Fall 2007

E 395M • Gender, Class, and Ethnicity in American Literature and Film

Course Description

This course is an introduction to film studies, which uses American fiction to initiate discussions about race, class, and gender. We will consider the way in which European American authors, and later, filmmakers use archetypes, national mythology, and gender construction, for example, to produce dominative narratives that inform our view of gender, class, and ethnicity in the United States. Once we have established a context for these prevailing narratives, we will then discuss how Chicana/o, American Indian, African American, and European American authors and filmmakers resist, revise, and affirm our assumptions about these issues. The critical approaches to these issues will include but are not limited to psychoanalytic, feminist, Marxist, and cultural/ethnic studies.

Texts

• Alexie, Sherman. Toughest Indian in the World.
• McCarthy, Cormac. All the Pretty Horses.
• Martinez, Nina Marie. ¡Caramba!
• Morrison, Toni. Paradise.
• Supplemental course packet tentatively will include articles by theorists such as Doane, Modelski, Mulvey, Dyer, Cox, Doty, Kuhn, Ramirez-Berg, Fregoso, Limón, and hooks.

• Benshoff, Harry M. and Sean Griffin. America on Film: Representing Race, Gender, Class, and Sexuality at the Movies.
• Phillips, William. Film: An Introduction.

• Idlewild (2006) by Bryan Barber
• Quinceañeara (2006) by Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland
• Brokeback Mountain (2005) by Ang Lee
• New World (2005) by Terrence Malick

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