Graduate Courses: Spring 2020
ART 645 Digital Media: Time Based
Tuesday/Thursday 1:00-3:45pm
Jenny Vogel
Explores experimental digital video and sound within the context of contemporary art practices in projects involving a sustained inquiry into self-selected themes. OPEN TO MASTERS ART MAJORS ONLY.
ART 684 Computer Animation II
Tuesday/Thursday, 7:00-9:45PM
Shane Mecklenberger
Second of two semester sequence. Animation techniques using digital tools as applied to film, video, music and technology. Animation software (Maya) and professional compositing programs are used. Development and design of personal work is stressed. Emphasis on creativity and professionalism. INSTRUCTOR CONSENT REQUIRED. Prerequisite: Art 674 or consent of instructor.
ART 685 Media and Motion Graphics
Tuesday/Thursday , 4:00-6:45pm
Colleen Keough
Experimental and narrative film titles and interactive art are studied and used as a catalyst for creation of experimental and applied motion graphics. Previous sound and visual editing experience helpful.
ART-HIST 691R American Art: Visual Legacies of Colonialism
Tuesday, 4:00-6:45pm
Ximena Gomez
In this seminar students will investigate the myriad ways that the European invasion of the Americas in the sixteenth century continues to inform contemporary popular culture. The course begins in the colonial period, using primary documents and images to identify and deconstruct the derogatory tropes that manifested in colonial visual culture. In the second part of the course, students will critically analyze contemporary popular visual media, including Hollywood films, television shows, and advertisements, that utilize colonial stereotypes, and discuss the social consequences of their endurance, especially for marginalized people.
ARTS-EXT 500. Introduction to Arts Management
COMBINED UNDERGRADUATE/GRADUATE COURSE
Tuesday/Thursday 4:20-5:35pm
Dee Boyle-Clapp
This is a 3 credit course open to Soph/Jr/Sr/Grad students. We meet twice a week for lecture/discussion and all assignments and exams are offered in Moodle. Students should plan to attend one nonprofit arts event in Week 4 or 5. If the course is filled or if you wish to register for a concurrent course and have trouble, contact the Arts Extension Service at aes@acad.umass.ed or 413-545-2360. The department is willing to open a second section if necessary.
Comm 597V Special Topics- Advanced Video Production Workshop
COMBINED UNDERGRADUATE/GRADUATE COURSE
Tuesday 4:00-7:00pm
Kevin Anderson
Students work individually or in small groups to devote the entire semester's class time to the creation and completion of a substantial media project: e.g. short narrative film, documentary, music videos, TV or Web series, etc. Students are required to have a script or outline of the project prior to the start of the semester so that projects will commence production shortly into the semester and move on to completion of post-production, including creation of a soundtrack; run test screenings; develop marketing strategies for distribution and/or festival exhibitions.
INSTRUCTOR CONSENT REQUIRED. Open to Undergraduate and Graduate students by application. Contact the instructor for an application form.
COMM 693D Introduction to Film Theory
REQUIRED FOR THE GRADUATE FILM CERTIFICATE
Tuesday 4:00-6:45pm
Anne Ciecko
This course offers an introductory overview of major approaches to the study of film and audiovisual media, including formalism and realism ("classical" film theory), and theoretical and critical methods informed by structuralism, semiology, phenomenology, psychoanalysis, political theory, and cultural studies. Auteurism, feminist film theory, queer theory, genre studies, spectator/audience/ reception, star and performance studies, apparatus theory, postcolonial theory, and theories of new media will also be considered. Film clips and occasional longer works will be shown in class, but students will also be responsible for watching a number of films and/or other audiovisual materials outside class. Writing assignments will provide students with opportunities to further engage with and respond to course readings and related materials, and enable them to develop (and present to the class) exploratory work on projects tailored to individual interests and goals. Prior study of film is not required. This course is a requirement for the Graduate Certificate in Film Studies, but is open to all graduate students, any major or program.
COMM 791V S- Media Historiography
Monday 4:00-6:45pm
Shawn Shimpach
Open to Doctoral and Masters Communication students only. Communication Doctoral & Masters Graduate students OR permission of instructor.
COMP LIT 695A-01 Seminar - International Film Noir
(also listed as FILM ST 695A-01)
Wednesday, 4:00-8:00pm
Don Levine
Often referred to as the only indigenous American film style, "film noir" in its very appellation reveals that its major effects (for certain modern conceptions of cinema) lay elsewhere. We will examine film noir in its American heyday (1945-1957) and how it came to be a major propelling force in the new European cinema of the 1960's (Godard, and the Cahiers du cinema).
EDUC 693K S-Designing Digital Media for Teaching and Learning
Thursday 4:00-6:45pm
Torrey Trust
This project-based course focuses on the theoretical and practical issues related to designing digital learning media (e.g. eBooks, videos, websites) and environments (e.g. online courses) for teaching and learning.
FILM-ST 597LF Special Topics- Latin American Film Festival
Date/Time TBD
Barbara Zecchi
1 credit
FILM-ST 597V Special Topics - Videographic Essay
COMBINED UNDERGRADUATE/GRADUATE COURSE
Tuesday 4:00-6:30pm
Daniel Pope
What is possible when the mode of film scholarship departs from the printed word and inhabits the form of the media it examines? As the media environment evolves, engagements with film are branching out, with promising adaptation to niches in the digital landscape - social media, podcasting, websites and blogs, etc.- and out of this field, the videographic essay emerges as a powerful medium for the film scholar. This is a course in planning, scripting, and editing videographic essays in film scholarship. Making a videographic essay is much like making a film, often with similarities to documentary and the essay film. As such, we will engage not only film analysis and film scholarship but also video editing, visual composition, sound design, and other aspects of moving image media. In this class, we examine a wide array of videographic essays and explore the unique analytical and expressive opportunities the medium offers. With this foundation, we develop the critical, creative, and technical skills necessary for making effective video essays addressing films and film theory, directors, genres, national cinemas, and cultural and sociological issues. UMass Amherst Undergraduate Certificate Categories: II, IV and V.
FILM-ST 691J Seminar – Holocaust Cinema: History, Memory, Narratives
(Also listed as Judaic 491J)
COMBINED UNDERGRADUATE/GRADUATE COURSE
Thursday 4:00-6:45pm
Olga Gershenson
This seminar provides a cultural history of cinematic treatments of the Holocaust, traces major trends and changes in Holocaust representations, and raises questions concerning historical memory of the Holocaust in national cinemas. The seminar will progress historically from the first-ever cinematic depictions of Nazi anti-Semitism, to the current plethora of genres and styles of Holocaust films. The scope of issues discussed in this seminar is defined by two sets of tensions: first, tensions between history and narrative, and second between eastern and western understanding of the Holocaust. To address the first set of tensions, we'll discuss modes of representation in fiction and documentary films, cinematography, style, and language. To address the second set of tensions, we will compare and contrast representations of the Holocaust in the major national cinemas of the Soviet bloc, with those of the US and Western Europe. We will consider circumstances of films' production and circulation, including censorship, funding, distribution, audience and critical reception. All films and film excerpts are with English subtitles.
FILM ST 695A-01 Seminar - International Film Noir
(Also listed as COMP LIT 695A-01 [description above])
GERMAN 697CE Special Topics- Central European Film
Tuesday/Thursday 11:30-12:45am
Mariana Ivanova
A graduate seminar examining East German, Czechoslovak and Polish cinema of the Cold War period (1940s-90s). Through films and readings covers contemporary theory and debates, including on: formalism and Socialist Realism; international influences, such as Italian Neo-Realism; the various national New Waves and political turmoil of the 1960s; and the impact on cinema of international peace movements in the 1970s and of perestroika and the Solidarity movement of the 1908s. Seminar held in English, all films with English subtitles.
ITALIAN 597DV Special Topics- The Divas: Feminine Icons in Italian Cinema
(Also listed as Italian 497DV)
COMBINED UNDERGRADUATE/GRADUATE COURSE
Tuesday/Thursday 4:00-5:00pm
Andrea Malaguti
The course explores the social role and meaning of some of the most important actresses of post-WWII Italian cinema (Anna Magnani, Sofia Loren, and Monica Vitti, among others) as both metamorphic representatives and problematic probes of a rapidly modernizing society, and proposes a model of the female figure as "the active face of the crisis" (Giorgio Tinazzi). Conducted in English.
MUSIC 520 Music Composition for Visual Media
Wednesday 4:40-7:30pm
Felipe Salles
Open to Graduate students only. This class is dependent on the student ability to use Sibelius 4 or above notation software. Purchase of the software is mandatory. Finale 2007 and above is acceptable. Experience with Protools, Logic or Digital Performer software is desirable.
This course is designed primarily for MM Jazz Composition and Arranging students. It is open as an elective to graduate students in other areas who possess a thorough knowledge of composition and orchestration, and software notation skills. This is a project based course on writing music for visual media. It involves the study of the work of industry standard compositions in three visual media areas, TV commercials, cartoons, and film. Students will analyze music for its emotional and visual impact and compose music for film/video projects.This class is dependent on the student ability to use Sibelius 4 or above notation software. Purchase of the software is mandatory. Finale 2007 and above is acceptable. Experience with Protools, Logic or Digital Performer software is desirable. Class work will take the form of three projects, a research presentation, readings and discussions. The final project will involve the use of virtual (and studio recorded real instruments where possible) in a cross platform integration of Sibelius/Finale, MIDI/Virtual Sounds and Logic.
REGULAR TAUGHT GRADUATE COURSES:
FILM-ST 597E – Strange Engagements-Figural Realism in Film and Literature
Daniel Pope
Lecture: Mo 9:00AM-12:00pm
Classroom: TBA
Course Description TBA
FILM-ST 597LF-01 LEC (22879): ST – Latin American Film Festival
1 Credit
Instructor: Barbara Zecchi
COMM 597V – Advanced Digital Production
Instructor: Kevin Anderson
Open to Undergraduate and Graduate students by application
Contact instructor for application form
Students work individually or in small groups to devote the entire semester’s class time to the creation and completion of a substantial media project: e.g. short narrative film, documentary, music videos, TV or Web series, etc. Students are required to have a script or outline of the project prior to the start of the semester so that projects will commence production shortly into the semester and move on to completion of post-production, including creation of a soundtrack; test audience screenings; develop marketing strategies for distribution and/or festival exhibitions. Course will be a mix of lecture, instruction, guest speakers and filmmakers, screenings, and workshopping of student projects in an active and highly engaging environment.
COMM 693D – S-Intro to Film Theory
3 Credits
Instructor: Anne Ciecko, Cap: 15
Seminar: Tu 4:00pm-6:45pm
ILC S416
Open to Doctoral & Masters students only
This course offers an introductory overview of major approaches to the study of film and audiovisual media, including formalism and realism ("classical" film theory), and theoretical and critical methods informed by structuralism, semiology, phenomenology, psychoanalysis, political theory, and cultural studies. Auteurism, feminist film theory, queer theory, genre studies, spectator/audience/ reception, star and performance studies, apparatus theory, postcolonial theory, and theories of new media will also be considered. Film clips and occasional longer works will be shown in class, but students will also be responsible for watching a number of films and/or other audiovisual materials outside class. Writing assignments will provide students with opportunities to further engage with and respond to course readings and related materials, and enable them to develop (and present to the class) exploratory work on projects tailored to individual interests and goals. Prior study of film is not required. This course is a requirement for the Graduate Certificate in Film Studies, but is open to all graduate students, any major or program.
COMP-LIT 695A – International Film Noir
Instructor: Don Levine
We 4:00pm-8:00pm
Classroom: TBD
Undergraduates with 2 prior film courses may enroll with permission from instructor
UNDERGRADUATE FILM STUDIES CERTIFICATE CATEGORY: III, IV, V
Often referred to as the only indigenous American film style, "film noir" in its very appellation reveals that its major effects (for certain modern conceptions of cinema) lay elsewhere. We will examine film noir in its American heyday (1945-1957) and how it came to be a major propelling force in the new European cinema of the 1960's (Godard, and the Cahiers du cinema).
GERMAN 797E – Exile Cinema
3 Credits
Instructor: Jonathan Skolnik, Cap: 15
Lecture: Tu 2:30pm-5:30pm
Classroom: TBD
An exploration of the cinematic work of refugees from Nazi Germany, primarily in the USA (both Hollywood and B-productions) but also in the USSR. Works by directors such as Wilder, Sirk, Ulmer, Lang, Lubitsch, Sternberg.