Instructor(s): Y. Tsivian, Staff Terms Offered: Autumn, Spring
Note(s): Required of students majoring in Cinema and Media Studies
Equivalent Course(s): ARTH 20000,ARTV 25300,ENGL 10800
CMST 10300. Visual Language: On Time and Space. 100 Units.
Through studio work and critical discussion on four-dimensional form, this course is designed to reveal the conventions of the moving image, performance, and/or the production of digital-based media. Basic formal elements and principles of art are presented, but also put into practice to reveal perennial issues in a visual field. Form is studied as a means to communicate content. Topics as varied as but not limited to narrative, mechanical reproduction, verisimilitude, historical tableaux, time and memory, the body politic, and the role of the author can be illuminated through these primary investigations. Some sections focus solely on performance; others incorporate moving image technology. Please check the time schedule for details. Visits to museums and other fieldwork required, as is participation in studio exercises and group critiques. Students must attend class for the full first week in order to confirm enrollment. Pink slip/wait list requests are due several weeks before the quarter begins. Sign up for the wait list at dova.uchicago.edu/content/wait-list-core-courses-0.
Terms Offered: Autumn, Winter, Spring
Note(s): ARTV 10100, 10200, and 10300 may be taken in sequence or individually. This course meets the general education requirement in the dramatic, musical, and visual arts. Previous experience in media-based studio courses not accepted as a substitute for this course.
Equivalent Course(s): ARTV 10300,TAPS 23400
CMST 14503. Cinema in Theory and Practice. 100 Units.
The course proposes an introduction to audio-visual literacy through the analysis of films, selective readings, and short film exercises focusing on fundamental cinematic elements such as shot, framing, point of view, camera movement, editing, and relations of image and sound. Assignments will consist in in writing review sheets and a formal film analysis, and in creating three 1-3 minute single-shot movies based on the works seen and discussed in class.
Instructor(s): D. Bluher Terms Offered: Autumn
Note(s): Students must attend first class to confirm enrollment. For nonmajors, any CMST 14400 through 14599 course meets the general education requirement in the dramatic, musical, and visual arts.
CMST 21020. African American Cinema Since 1970. 100 Units.
This course surveys African American cinema since the Civil Rights Era. We will consider longstanding debates about Black images in popular culture, Black access to the means of film production, distribution and exhibition, and the development of a Black film aesthetic. Films made by, about and for African Americans will be considered in light of Black nationalisms, affirmative action initiatives, Black Feminist and Queer art and activism, Black moviegoing and spectatorship practices, the emergence of video and digital technologies, hip hop culture, and “post-racial” discourse in the Age of Obama. The course will also consider developments in scholarship on race and cinema. Topics to be discussed include Blaxploitation, the L.A. Rebellion school of Black independent filmmakers (Charles Burnett, Julie Dash, Haile Gerima, Alile Sharon Larkin), “ghettocentric” films, Black romantic comedy, literary adaptation, documentary and experimental works, as well as the careers of artists including Melvin Van Peebles, Ossie Davis, Pam Grier, Eddie Murphy, Marlon Riggs, Oprah Winfrey, Spike Lee, Denzel Washington, Cheryl Dunye, Tyler Perry, Lee Daniels, and Ava DuVernay.
Instructor(s): J. Stewart Terms Offered: Winter
Prerequisite(s): CMST 10100, ARTH 20000, ENGL 10800, ARTV 25300, or consent of instructor.
Equivalent Course(s): CMST 31020
CMST 21801. Chicago Film History. 100 Units.
Students in this course screen and discuss films to consider whether there is a Chicago style of filmmaking. We trace how the city informs documentary, educational, industrial, narrative feature, and avant-garde films. If there is a Chicago style of filmmaking, one must look at the landscape of the city; and the design, politics, cultures, and labor of its people, as well as how they live their lives. The protagonists and villains in these films are the politicians and community organizers, our locations are the neighborhoods, and the set designers are Mies van der Rohe and the Chicago Housing Authority.
Instructor(s): J. Hoffman Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): ARTV 26750,ARTV 36750,CMST 31801,HMRT 25104,HMRT 35104
CMST 21810. Post-War American Avant-Garde. 100 Units.
In the 1940’s the American avant garde cinema gained a new identity with the work of filmmakers like Maya Deren, and Kenneth Anger. Working primarily in 16mm, exhibiting mainly in non-commercial theaters, pursuing new models of sexuality, perception and political action, a generation of filmmakers formulated an alternative cinema culture and a new visionary aesthetic. This tradition gained further definition in the following, with journals, new critical discourses and a network of exhibition. Film modes moved through the mythic and dream-like cinema of Stan Brakhage, Bruce Baillie, the underground cinema of Ken Jacobs, Andy Warhol and Jack Smith, and the structural films of Hollis Frampton, Michael Snow and Ernie Gehr. The course will trace these develops and examine its legacy.
Instructor(s): T. Gunning Terms Offered: Winter
Prerequisite(s): CMST 10100, ARTH 20000, ENGL 10800, ARTV 25300, or consent of instructor.
Equivalent Course(s): CMST 31810
CMST 23202. Rome in Film and Literature. 100 Units.
We shall analyze films and fictional works that reflect both realities and myths about the “Eternal City,” Rome. Classical Rome will not be studied; instead the focus will be on a trajectory of works, both written and cinematic, that are set in and explore late nineteenth to late twentieth-century Rome. The goal is to analyze some of the numerous diverse representations of modern Rome that portray historical, political, subjective, and/or fantastical/mythopoetic elements that have interacted over time to produce the palimpsest that is the city of Rome. Books by D’Annunzio, Moravia, Pasolini and Malerba; films by Fellini, Visconti, Rossellini, Bertolucci, Pasolini, and Moretti.
Instructor(s): R. West Terms Offered: Winter
Note(s): Taught in English; Italian majors will read the texts in the original Italian.
Equivalent Course(s): ITAL 23203,CMST 32302,ITAL 33203
CMST 23404. French Cinema of the '20s and '30s. 100 Units.
In our study of two decades in the history of French cinema, we will track the rise of the poetic realist style from the culture of experimentation that was alive in both the French film industry and its surrounding artistic and literary landscape. As an exercise in the excavation of a history of film style, we will consider the salient features of the socio-political, cultural, theoretical, and critical landscape that define the emergence and the apex of poetic realism, and that reveal it as a complicated nexus in the history of film aesthetics. Main texts by Dudley Andrew and Richard Abel will accompany a wide range of primary texts. Films by Epstein, L’Herbier, Buñuel, Dulluc, Dulac, Gance, Clair, Vigo, Feyder, Renoir, Duvivier, Allégret, Carné, Grémillon.
Instructor(s): J. Wild Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): CMST 10100, ARTH 20000, ENGL 10800, ARTV 25300, or consent of instructor.
Note(s): This class is cross-listed with the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures and may be accompanied by a French language section.
Equivalent Course(s): CMST 33404
CMST 23904. Senior Creative Thesis Workshop. 100 Units.
This seminar will focus on how to craft a creative thesis in film or video. Works-in-progress will be screened each week, and technical and structural issues relating to the work will be explored. The workshop will also develop the written portion of the creative thesis. The class is limited to seniors from CMS and DOVA, and MAPH students working on a creative thesis.
Instructor(s): J. Hoffman Terms Offered: Winter
Prerequisite(s): CMST 23930; CMST 23931; departmental approval of senior creative thesis project.
Equivalent Course(s): ARTV 23904,ARTV 33904
CMST 23905. Creative Thesis Workshop. 100 Units.
This seminar will focus on how to craft a creative thesis in film or video. Works-in-progress will be screened each week, and technical and structural issues relating to the work will be explored. The workshop will also develop the written portion of the creative thesis. The class is limited to seniors from CMS and DOVA, and MAPH students working on a creative thesis.
Instructor(s): J. Hoffman Terms Offered: Winter, Spring
Prerequisite(s): CMST 23930; CMST 23931 or 27600; departmental approval of senior creative thesis project.
CMST 23930. Documentary Production I. 100 Units.
This class is intended to develop skills in documentary production so that students may apply for Documentary Production II. Documentary Production I focuses on the making of independent documentary video. Examples of various styles of documentary will be screened and discussed. Issues embedded in the documentary genre, such as the ethics and politics of representation and the shifting lines between fact and fiction will be explored. Pre-production methodologies, production, and post-production techniques will be taught. Students will be expected to develop an idea for a documentary video, crews will be formed, and each crew will produce a five-minute documentary. Students will also be expected to purchase an external hard drive.
Instructor(s): J. Hoffman Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): Prior or concurrent enrollment in CMST 10100 is strongly recommended.
Equivalent Course(s): ARTV 23930
CMST 23931. Documentary Production II. 100 Units.
This course focuses on the shaping and crafting of a nonfiction video. Students are expected to write a treatment detailing their project. Production techniques focus on the handheld camera versus tripod, interviewing and microphone placement, and lighting for the interview. Postproduction covers editing techniques and distribution strategies. Students then screen final projects in a public space.
Instructor(s): J. Hoffman Terms Offered: Winter
Prerequisite(s): CMST 23930/ARTV 23930
CMST 24106. Radical Cinema in India: From Decolonization to the Emergency. 100 Units.
What constitutes radicalism in cinema? All too often the expression radical has been reserved for films that come under the rubric of “art”, “parallel” or “third” cinema. Formally these films share certain commonalities with Latin American, Eastern European cinemas and even the various European new waves. Is it possible however to read a radical politics and ethics into films and filmmakers who did not self-consciously describe themselves as such? To what extent does political cinema and extra-cinematic discussions of such films compromise questions of formalism? This course will analyze these and related issues by looking closely at Indian cinema from 1947 to 1977. We will be watching and discussing both “popular” and “art” films to understand the ways in which they have addressed (or not) issues of mass politics, the state, and the people. You do not need a prior background in Indian films or Indian history to take this class but it is absolutely essential that you attend all the screenings and participate in class discussion.
Instructor(s): R. Majumdar Terms Offered: Spring 2015
Equivalent Course(s): SALC 20508,HIST 26707,HIST 36707,SALC 30508
CMST 24204. South African Fiction and Film. 100 Units.
This course examines the intersection of fiction and film in Southern Africa since mid-20th-century decolonization. We begin with Cry, the Beloved Country, a best seller written by South African Alan Paton while in the US, and the original film version by a Hungarian-born British-based director (Zoltan Korda) and an American screenwriter (John Howard Lawson), which together show both the international impact of South African stories and the important elements missed by overseas audiences. We will continue with fictional and non-fictional narrative responses to apartheid and decolonization in film and in print, and examine the power and the limits of what critic Louise Bethlehem has called the “rhetoric of urgency” on local and international audiences. We will conclude with writing and film that grapples with the complexities of the post-apartheid world, whose challenges, from crime and corruption to AIDS and the particular problems faced by women and gender minorities, elude the heroic formulas of the anti-apartheid struggle era. (B)
Instructor(s): L. Kruger Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): ENGL 24807
CMST 24400. From Post-War to Post-Wall: A History of Polish Film. 100 Units.
This course will explore post-World War II film from Poland—approaching the works both as examples of the cinematic art in the region and as a lens through which to view developments and transformations in East European culture. We will view ten films by most renowned directors from Poland. The course will assess what the end of World War II, joining the Eastern Bloc, the fall of communism, and finally the entry into post-Soviet Europe have meant for the film culture and the Polish national film tradition. We will also consider how Eastern European cinematic discourse is undergoing—or should undergo—revision, viewing it as an increasingly transnational phenomenon, rather than the example of a national film industry. The films will be viewed in the original language with English subtitles.
Instructor(s): Kinga Kosmala Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): POLI 22400,CMST 34400,POLI 32400
CMST 24612. Chinese-language Film Comedy. 100 Units.
With the exception of the Hong Kong martial arts comedies that have gained worldwide popularity in recent decades, comedy has not been a genre generally associated with Chinese-language cinemas. Yet precisely because of the “seriousness” of China’s long 20th century laden with suffering and crisis, Chinese-language comedies provide a concentrated site for investigating national cinema on the one hand and the generic conventions of comedy on the other. Various modes of production and style will be explored in this course, including slapstick comedy and costume drama in the silent era; left-wing romantic comedy in the 1930s; post-WWII screwball comedy; the post-1949 tripartite development of comedy in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan; Chinese-American “comedy of immigration”; as well as post-modern pastiche and dark comedy from the post-new-era in the 21st century.
Instructor(s): X. Dong Terms Offered: Winter
Prerequisite(s): CMST 10100, ARTH 20000, ENGL 10800, ARTV 25300, or consent of instructor.
Equivalent Course(s): CMST 34612
CMST 24620. Introduction to South Korean Cinema: Gender, Politics, History. 100 Units.
This undergraduate course examines the cinematic representation of modern Korean history, politics, and gender in South Korean films, aiming to establish a comprehensive understanding of Korean film history from its early stage to its contemporary global recognition. While proceeding chronologically, we will interrogate key problematic subjects in South Korean cinema such as gender politics, the discourse of modernity, the representation of historical and political events, and practices of film culture and industry. The film texts examined in this course include not only break-though masterpieces of prominent film auteurs but also popular genre films that enjoyed box-office success. Through these examples, we will examine how the most influential art form in South Korea has recognized, interpreted, and resolved current societal issues through creative endeavor. The course also seeks to establish a balance between understanding Korean cinema as both a reservoir of historical memory and as an example of evolving world cinema. Being presented with methodological issues from film studies in each week’s film reading, including the question of archives, national cinema discourse, feminist film theory, auteurism, and genre studies, students in this course will learn to analyze Korean filmic texts not only as a way to understand the particularity of Korean cinema and history but also as a frontier of cinematic language in the broader film history.
Instructor(s): H. Park Terms Offered: Spring
Note(s): All the materials are available in English and no knowledge of Korean language is required.
Equivalent Course(s): EALC 16600,GNSE 16610
CMST 24914. Delinquent Cinemas in Japan. 100 Units.
This course examines Japanese film history from the perspective of youth: films made for, about, and by young people. Starting with 1933’s Dragnet Girl and moving through 2003’s Bright Future, we will study a wide range of films dealing with juvenile delinquency and ask how the bad boys and girls of the screen reflect and embody the sociocultural crises, ideological debates, and aesthetic aspirations of their times. Young people have long been the Japanese film industry’s largest (and most economically important) demographic group. The ways in which young characters are used to hail, edify, and/or entertain their counterparts in the audience will be closely considered. Readings will mostly be secondary scholarship, but where appropriate we will address contemporaneous fiction and non-fiction texts as well. All readings are in English and available on Chalk. No prior Japanese or cinema studies background required.
Instructor(s): R. Davis Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): EALC 24930
CMST 25204. Media Ecology: Embodiment and Software. 100 Units.
Media ecology examines how the structure and content of our media environments—online and offline, in words, images, sounds, and textures—affect human perception, understanding, feeling, and value; or alternatively, media ecology investigates the massive and dynamic interrelation of processes and objects, beings and things, patterns and matter. At stake are issues about agency—human or material—and about determinism—how does society or culture interact with or shape its technologies, or vice versa? This course investigates theories of media ecology by exploring systems of meanings that humans embody (cultural, social, ecological) in conjunction with the emerging field of software studies about the cultural, political, social, and aesthetic impacts of software (e.g., code, interaction, interface). In our actual and virtual environments, how do we understand performing our multiple human embodiments in relation to other bodies (organism or machine) in pursuit of social or political goals?
Instructor(s): M. Browning Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): HUMA 25202,HIPS 25203,LLSO 27801,TAPS 28452
CMST 25215. Catching Spies. 100 Units.
How do we account for 20th century literature's fascination with spies and spying? How do we explain the emergence of this new literary subject with the inauguration of the new century? This course will examine the place the figure of the spy holds for twentieth-century imagination as reflected in literature, theater and film. It will suggest that the spy becomes a locus of fascination for literature when overlooked by the disciplines charged with regulating his actions. In positing espionage literature and film as a response to the law's impossibility of address we will establish the potential the figure of the spy holds to respond to an array of questions relating to identity and subjectivity through such tropes as homelessness and border crossing, sexual difference, theatricality and masquerade, technology and voyeurism.
Instructor(s): T. Abramov Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): GRMN 25215,ENGL 25215
CMST 25521. East European Horror Cinema. 100 Units.
Eastern Europe has menaced the "enlightened" West for centuries. It remains to this day a valuable source for negotiating the West’s phantasies. One need only look at the rich and varied story of the vampire through popular culture from the 18th-century revenant to the 21st-century sex symbol and family man to confirm this fascination. Eastern Europe (and I use this term here to conform to popular discourse) is the West’s necessary construct to enforce the ideation of its own health and weal. In this course, contemporary horror film produced both within and without Eastern Europe—and at times in partnership with the “West”—but all with the East as haunt, landscape, and affect are discussed with the West’s and East’s anxieties (social, political, artistic) in mind. Films include Eli Roth’s Hostel franchise, Julie Delpy’s The Countess, Timur Bekmambetov’s Night Watch and Day Watch, Pavel Ruminov’s Dead Daughters, Nacho Cerdà’s The Abandoned, György Palfi’s Taxidermia, and the highly controversial A Serbian Film directed by Srđan Spasojević. Readings range from work on defining the horror genre to philosophies of anxiety to critical interrogations of specific films. This class contains films with scenes that ought to be disturbing.
Instructor(s): Malynne Sternstein Terms Offered: Spring
Prerequisite(s): Knowledge of an East European or Central European Slavic language
Equivalent Course(s): EEUR 39301,CMST 35521,EEUR 29301
CMST 26302. Ernst Lubitsch: An International Style. 100 Units.
“How would Lubitsch do it?” asks Billy Wilder, who famously hang this question in his office. He asked the question hanging in the minds of generations of filmmakers around the world, most likely including Lubitsch himself. In a career spanning nearly three decades, Lubitsch’s name has come to denote a style about style, first exported from Germany to Hollywood and then from Hollywood to the world. In this sense, Lubitsch is first and foremost a filmmaker for filmmakers, and his style decidedly an international one. It is the goal of this course to examine a broadly defined international stylistic history developed by and associated with Lubitsch, whose legacy cannot be adequately assessed without such a perspective. With dual emphases on formal and historical analyses, we will look at Lubitsch’s early Weimar comedy and epic films, American silent masterpieces, musicals, sound comedies, and political farces, as well as Lubitsch-esque films made in Japan, China, and France.
Instructor(s): X. Dong Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): CMST 36302,FNDL 26507
CMST 26404. The Cinema of Walt Disney. 100 Units.
This course offers a critical survey of the animated cartoons produced by Walt Disney during his lifetime. We will watch his major feature films and shorts with an eye to the relationship between cinematic form and technology. Although we will not neglect Disney's place in global culture, our focus will be on developing a vocabulary for analyzing the visual style of celluloid animation and learning to conduct primary research in the history of film production and reception. Readings will draw equally from criticism by Disney's contemporaries and recent works of historical and theoretical scholarship on animation in general and Disney in particular.
Instructor(s): H. Frank Terms Offered: Winter
CMST 26610. Eisenstein: His Films and Ideas. 100 Units.
How well do we really know Sergei Eisenstein? His reputation has long been secure as creator of the Soviet cinema’s most enduring classics, and as a pioneer theorist and teacher. This class will help students to keep pace with a rising tide of Eisenstein’s scholarship to reveal a far more eclectic and erotic figure than tradition would suggest.
Instructor(s): Y. Tsivian Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): CMST 10100, ARTH 20000, ENGL 10800, ARTV 25300, or consent of instructor.
Equivalent Course(s): CMST 36610,FNDL 26504
CMST 26810. Agnes Varda. 100 Units.
This course examines the work of one of the most significant directors working in France today. Making important films from the 1960s to the present day, Varda has been crucial to the development of new film practices: both in the past—as with the birth of the French New Wave Cinema—and in the present by exploring new form of plastic narration and by working with moving images in gallery spaces.
Instructor(s): D. Bluher Terms Offered: Spring
CMST 27210. Cinema and Theory. 100 Units.
The course proposes an introduction to audio-visual literacy through the analysis of films, selective readings, and short film exercises focusing on fundamental cinematic elements such as shot, framing, point of view, camera movement, editing, and relations of image and sound. Assignments will consist in in writing review sheets and a formal film analysis, and in creating three one-to-three-minute single-shot movies based on the works seen and discussed in class.
Instructor(s): D. Bluher Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): CMST 10100, ARTH 20000, ENGL 10800, ARTV 25300, or consent of instructor.
CMST 27220. Classical Film Theory. 100 Units.
This course will present a critical survey of the principal authors, concepts, and films in the classical period of film theory. The main though not exclusive emphasis will be the period of silent film and theorists writing in the context of French and German cinema. We will study the aesthetic debates of the period in their historical context, whose central questions include: Is film an art? If so, what specific and autonomous means of expression define it as an aesthetic medium? What defines the social force and function of cinema as a mass art? Weekly readings and discussion will examine major film movements of the classical period—for example, French impressionism and Surrealism—as well as the work of such major figures as Hugo Münsterberg, Rudolf Arnheim, Jean Epstein, Germaine Dulac, Béla Balázs, Erwin Panofsky, Hans Richter, Siegfried Kracauer, Walter Benjamin, and André Bazin.
Instructor(s): D.N. Rodowick Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): CMST 10100, ARTH 20000, ENGL 10800, ARTV 25300, or consent of instructor.
Equivalent Course(s): CMST 37220
CMST 27230. Modern Film Theory. 100 Units.
This course will examine influential writings on photography, film, and film narrative published in the post-war period in the context of semiology, structuralism, and narratology. We will examine how questions of form, structure, and narrative in film and photography are addressed by critics writing from the end of World War II until the early seventies, especially in France and Italy. In what ways can the image be considered a sign? How do images come to have meaning in a denotative or connotative sense? What are the principal codes organizing images as narrative media and how do spectators recognise those codes? Readings will include work by Roland Barthes, Christian Metz, Jean Mitry, Noël Burch, Raymond Bellour, Umberto Eco, Pier Paolo Pasolini, and David Bordwell, among others.
Instructor(s): D.N. Rodowick Terms Offered: Winter
Prerequisite(s): CMST 10100, ARTH 20000, ENGL 10800, ARTV 25300, or consent of instructor.
Equivalent Course(s): CMST 37230
CMST 27600. Introduction to Black and White Film Photography. 100 Units.
Photography is a familiar medium due to its ubiquitous presence in our visual world, including popular culture and personal usage. In this class, students learn technical procedures and basic skills related to the 35mm camera, black and white film, and print development. They also begin to establish criteria for artistic expression. We investigate photography in relation to its historical and social context in order to more consciously engage the photograph's communicative and expressive possibilities. Course work culminates in a portfolio of works exemplary of the student's understanding of the medium. Field trips required.
Instructor(s): S. Huffman, L. Letinsky Terms Offered: Autumn, Spring
Prerequisite(s): ARTV 10100, 10200, or 10300
Note(s): Camera and light meter required.
Equivalent Course(s): ARTV 24000,ARTV 34000,CMST 37600
CMST 27810. Cinema and New Media. 100 Units.
Over the past two decades, new media such as television, computers and the web, digital image production, and video games have begun to transform, and even supplant, the social and cultural prominence of cinema. This course will look at how these media work: the history of their development, the changes they have brought about in a broader media culture, their political implications, and their social status and significance (e.g., the place they occupy in culture, the kinds of interactions they make possible). The focus will equally be on the ways in which cinema has responded to the changing digital landscape, which will be explored through both blockbuster and experimental films as well as video and web-based art. Readings will be taken from the history of film theory, recent work in media history and archeology, and theoretical studies of digital media and technology.
Instructor(s): D. Morgan Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): CMST 37810
CMST 28005. Grain. 100 Units.
Grain is an elemental property of film, wood, and the human voice. This production seminar investigates the essential structure of these three materials through screenings, discussions, and studio work in 16mm film production, sculpture, and performance. Emphasis will be on direct manipulation of material—hand processing and editing black and white 16mm film and woodworking with hand tools. Texts by Bergson, Deleuze, Barthes, and Sennet will inform our engagement with matter and perception as will a 16mm film series including works by Griffith, Frampton, Snow, and Andersen, and sound works by Beuys, Cage, and others.
Instructor(s): K. Pandian Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): ARTV 10100, 10200 or 10300
Equivalent Course(s): ARTV 23848,ARTV 33848
CMST 28100. Issues in Film Music. 100 Units.
This course explores the role of film music in the history of cinema. What role does music play as part of the narrative (source music) and as nondiegetic music (underscoring)? How does music of different styles and provenance contribute to the semiotic universe of film? And how did film music assume a central voice in twentieth-century culture? We study music composed for films (original scores) as well as pre-existent music (e.g., popular and classical music). The twenty films covered in the course may include classical Hollywood cinema, documentaries, foreign (e.g., non-Western) films, experimental films, musicals, and cartoons.
Instructor(s): B. Hoeckner
Note(s): This course typically is offered in alternate years.
Equivalent Course(s): CMST 38100,MUSI 22901,MUSI 30901
CMST 28500-28600. History of International Cinema I-II.
This sequence is required of students majoring in Cinema and Media Studies. Taking these courses in sequence is strongly recommended but not required.
CMST 28500. History of International Cinema I: Silent Era. 100 Units.
This course introduces what was singular about the art and craft of silent film. Its general outline is chronological. We also discuss main national schools and international trends of filmmaking.
Instructor(s): T. Gunning Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): Prior or concurrent registration in CMST 10100 required. Required of students majoring in Cinema and Media Studies.
Note(s): This is the first part of a two-quarter course.
Equivalent Course(s): ARTH 28500,ARTH 38500,ARTV 26500,ARTV 36500,CMLT 22400,CMLT 32400,CMST 48500,ENGL 29300,ENGL 48700,MAPH 36000
CMST 28600. History of International Cinema II: Sound Era to 1960. 100 Units.
The center of this course is film style, from the classical scene breakdown to the introduction of deep focus, stylistic experimentation, and technical innovation (sound, wide screen, location shooting). The development of a film culture is also discussed. Texts include Thompson and Bordwell's Film History: An Introduction; and works by Bazin, Belton, Sitney, and Godard. Screenings include films by Hitchcock, Welles, Rossellini, Bresson, Ozu, Antonioni, and Renoir.
Instructor(s): T. Gunning Terms Offered: Winter
Prerequisite(s): Prior or concurrent registration in CMST 10100 required. Required of students majoring in Cinema and Media Studies.
Note(s): CMST 28500/48500 strongly recommended
Equivalent Course(s): ARTH 28600,ARTH 38600,ARTV 26600,CMLT 22500,CMLT 32500,CMST 48600,ENGL 29600,ENGL 48900,MAPH 33700
CMST 28801. Digital Imaging. 100 Units.
This studio course introduces fundamental tools and concepts used in the production of computer-mediated artwork. Instruction includes a survey of standard digital imaging software and hardware (i.e., Photoshop, scanners, storage, printing, etc), as well as exposure to more sophisticated methods. We also view and discuss the historical precedents and current practice of media art. Using input and output hardware, students complete conceptually driven projects emphasizing personal direction while gaining core digital knowledge.
Instructor(s): J. Salavon Terms Offered: Spring
Prerequisite(s): ARTV 10100, 10200, or 10300
Equivalent Course(s): ARTV 22500,ARTV 32500,CMST 38801
CMST 28903. Video. 100 Units.
This is a production course geared towards short experimental works and video within a studio art context.
Instructor(s): S. Wolniak Terms Offered: Spring
Prerequisite(s): ARTV 10100, 10200 or 10300
Equivalent Course(s): ARTV 23801,ARTV 33801
CMST 29004. Architectural History and Critical Media Practice. 100 Units.
This advanced studio course is offered in conjunction with a Gray Center collaboration between D. N. Rodowick and Victor Burgin. We will investigate how creative practice can engage specific architectural sites and explore the erased or disappeared cultural histories, real and/or imagined, inscribed in those spaces. Our focus will be the history of “The Mecca” apartment building. Despite great protest, The Mecca was demolished in 1952 as part of the expansion of the Illinois Institute of Design under the plan of Mies van der Rohe. This site and its Bronzeville environs thus present a variety of opportunities for exploring themes of displaced architectures, competing visions of modernism and utopia, and conflicts in popular and cultural memory. Students are expected to propose and pursue individual projects around this theme and to work experimentally with strategies of research and writing together with still and/or moving image production. Field trips required.
Instructor(s): D. N. Rodowick, V. Burgin Terms Offered: Spring
Prerequisite(s): Prior coursework and/or experience with a camera-based practice (photography, film, video, 3D modelling) is required. Admission to this course is by application and with consent of the instructors. Please contact Sophia Rhee sophiar@uchicago.edu to apply for consent.
Equivalent Course(s): ARTV 26201,ARTH 26201,ARTH 36201,ARTV 36201,CMST 39004
CMST 29700. Reading and Research Course. 100 Units.
Terms Offered: Autumn, Winter, Spring
Prerequisite(s): Consent of faculty adviser and Director of Undergraduate Studies
Note(s): Students are required to submit the College Reading and Research Form. This course may be counted toward distribution requirements for the major.
CMST 29800. Senior Colloquium. 100 Units.
This seminar is designed to provide fourth-year students with a sense of the variety of methods and approaches in the field (e.g., formal analysis, cultural history, industrial history, reception studies, psychoanalysis). Students present material related to their BA project, which is discussed in relation to the issues of the course.
Instructor(s): J. Wild Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): CMST 10100. Required of students majoring in Cinema and Media Studies.
CMST 29900. BA Research Paper. 000 Units.
Terms Offered: Winter, Spring
Prerequisite(s): Consent of instructor. Required of students majoring in Cinema and Media Studies.
Note(s): Students are required to submit the College Reading and Research Form. This course may not be counted toward requirements for the major or as a free-elective credit.
Contacts
Chair
Barbara E. & Richard J. Franke Distinguished Service Professor
James Chandler
Regenstein S102
773.702.8274
Email
Undergraduate Primary Contact
Assistant Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies
Xinyu Dong
Gates-Blake 416
773.834.1077
Email
Administrative Contact
Department Coordinator
Gates-Blake 418
773.834.1077
Email