ENG 1025 Film and Gender

Cinema is a matter of what is in the frame and what is out, quote by Martin Scorsese. In this course students will learn how to analyze film as an art form that is also informed by a politics of representation. First, film as an art form. This course will cover basic film concepts (cinematography, mise-en-scene, editing sound) and apply them to individual films. Second, what is considered politics of representation? Among many other things, movies tell us what women are like, what women like, what men like, who the real men are, and so on, but who is telling us? A first step in an attempt to answer this question is a discussion of Laura Mulvey's seminal article Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema. The key phrase and concept Mulvey gives birth to here, and that has wielded enormous influence in film theory and cinema studies in general, is the concept of what is considered the male gaze, defined as follows: The male gaze is the way in which the visual arts and literature depict the world and women from a masculine point of view, presenting women as objects of male pleasure. This course will expand on that concept by looking, conversely, what is considered the female gaze and female pleasure and also perhaps at something we might call the gender-disorienting gaze and its pleasures. We will also discuss the limitations of Mulvey's theory as perhaps too focused on mastery and control. Through film analysis, this course will enable students to understand large and slippery concepts like society, politics, ideology, gender and subjectivity, and show them how gaining skill in film analysis will also help them to read and analyze real life critically.

Credits

3