Fall 2024 - CMNS 314 D300
Topics in Media Production and Aesthetics (4)
Class Number: 2747
Delivery Method: In Person
Overview
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Course Times + Location:
Sep 4 – Dec 3, 2024: Wed, 2:30–5:20 p.m.
Burnaby
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Instructor:
Kirsten McAllister
kmcallis@sfu.ca
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Prerequisites:
17 CMNS units with a minimum grade of C- or 45 units with a minimum CGPA of 2.00.
Description
CALENDAR DESCRIPTION:
Topics on the cultural production of acoustic, visual, and/or multimodal communication. Explores cultural contexts of media production, media artifacts, media perceptions, and alternative media practices. Topics include: advertising, film, gaming, radio, television, and questions of representation in media professions. This course can be repeated once for credit (up to a maximum of two times).
COURSE DETAILS:
Topic for Fall 2024: Visual Studies in Communication
Photographs have a special relation to reality. Susan Sontag writes, “A photograph passes for incontrovertible proof that a given thing has happened. The picture may distort; but there is always a presumption that something exists, or did exist.” In our image-saturated society, photography has become integral to how we see, understand and order our worlds. This course introduces students to theories and methods for studying photography, focusing on photographs that are used as visual records of social and political life, whether family portraits, passport photos, ethnographic records, or photojournalists’ documentations of human rights abuses. The first section of the course introduces critical approaches for analyzing photography. Going beyond a textual or semiotic analysis of images and how images function as ideological representations of the world, we use methods of analysis from psychology, sociology and art history to examine how as “pictures” they function to constitute and control as well as challenge the formation of our subjectivities and worlds. The course uses feminist and anti-colonial/anti-racist methods to critically examine three genres of photography that have the authority of “incontrovertible proof” in addition to the critical and creative ways activists and artists have subverted them. Note that some of the photos examined have disturbing content (colonial photographs and journalists’ photographs) and the work on family photos can be challenging.
Grading
- Tutorial Attendance 3%
- Tutorial Presentations 2%
- 1st Assignment 20%
- 2nd Assignment / Mid-Term Exam 30%
- 3rd Assignment 30%
- Review Quiz 15%
Materials
REQUIRED READING:
Wells, Liz (2021 or other editions), Photography: A Critical Introduction. London: Routledge.
On-line articles / Library or Canvas.
REQUIRED READING NOTES:
Your personalized Course Material list, including digital and physical textbooks, are available through the SFU Bookstore website by simply entering your Computing ID at: shop.sfu.ca/course-materials/my-personalized-course-materials.
Registrar Notes:
ACADEMIC INTEGRITY: YOUR WORK, YOUR SUCCESS
SFU’s Academic Integrity website http://www.sfu.ca/students/academicintegrity.html is filled with information on what is meant by academic dishonesty, where you can find resources to help with your studies and the consequences of cheating. Check out the site for more information and videos that help explain the issues in plain English.
Each student is responsible for his or her conduct as it affects the university community. Academic dishonesty, in whatever form, is ultimately destructive of the values of the university. Furthermore, it is unfair and discouraging to the majority of students who pursue their studies honestly. Scholarly integrity is required of all members of the university. http://www.sfu.ca/policies/gazette/student/s10-01.html
RELIGIOUS ACCOMMODATION
Students with a faith background who may need accommodations during the term are encouraged to assess their needs as soon as possible and review the Multifaith religious accommodations website. The page outlines ways they begin working toward an accommodation and ensure solutions can be reached in a timely fashion.