Courses Offered in Related Disciplines:
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Fall 2011 - Spring 2012
Public Speaking
Note: Theatre 203 is taught by English department faculty.
Fall 2011
THEA 203
Communication/Public Speaking
Instructors: Matthew Beedham (
M/W 2:30-4:00
);
Deborah Torkko (
M/W 11:30-1:00)
A practical course designed to develop awareness of the skills involved in effective oral communication and to improve techniques of organization and presentation. There is no prerequisite for this course.
Spring 2012
THEA 203
Communication/Public Speaking
Instructors: Liza Potvin (
T/R 1:00-2:30);
Matthew Beedham (M/W 10:00-11:30)
A practical course designed to develop awareness of the skills involved in effective oral communication and to improve techniques of organization and presentation. There is no prerequisite for this course.
Film
Fall 2011
FILM 220 - (Cowichan)
W 6:00 - 9:00
Special Topics in Film Studies
Professor: Jay Ruzesky
Jay.Ruzesk@viu.ca
Course Outline:
FILM 220 will be useful for anyone who wants to try to express themselves through film. In its digital form, film is a growing aspect of our lives and is used in everything from real estate sales to politics to biographies. University students will find their film skills useful as an alternative to writing term papers.
This course in Documentary Film will provide an overview of the tradition and practice of documentary film from the origins of film to the rise of 21st century technologies. Students will study different types of documentary film, investigate film techniques, and practice the skills necessary to make a documentary film.
The course will include a survey of the history of documentary film, an examination of documentary structures, and practice in film making skills including research, writing, interviewing, cinematography, digital camcorder operation, sound, and editing.
Course Objectives:
Research documentary film subjects.
Identify documentary film structures.
Outline the history of documentary film.
Write a film proposal.
Operate a digital camcorder.
Film an interview.
Demonstrate how sound contributes to a finished film.
Use basic editing to create a short film.
Prerequisites:
An interest in film and photography and basic computer skills. Some experience with a digital camera or camcorder would be useful. FILM 101 and 201 are recommended but not required.
Spring 2012
ENGL 272
Literature and Film II
M 1:00-4:00
Instructor: Craig Tapping
PSYCHOANALYSIS AND DREAMS
The study of film and of literature is deeply enriched by critical/theoretical nexus of ideas generated by psychoanalysis and the interpretation of dreams—an ancient practice if we are to understand the story of Joseph from the Pentateuch, of course, but very contemporary after the “explosion” of ideas into Western culture generated by Freud and his disciple (later critical dissident), Jung.
In this course, students will discover how writers, and filmmakers, have exploited these two vocabularies of the psyche, the inner self and sub-conscious, to explore problems in human relationships within individuals, families, between lovers and within groups in the larger community. The books and films together open a discursive sense of how the inner dreamworld is the site of fantasy, repressed desires, and hidden memories—all of which generate styles and manners, tropes and rhetoric of consciousness in both prose fictions and film.
Freud asserts that dreams are a language that functions like a rebus, a visual puzzle, and that breaking the code is the first step in discovering what childhood traumas—always based on the attempt by elders to control instinctual drives—are hindering the adult patient’s health and sanity.
Jung, on the other hand, created a belief system that dreams are actually maps of forgotten, but culturally acquired and genetically transmitted, mythologies: the personal memory of a shared, universal “collective unconsciousness”. By dreaming, therefore, an individual enters “mythic” time and community with all other human beings. Jung’s belief systems are the basis of many contemporary “new age” philosophies and their attendant practices.
ASSIGNED READINGS (LITERATURE), to be chosen from:
Robertson Davies, Fifth Business (1970)
Herman Hesse, Steppenwolf (1927)
D.H. Lawrence, Sons and Lovers (1913)
Doris Lessing, The Golden Notebook (1962)
Sally Vickers, Where Three Roads Meet (2007)
CRITICISM (on reserve in the Library): basic writings on dream theory, incl.
excerpts from Freud’s The Interpretation of Dreams (1899-1900)
Richard Appignanesi, Oscar Zarate, Tom Engelhardt. Freud For Beginners (1990)
Joseph Campbell, Hero With A Thousand Faces (1949)
Michael McGuinness and Maggie Hyde, Jung for Beginners (1994)
Juliet Mitchell, Psychoanalysis and Feminism: Freud, Reich, Laing, and Women (1974)
A SPECIAL STUDY on the character Tiresias: Carol Ann Duffy, Ted Hughes, T.S. Eliot, Sophocles, and others
FILMS TO BE SCREENED may include, but are not limited to:
Ingmar Bergman, one of PERSONA (1966), HOUR OF THE WOLF (1968), or CRIES AND WHISPERS (1972)
Luis Bunuel, DISCREET CHARM OF THE BOURGEOISIE (1972)
Fellini, JULIET OF THE SPIRITS (1965)
Kurosawa, DREAMS (1990)
Brian Large, ELEKTRA (1989: infamous film of “dirty” production of Strauss’s opera)
Pasolini, OEDIPUS REX (1967)
Ken Russell, WOMEN IN LOVE (1969)
Guillermo del Toro, PAN’S LABYRINTH (2006)
Craig Tapping, Ph.D.
STUDENTS SHOULD BE WARNED THAT SOME OF THE CONTENT OF THIS COURSE IS DIRECTLY AND EXPLICITLY SEXUAL AND MAY BE DISTURBING.
FILM 201
Film Studies
W 1:00-5:00
Professor: Keith Harrison
Keith.Harrison@viu.ca
This study of film as an art form and as a medium of cultural communication will emphasize the feature film, but also look at documentary, experimental, and animation modes. We will explore varied concerns and genres of cinematic story-telling through aesthetically and geographically diverse examples of filmmaking. There will be a mini-focus on contemporary films from France and Canada.
Reading list:
Richard Barsam & Dave Monahan – Looking At Movies, 3rd ed.
Projected filmography: Mon Oncle Antoine, The Barbarian Invasions, Videodrome, Barney’s Version, I've Heard the Mermaids Singing, Chloe, Incendies, Ladies and Gentlemen … Mr. Leonard Cohen, The Celebration, Persepolis, The Gleaners and I, I’ve Loved You So Long, Biutiful.
Method of evaluation:
One-pagers (8x5=40%), Brief comparative paper (15%), Research essay (25%), In-class exam (10%), and Class participation (10%)
Linguistics
Fall 2011
LING 211
History of the English Language
M/W 11:30-1:00
Professor: Matthew Beedham
Matthew.Beedham@viu.ca
A study of the history and development of the English language from its origins to the present, including the historical context of the development of the language; the changes in phonology, grammar, and vocabulary from Old to Middle to Modern English; the history and diversity of English dialects; the role of English today as a world language; and the history and nature of Canadian English.
Spring 2012
LING 212
Indo-European Studies
M/W 11:30-1:00
Professor: Matthew Beedham
Matthew.Beedham@viu.ca
A study of Indo-European languages and their "family" emphasizing the principles of classifying languages; debate concerning macro-families; the theories of the origins and nature of Proto- Indo-European; archaeolinguistic evidence supporting these theories; the nature of Indo-European texts; the provenance and dispersal of Indo-European languages, and the controversies concerning their relationships.
LING 350: Linguistics and the Dimensions of Literacy
M/W 4:00-5:30
Professor Matthew Beedham
Matthew.Beedham@viu.ca
An introduction to theoretical and historical linguistic studies and the application of this knowledge to the development and teaching of literacy skills. Considers the shaping, formative role of language in a culture and investigates assumptions about the relationship between language, thought, and culture.
Women's Studies
Fall 2011
WOST 200
Introduction to Women's Studies I
This interdisciplinary course offers an introduction to the intellectual and social origins of feminism, and an exploration of the position of women in contemporary society. There is no prerequisite for this course.
WOST 210
Intro to Women's Studies: First Nations I
Using the tools of feminist inquiry, studies the roles and position of First Nations women in contemporary society with particular attention paid to women's identities, history and spirituality and to the effects of education, social policy, law and tradition on their lives.
Spring 2012
WOST 100
Young Women and Leadership: Issues and Action
Introduction to the history, challenges, and achievements of women as leaders and to the basic concepts of leadership theory, skills, and attributes. It explores critical issues facing young women preparing to assume leadership roles in their workplace or communities and draws on the experience of those who have done so.
WOST 310
Women's Autobiographies
Instructor: Marni Stanley
This course cross-lists with English so may be taken for credit in either discipline.
“Why hath this lady writ her own life?”
Margaret Cavendish(1656)
Autobiography is one of the most common writing performances. Most of us are guilty—if only in a letter or email—of an autobiographical act. It is also one of the richest genres in the exploration of emotion and experience and in experiments with form and style. Not only literary theorists, but historians, anthropologists, folklorists, sociologists, linguists and psychologists are finding autobiographies useful sources in their disciplines. The genre of autobiography invites us to imagine the ways in which each person matters regardless of the criteria of fame. Autobiography is a genre frequently chosen by women, perhaps, in part, because of the many forms it may take: journals, memoirs, diaries, sketches. Women use it to record the events and people of their lives to both realize and transcend the self. In this way autobiography may transgress the boundary between public and private writing.
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