MCST 110-01 |
Texts and Power: Foundations of Media and Cultural Studies |
Days: T R
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Time: 09:40 am-11:10 am
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Room: OLRI 300
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Instructor: Bradley Stiffler
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Avail./Max.: Closed 1 / 16
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*First day attendance required*
Details
This course introduces students to the intellectual roots and contemporary applications of cultural studies, including critical media studies, focusing on the theoretical bases for analyses of power and meaning in production, texts, and reception. It includes primary readings in anti-racist, feminist, modern, postmodern, and queer cultural and social theory, and compares them to traditional approaches to the humanities. Designed as preparation for intermediate and advanced work grounded in cultural studies, the course is writing intensive, with special emphasis on developing skills in critical thinking and scholarly argumentation and documentation. Completion of or enrollment in MCST 110 is the prerequisite for majoring in media and cultural studies.
General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
Distribution Requirements:
Humanities
Course Materials
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MCST 128-01 |
Film Analysis/Visual Culture |
Days: M W F
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Time: 09:40 am-10:40 am
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Room: HUM 401
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Instructor: Bradley Stiffler
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Avail./Max.: Closed -1 / 24
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*First day attendance required*
Details
This course introduces the aesthetics of film as well as selected issues in contemporary film studies. Its aesthetic approach isolates the features that constitute film as a distinct art form: narrative or non-narrative structure, staging, cinematography, editing, and sound. Topics in contemporary film studies that might be considered include one or more of the following: cultural studies and film, industrial organization and globalization, representations of gender and race, and theories of authorship, horror, and spectatorship. Several papers, a test covering basic film terms, and a short video project emphasizing abstract form are required. Suitable for first year students.
General Education Requirements:
U.S. Identities and Differences
Distribution Requirements:
Fine arts
Course Materials
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MCST 194-01 |
Spatial Humanities |
Days: T R
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Time: 03:00 pm-04:30 pm
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Room: HUM 402
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Instructor: Tia-Simone Gardner
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Avail./Max.: 10 / 21
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*First day attendance required*
Details
Spatial Humanities is the interdisciplinary study of place, space and geography within the context of humanities. Because of its connection to the discipline of Geography, much of spatial humanities relies on the use of GIS (Geographic Information Science) as a means to understand and visualize the world, however in this class we will look at Spatial Humanities through the labor cultural producers. We will analyze how artists, architects, and activists have engaged ideas about geography and allow us to rethink the meaning of place. This class includesg visiting lectures and site visits. Students are expected to work on real and imagined public-facing design problems.
General Education Requirements:
Distribution Requirements:
Course Materials
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MCST 202-01 |
Global Media Industries |
Days: M W F
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Time: 02:20 pm-03:20 pm
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Room: OLRI 250
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Instructor: Michael Griffin
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Avail./Max.: Closed 0 / 25
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*First day attendance required; cross-listed with INTL 202-01*
Details
Global media collectively have tremendous influence in how many see and comprehend the world and therefore on the information and beliefs upon which they feel or act. While media are central to the continued production of a sense of "the world" at large or the "global" scale, media industries are situated geographically, culturally and institutionally. Even if they promise worldwide coverage or are multinational companies, there is much to be gained from studying how media are produced and distributed differently according to specific social, political, economic and historical conditions. This course considers media industries around the world with a focus on the relationships between the labor and infrastructures behind representations in a broad range of media (television, radio, cinema, news, telecommunications, internet).
General Education Requirements:
Writing WP
Internationalism
Distribution Requirements:
Humanities
Course Materials
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MCST 279-01 |
Value: The Bad, the Ugly, and the Cheap |
Days: T R
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Time: 03:00 pm-04:30 pm
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Room: HUM 212
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Instructor: Kiarina Kordela
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Avail./Max.: 6 / 25
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*Cross-listed with GERM 279-01*
Details
For thousands of years value has been scrutinized in philosophy, art history, and economic analysis, as it cuts across three constitutive aspects of social, cultural, and political life: economy, aesthetics, and ethics. Not only do we have and impose on the world our moral, aesthetic, and exchange values, but these three fields often become difficult to distinguish, as is evident in the slippery flexibility of words that allow us to say as much "this painting is bad or worthless" as "I think this person is bad or worthless," or "this is a bad, or worthless, remark" and "this is a bad or worthless check." This course will focus primarily on influential accounts of value in aesthetic theory, while also examining the ways in which aesthetic value demarcates itself from or implicates its moral and economic counterparts, and what the interplays among the three fields entail for aesthetic value. Our readings will focus on the impact of primarily German thought on the formation of modern aesthetic theory-from the early eighteenth century through the Enlightenment and Romanticism to high modernism and the Frankfurt School. Class and readings in English. Prerequisite(s): No pre-knowledge required. This course is appropriate for all level students.
General Education Requirements:
Internationalism
Distribution Requirements:
Humanities
Course Materials
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MCST 294-01 |
Blackness and Images |
Days: T R
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Time: 01:20 pm-02:50 pm
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Room: HUM 402
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Instructor: Tia-Simone Gardner
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Avail./Max.: Closed 2 / 16
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*First day attendance required*
Details
This course is a survey of cultural production of and about Blackness. Looking at the work of artists, filmmakers, and theoreticians, we will analyze the relationship between race and image making from the late 19th century to today. We will read works by Tina Campt, Michael Gillespie, and Hito Steryl. Also included in this class are canonical films like Birth of a Nation, but will also look at contemporary critical responses to this film such as DJ Spooky's Rebirth of a Nation, and Garrett Bradley's America. While the course is focused primarily on the US, we will also talk about racial formations beyond the US and how cultural workers outside the US have engaged Blackness as a way of seeing, a way of listening, and a process of being.
General Education Requirements:
U.S. Identities and Differences
Distribution Requirements:
Course Materials
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MCST 294-02 |
Intro to Video Production |
Days: T R
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Time: 08:00 am-09:30 am
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Room: HUM 412
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Instructor: Morgan Adamson
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Avail./Max.: Closed 1 / 12
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*First day attendance required*
Details
This course is designed as a basic introduction to digital video production. The objective of the class is to familiarize students of film theory and history with the language of cinema from the standpoint of production in order to deepen your appreciation and knowledge of the technical aspects of film/video and to develop your capacity to use video as a tool for research and communication. The course will be a combination of technical instruction, critical engagement, and creative exploration. We will analyze and employ a variety of filmmaking techniques as well as constructing narrative and non-narrative strategies for doing so. The focus of the course will be to familiarize you with some basic conventions of experimental, documentary, and narrative cinema. In each assignment, you will be encouraged to think about how formal decisions enhance and further narrative or thematic elements. We will thus pay very close attention to formal aspects of cinematic production: mise-en-scene. cinematography, editing, and sound design. In addition to this attention to form, success in the class will be dependent on a commitment to working through the technical aspects of video production (camera operation, lighting, editing software) in order to create short, original video pieces. Prior experience with film studies such as MCST 128 is encouraged, but not required.
General Education Requirements:
Distribution Requirements:
Fine arts
Course Materials
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MCST 294-03 |
Intro to Video Production |
Days: T R
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Time: 09:40 am-11:10 am
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Room: HUM 412
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Instructor: Morgan Adamson
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Avail./Max.: Closed 0 / 12
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*First day attendance required*
Details
This course is designed as a basic introduction to digital video production. The objective of the class is to familiarize students of film theory and history with the language of cinema from the standpoint of production in order to deepen your appreciation and knowledge of the technical aspects of film/video and to develop your capacity to use video as a tool for research and communication. The course will be a combination of technical instruction, critical engagement, and creative exploration. We will analyze and employ a variety of filmmaking techniques as well as constructing narrative and non-narrative strategies for doing so. The focus of the course will be to familiarize you with some basic conventions of experimental, documentary, and narrative cinema. In each assignment, you will be encouraged to think about how formal decisions enhance and further narrative or thematic elements. We will thus pay very close attention to formal aspects of cinematic production: mise-en-scene. cinematography, editing, and sound design. In addition to this attention to form, success in the class will be dependent on a commitment to working through the technical aspects of video production (camera operation, lighting, editing software) in order to create short, original video pieces. Prior experience with film studies such as MCST 128 is encouraged, but not required.
General Education Requirements:
Distribution Requirements:
Fine arts
Course Materials
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MCST 294-04 |
Digital Cultural Heritage |
Days: M W F
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Time: 01:10 pm-02:10 pm
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Room: CARN 105
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Instructor: Aisling Quigley
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Avail./Max.: Closed 1 / 16
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*Cross-listed with ANTH 294-03*
Details
Cultural heritage sites, including libraries, archives and museums, have existed in some shape or form for a very long time. Computers, on the other hand, have only been a part of these institutions for about sixty years. Although technologies offer more efficient and cost-effective ways to store and disseminate information and promise greater accessibility to materials, that doesn't necessarily mean that they successfully facilitate the missions of these cultural heritage sites or the needs of their visitors. Why is this the case? Do digital technologies truly have the potential to decentralize and democratize these spaces? What can they tell us about what we value, as a culture? In this interdisciplinary course, we will reflect on the impact of digital technologies on cultural heritage sites, and museums in particular, starting in the 1960s and continuing through the present, including discussion of how museums responded to the COVID-19 pandemic. Among other things, students will learn how to collect, curate, and digitize objects, write and design an object label, and contribute to an online exhibition.
General Education Requirements:
Writing WP
Distribution Requirements:
Social science
Course Materials
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MCST 394-01 |
Structures and Cultures of International Journalism |
Days: M W F
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Time: 01:10 pm-02:10 pm
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Room: HUM 400
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Instructor: Michael Griffin
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Avail./Max.: 8 / 16
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*First day attendance required; cross-listed with INTL 394-01*
Details
Journalism, as a concept, and as an institutionalized and normative set of practices, has evolved in conjunction with developments in Western systems of communication media—printing, the telegraph, newswire networks, film, radio, television, satellite systems and the Internet. Colonial and postcolonial extensions of communication infrastructure and networks have extended Western journalism practices across regions, nations and cultures, but norms and practices have also been opposed, resisted and adapted in diverse cultural and socio-political contexts. This course offers students the opportunity to explore the nature of journalism production in particular local contexts and across regional, cultural and global networks of news circulation. Of special interest will be cultures of news production and structures of news flow that characterize journalism activity and influence in differing circumstances under different political and economic systems in various parts of the world. Class members will pursue comparative case studies, in consultation with the instructor, that explore and illuminate intersections of local cultural production with national and transnational communication networks. Such studies of journalism activity may involve professional reporting, writing, editing, photography, video, and visual design across various media platforms as well as non-professional and citizen journalism production that challenges institutionalized professional models. Studies will also consider the influence of different systems of funding and production support and control: commercial, state-sponsored, or independent non-profit.
General Education Requirements:
Writing WP
Internationalism
Distribution Requirements:
Social science
Course Materials
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MCST 394-02 |
Oppositional Cinemas: Experiment and Critique through the Moving Image |
Days: T R
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Time: 01:20 pm-02:50 pm
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Room: ART 301
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Instructor: Morgan Adamson
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Avail./Max.: 5 / 16
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*First day attendance required*
Details
In this class, we will consider the ways that artists and social movements have used the moving image to challenge and transform dominant cultural norms. Engaging with international histories of experimental film, video, and new media, we will address the political and cultural contexts through which oppositional cinematic forms emerged—those contesting race, gender, resistance to capitalism and imperialism, sexual norms, and more. We will also examine cinematic practices that have sought to alter and disrupt the way we see the world and consume visual culture. In doing so, we will seek to understand the legacy of historical oppositional cinematic practices in our present moment, while addressing the profound impact that transformations in both the production and distribution of moving images have had in expanding and altering the meaning of oppositional cinema. Exploring a wide range of practices within the field of oppositional cinema--including digital video, installation art, and even virtual and augmented reality--this class will give you the opportunity to conduct practice-based research, creating your own oppositional cinematic pieces. We will also make use of the rich film culture in the Twin Cities, including the incredible collection of oppositional and experimental cinema held at the Walker Art Center.
General Education Requirements:
Distribution Requirements:
Course Materials
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MCST 488-01 |
Advanced Topics Seminar |
Days: W
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Time: 07:00 pm-10:00 pm
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Room: HUM 402
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Instructor: John Kim
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Avail./Max.: 5 / 12
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*First day attendance required*
Details
In the capstone seminar, students working on an independent project in line with the theme of the seminar share their scholarship, integrating what they have learned in the major, emphasizing knowledge gained in their focus area, as well as presenting their work at a concluding mini-conference. The capstone experience involves close analysis of cultural artifacts that examine at a higher level issues first raised in the introductory course. The department plans to offer two seminars every year, at least one in media studies, enabling students to select the seminar most relevant to their intellectual development. In exceptional cases, students with sufficient preparation may take the seminar prior to their senior year. Students may take more than one MCST senior seminar as long as content varies. Recent seminar topics have included: Image/Text: Metaphor, Myth and Power; Advanced Film Analysis; Advanced Studies in War and Media; Postmodernism, Identity and the Media; Whiteness and the Media; Advanced Queer Media. Prerequisite(s): MCST 110 - Texts and Power: Foundations of Media and Cultural Studies or permission of instructor. MCST 128 - Film Analysis/Visual Culture recommended for film studies seminars. Non-majors are welcome if they have taken MCST 110 or a comparable course.
General Education Requirements:
Distribution Requirements:
Course Materials
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