Please note: The reading list includes the 'tilleggspensum' for hovedfag students. MA students will be told in class which items they are not responsible for.
Readings:
Sklar, Robert: Movie-Made America: A Cultural History of American Movies , 1994. NY: Vintage. (Hovedfagstillegg 3-121; everyone -- rest of book).
Buel, Joy Day and Richard Buel, Jr.: The Way of Duty: A Woman and Her Faily in Revolutionary America, 1984. W.W. Norton. (* To be read quickly - not in depth).
Couvares, Francis G., ed.: Movie Censorship and American Culture, 1996. Smithsonian Institution Press.
Landy, Marcia, ed.: The Historical Film: History and Memory in Media, 2000. Rutgers U Press. (Hovedfagstillegg pp. 125-200, 235-266, 269-302; everyone -- rest of book).
Compendium 'NORAM4505 Movies and American Culture':
- Steven Mintz and Randy Roberts, eds., Hollywood's America: United States History Through Its Films (St. James, NY: Brandywine Press, 1993), Introduction, ix-27.
- Neal Gabler, An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood (NY: Anchor Books, 1988), Introduction, 1-7.
- Tino Balio, 'Adjusting to the New Global Economy: Hollywood in the 1990s', in Albert Moran, ed. Film Policy: International, National and Regional Perspectives (London: Routledge, 1996), 23-38.
- Vicki L. Ruiz, ''Star Struck': Acculturation, Adolescence, and Mexican American Women, 1920-1950', in Unequal Sisters, 3rd Ed., 346-361.
- Robert Brent Toplin, History by Hollywood: The Use and Abuse of the American Past (U of Illinois Press, 1996), ch 1: Mississippi Burning, 25-44.
- Michael Medved, Hollywood vs. America: Popular Culture and the War on Traditional Values, (Harper-Collins, 1992), 216-235.
- Jesse Algeron Rhines, Black Film/White Money (Rutgers University Press, 1996) Ch 4: 'The Negro Cycle through Blaxploitation: 1945-1974', 36-50.
- Ed Guerrero, Framing Blackness: The African American Image in Film (Philadelphia: Temple U. Press, 1993), Ch 3: 'The Rise and Fall of Blaxploitation', 69-111.
- Jeanine Basinger, A Woman's View: How Hollywood Spoke to Women, 1930-1960 (Hanover, NH: U. Press of New England, 1993) 'The Genre', 3-23.
- Thomas Cripps, 'The Making of The Birth of a Race: The Emerging Politics of Identity in Silent Movies' in Daniel Bernardi, ed. The Birth of Whiteness: Race and the Emergence of U.S. Cinema (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers U. Press, 1996) 38-55.
- Catherine Silk & John Silk, Racism and Anti-racism in American Popular Culture: Portrayals of African-Americans in Fiction and Film (Manchester University Press, 1990) 134-147.
- Ian Jarvie, Hollywood's Overseas Campaign (Cambridge U Press, 1992) Ch 7: 'Trial of Strength: Hollywood's boycott of the British Market, 1947-1948' (213-246).
- Peter Biskind, Seeing is Believing: How Hollywood Taught us to Stop Worrying and Love the Fifties (Pantheon Books, 1983) Ch 4: 'The Enemy Within' (pp.162-245) (Hovedfagstillegg).
- Charles Lyons, The New Censors: Movies and the Culture Wars (Temple U Press, 1997) Introduction (1-25).
- Robyn Wiegman, 'Black Bodies/American Commodities: Gender, Race, and the Bourgeois Ideal in Contemporary Film', Ch 11 in Lester D. Friedman, ed., Unspeakable Images: Ethnicity and the American Cinema (U of Illinois Press, 1991). (308-328).
Films:
Each student will view 20 films. Some films are obligatory for all. Some films will be divided among class participants so that all films are part of the discussion. Some films are background, and it will be assumed that students are familiar with most of these.
- + Mississippi Burning (viewing Tuesday Aug 19)
- JFK or Malcolm X (background, optional)
- + Mary Silliman's War (viewing Tuesday Aug 19, only available if viewed together - not available for rent)
- George Washington (optional)
- + Birth of a Nation
- Gone with the Wind (background, optional)
- ++ Corrina, Corrina
- + Midnight Ramble: Oscar Micheaux and the Story of Race Movies
- + Pinky
- + Guess Who's Coming to Dinner
- ++ Mandingo
- ++ Dutchman
- ++ Jungle Fever
- ++ The Long Walk Home
- ++ Driving Miss Daisy
- ++ It's a Wonderful Life
- ++ Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
- ++ Rebel Without a Cause
- ++ The Graduate
- American Beauty (background, optional)
- + The Jazz Singer (1927)
- + Hester Street
- Roots (optional)
- ++ Gentleman's Agreement
- ++ Showboat
- ++ Imitation of Life
- ++ Soul Man
- ++ Watermelon Man
- ++ Little Women
- ++ Broken Blossoms
- ++ Mildred Pierce
- ++ His Girl Friday
- ++ Woman of the Year
- ++ Adam's Rib
- ++ Cinderella
- ++ Love Story
- ++ Thelma and Louise
- + Smoke Signals
- ++ Dances with Wolves
- ++ Broken Arrow
- ++ Pochahontas
- ++ The World of Suzie Wong
- + Sayonara
- ++ The Bitter Tea of General Yen
- ++ The King and I (2 versions)
- ++ 1000 Pieces of Gold
- +++ Why we Fight
- +++ Rosie the Riveter
- +++ Eyes on the Prize
- +++ Ethnic Options
- ++ Land Before Time
- ++ Beauty and the Beast
+ = obligatory for all
++ = to be divided among course participants
+++ = to be selected from list by class
Secondary Works:
Reference works
- James Monaco, How to Read a Film: The World of Movies, Media, and Multimedia: Language, History, Theory (Oxford U. Press, 2000).
- Joanne Hollows and Mark Jancovich, Approaches to Popular Film (Manchester: Manchester U. Press, 1995).
- Stephen Prince, Movies and Meaning: An Introduction to Film (2nd Ed.) (Allyn & Bacon, 2000).