Week One: Genre/Film language
T 1/18: Snow Day! No class. Subscribe to Netflix.
TH 1/20: Introductions and course overview. Genre analysis in print, This American LIfe (TAL), YouTube.
Homework: Create your blog www.wordpress.com (see instructions tab on course blog) and send us your URL ASAP. Read Nichols excerpts “Film as a Language” and “Documentary film” (handout); Watch TAL: Season 1: Episode 4: “The Camera Man” (28mins)
Week Two: The self in nonfiction film
*Blog Post #1: Due Monday by midnight.
T 1/25: Discuss Nichols and TAL.
Homework: Watch TAL: Season 1: Episode 3: “God’s Close-up” (28mins) Read: Suzanna Egan, “Encounters in Camera: Autobiography as Interaction.” Modern Fiction Studies 40.3 (1994) 593-618. (available via ProjectMuse)
TH 1/27: In class watch Ruth Ozeki’s Halving The Bones and discussion.
*Blog Post #2: Due Friday by midnight. *Two blog comments: Due Sunday by midnight.
Homework: Watch Roger & Me (available via Netflix)
Read: Yale film analysis website (see course site for link)
Week Three: The community in nonfiction film
*Blog Post #3: Due Monday by midnight.
T 2/1: SNOW DAY
TH 2/3: Discuss Roger & Me and Yale site.
Homework: watch Dogtown and Z Boys (available via Netflix); revisit Yale site
*Blog Post #4: Due Friday by midnight.
*Two blog comments Sunday by midnight.
Week Four: The social/political/global in nonfiction film
*Blog Post #5: Due Monday by midnight.
T 2/8: Discuss Dogtown and Z Boys
Homework: Watch TAL: Season One, Episode 6: Pandora’s Box
TH 2/10: Discuss TAL; Introduction to digital video. Brainstorm one-minute video projects. Collect footage.
*Blog Post #6 Due Friday by midnight: Write about three of your possible autovideo topics. *Two blog comments: Which topics seem most interesting, unusual, and full of potential? Due Sunday by midnight.
Homework: collect footage, look for emerging themes, etc. (For Blog Post #7)
Week Five:
*Blog Post #7: Due Monday by midnight: What images/shots/scenes are you planning for your autovideo? What have you discovered thus far with your footage and camera work? What has surprised you (about your topic, about getting behind the camera, about what you’ve seen or discovered)? Who are your style inspirations (and why)? What are some of the challenges you’ve encountered?
T 2/15: Watch Good Hair in class.
Homework: Finish collecting footage; comments and suggestions on footage collection
TH 2/17: Lab day (Meet in AH 111). Come in with footage. Practice downloading, capturing, and editing. Moviemaker.
No blog post this week due to technical difficulties in lab.
Week Six:
*Blog Post #8: Due Monday by midnight:
T 2/22: No class–continue to collect footage.
Homework: Watch Morgan Spurlock’s “Supersize Me” (available via Netflicks). Pay close attention to his inquiry project and the different ways he works with evidence and images.
TH 2/24: Lab Day #2 (Meet in CCIM 121–the Mac lab); work on dumping footage, editing of projects.
*Blog Post #9 Due Friday by midnight (see blog for details on this post.)
Week Seven: YouTube as Cultural Phenomenon
*Blog Post #10:(See blog for details on this post!) Due Monday by midnight. *Two blog comments: Due Sunday by midnight.
T 3/1: Lab day. Workshop.
TH 3/3: Lab day.Viewing. Mid-term Portfolio
*Blog Post #11 Due Friday by midnight.
*Two blog comments: Due Sunday by midnight.
Week Eight—Spring Break:
T 3/8–TH 3/10 Over break, read Chs 1-3 in YouTube and Fossati on YouTube Curation (from The YouTube Reader–pdf sent via email). Before class on Tuesday, please VIEW at least two of your classmates’ videos and leave comments. To ensure that everyone gets feedback, please watch the videos of the two people who appear below you in the blog list (e.g., Kelsie watches Kim’s and Lauren’s; Taylor watches Alexa and Alison’s, etc.).
Week Nine
*Blog Post #12: Due Monday by midnight–respond to the YouTube book and the Fossati piece.
T 3/15: Discuss YouTube chs1-3, Fossati.; watch clips, discuss curation assignment
Homework: Read chs. 4, 5, and 6
TH 3/17: Discuss YouTube; lab day and partner research into YouTube curation.
Homework: finish YouTube (essays by Jenkins and Hartley)
*Blog Post #13 Due Friday by midnight—response to chapters 3-6. What specific issues, arguments, ideas in the book and/or class discussion resonate with you? What can you add to those ideas now? Refer to specific passages, page numbers, etc.
*Two blog comments: Due Sunday by midnight.
Week Ten
*Blog Post #14: Due Monday by midnight. Describe your ongoing work with the curation project. Use this as a draft for your writing and collaborative involvement with the project (if you decide to post a video, include your analysis and thinking about the ways that it represents key ideas from the Burgess and Green book).
T 3/22: ADVISEMENT DAY. No class. Work on curation presentation–check in with group to edit, revise, and finalize your installation and presentation.
TH 3/24: Curation presentations and discussion.
*Blog Post #15 Due Friday by midnight: reflection on curation project. Discuss what you thought was effective/not effective; what you would have done differently. How your own thinking has shifted and evolved now that you’ve seen the other three presentations, read Jenkins and Hartley, and discussed them. *Two blog comments: Due Sunday by midnight.
Homework: Read Essays from The YouTube Reader: Lange; Peters and Seier (handout)
Week Eleven
*Blog Post #16: Due Monday by midnight: discuss essays–remember to make reference to specific passages, arguments, etc.
T 3/29: Discuss The YouTube Reader; brainstorming for final video project. Sign up for individual conferences.
Homework: prepare materials for conference.
TH 3/31: No class–conferences
with Megan
*Blog Post #17 Due Friday by midnight. *Two blog comments: Due Sunday by midnight.
Homework: Watch Emily Armstrong’s YouTube repertoire; read Muller essay, “Where Quality Matters” from The YouTube Reader
Week Twelve: Filmmaking
*Blog Post #18: Due Monday by midnight.
T 4/5: Discuss Muller and Emily Armstrong’s YouTube work.
Homework: prepare for lab work—Bring your Levelle book!
- Review blog post describing your project. Where are you now? What has changed? What has solidified, and what do you have questions about? Compose a short (3-5 sentence) paragraph describing your inquiry project, and write 2 questions you’d like someone else to help you with. What might an observer or outsider be able to help you figure out, plan, or see about your project thus far? Finally, review our readings about YouTube. Choose 2 YT theorists, and explain how their ideas might inform your project as you go forward. Bring this writing to class with you on Thursday in the CCIM.
- prepare ideas for symposium discussion. What one idea/theory/component/context/etc. of or about YouTube would you want to make your audience of English majors aware of? Choose 1-2, and locate an example that we could consider for the presentation.
TH 4/7: Lab Work; discuss symposium; Levelle book; (brainstorming footage; style;research)
*Blog Post #19: What’s your role as a filmmaker in the YouTube era? Who are your touchstones as you consider the specific cultural, political, aesthetic facets of YouTube? Be sure to site specific thinkers and concepts. Due Friday by midnight. *Two blog comments: Due Sunday by midnight.
Homework: Research review: Begin collecting sources for your brief annotated bibliography of 5-7 sources that will help you think about your project from an informed perspective. A minimum of two scholarly sources; consider also newspapers, other media (blogs, podcasts, etc.)
Week Thirteen:
*Blog Post #20: Draft up an annotation of two sources: (one of your scholarly sources) and one other source. What’s the central argument of each source? How does this source add to your understanding of your project? What new ideas, concepts, information is most important? Does this initial research suggest new directions of inquiry? (each annotation should be a hearty paragraph or two)
T 4/12: Preparation for symposium; brainstorming aesthetics (film and editing techniques)
TH 4/14: English Dept. Symposium
Week Fourteen:
T 4/19: Workshop storyboard of project; what’s your story, were are you going, what’s missing?
TH 4/21:Lab work
Week Fifteen
T 4/26: Workshop: problem solving. Visual images, overarching inquiry, refining storyboard.
TH 4/28: Revisions and lab work.
**F 4/29: Final Blog Portfolio, due via email, 5 p.m. (send to both of us!)**
Week Sixteen
T 5/3: TBA. (no class—schedule lab time! see blog for possible times)
TH 5/5: final revisions/lab work; complete portfolio for Tuesday!
Scheduled exam period: Tues, May 10 1:30-4 (film festival!); FINAL PORTFOLIO DUE 5 P.M. (video, post-production reflection, annotated bibliography—all posted to your blog.)
