11377 EGC 303 Representations and Power Fall 2007

1:55-3:05 MWF 130 Noble Hall Instructor: Dr. Kathleen Fine-Dare

Office: 279 CSWS, 247-7438 fine_k@fortlewis.edu Office Hours: 3:30-5:00 MW, 1:00-3:00 Tu

NOTE: This course also counts towards the TS2 credit as an “R” (TS2R 407)

Course description:

We are seduced each day by films, photographs, paintings, print, music, museum exhibits, and other finely-crafted cultural expressions. The power of these expressions lies in their ability to persuade us that we are in the presence of “pure” representations of reality, and that we need not look any deeper into their causes and effects, or the ways the representations we view are mere stereotypes rather than truth. But why should we look more deeply? Don’t we want to experience life, not analyze it? Or to absorb it, rather than subject it to critique? The more complex our lives become, the more we rely on these expressions (and on expressions of our own) to help us find our way through the maze of everyday life. If we analyze it “to death,” how can we sail through the days?

What we need to realize is that “sailing through” on these images not only deprives us of getting the most out of them that we could, but serves as a kind of brainwashing wherein we lose our free will and our ability to say no to something we do not accept as true, meaningful, or valuable. are we getting the most out of these cultural representations that we could? Should we think about diving in, resisting the current, looking into the layers? And perhaps more importantly, should we think about how no representation is “objective;” that innocence is impossible; that power is often present? How much of what we see is what someone else hopes we will see? How much is a result of the fact that those with the power to make us see (producers of television shows, creators of museum exhibits) are just giving us their own narrow views on the tube or in the big exhibit hall? And in what ways might we empower ourselves by better crafting our own representations of self and society?

In this class we will try to “see” more deeply, meaningfully, and historically. Together we will pursue the idea that cultural representations are multilayered, historically established, and complex theories of reality, rather than straightforward “snapshots” of it. In other words, we will investigate the idea that because what we view and express regarding cultural identity and cultural difference is artificial (i.e., not “natural”), that there might be more at play than “capturing,” “telling,” “reporting,” ”exhibiting," or "reenacting." Because these representations play such a key role in decisions we make regarding ourselves and others, we need to learn how to read them at a deeper level if we are to overcome human misunderstanding in the workplace, in our intimate lives, in our foreign policy, and so on.

Our goal is therefore to find ways to overcome what is known as “naive realism,” or commonplace assertions about what is represented “what’s really real.” By looking at a variety of representations in print and on film, in photographs and maps, and in museums, monuments, and popular art, we can know something more about how representations are created, how they change historically, how they can be contested, and how people can reclaim their identities and therein their own power through revising or even appropriating the representations that have been made of them

Required texts:

1. SLATER, Candace. 2001. Entangled Edens: Visions of the Amazon. Berkeley: University of California Press.

2. EWEN & EWEN. 2006. Typecasting: On the Arts and Sciences of Human Inequality. New York: Seven Stories Press.

3. LIPPARD, Lucy R., ed. Partial Recall: Photographs of Native North Americans. 1992. New York: The New Press.

4. BILBIJA, Ksenija, Jo Ellen FAIR, Cynthia E. MILTON, and Leigh A. PAYNE. 2005. The Art of Truth-Telling About Authoritarian Rule. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press.

Course evaluation:

· 60% THREE ESSAYS

· 20% PRESENTATION (over Bilbija et al.) You will be graded over your OWN presentation that will be done, however, within a group context. You must produce a power-point RESEARCH-BASED work that provides additional information about the issue and/or example under discussion.

· 20%: PARTICIPATION: Preparation (Be in class ready to answer questions on the readings and to share your most recent journal entry by reading it to us.) Lead discussion over assigned chapters, relating them to any films we see. (When you do a presentation you must turn in a typed 1-2 page summary of the main points you are discussing).

EGC 303 SCHEDULE

NOTE: A good deal of the course is based on visual representations we will view in class. Many of the films we see are not available in the FLC library and cannot be given to you on loan. Only a FEW of the films we will view are listed on this syllabus. It is your responsibility to be in class.

Week #	Topic	Readings	Notes
1 Aug 27,29,31	"The meeting of the waters" “A tale of two cities”	Slater 1-75, 205-222, 313-316	IMAX 1997 "Amazon"
2 Sept 3,5,7	"Amazon women" Illustrations “Roots of the Rain Forest”	Slater 81-101 (look at photos follow p. 129) Slater 133-157	"Spirit of TV" "Amazon Journal *Film segment: “Burden of Dreams”
3 Sept 10,12,14 * census Sept. 11	“Beyond Eden”	Slater 183-204	*Film: “American Chief in the Amazon” *Film: “The U’wa”

4 Sept 17,19,21	TYPECASTING Part I “Genesis: The Modern World System” Part II “Taxonomies of Human Difference”,	xv-xvii, 3-68, 83-99	ESSAY #1 DUE Sept 21 Film: “Sara Baartmann: The Hottentot Venus”
5 Sept 24, 26,28	TYPECASTING Part II, cont.	109-150, 183-197, 201-207	Film: “Stephen Jay Gould: This View of Life” (or “Race: The Story We Tell”)
6 Oct 1,3,5	TYPECASTING Part IV “Nordic Nightmares”	257-324	Film: “World’s Fair, St. Louis 1904”
7 Oct 8,10,12	TYPECASTING Part V “The Modern Battlegrounds of Type”	327-400	Film TBA
8 Oct 15,17,19	TYPECASTING Part V, cont.	437-497
9 Oct 22,24,26	PARTIAL RECALL	*Silko “Preface” PR 8-11, *Green “Rosebuds of the Plateau” PR 46-53 *Photographs PR 127-199	ESSAY #2 DUE Oct 22
10 Oct 29,31, Nov 2	PARTIAL RECALL	*Lippard “Intro” PR 12-45 *Durham “Geronimo!” PR 54-58 *Vizenor “Ishi Bares His Chest” PR 64-71 *Smith “Every Picture Tells A Story” PR 94-99 *McMaster “Colonial Alchemy” PR 76-87 *Benally “Women Who Walk Across Time” PR 100-104 *Seals “’Wounded Knee, 1989’ by Sarah Penman” PR 120-125	*Film: “The Shadow Catcher” and/or Film: “Bodmer & Maximilian”
11 Nov 5,7,9	Native American self-representation through film		*Film: “Qaqqiq” or “Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner”
12 Nov 12,14,16	REPRESENTATION, Truth-Telling, and Human Rights	Discuss book viii-ix; look at images
13 Nov 19,21,23		THANKSGIVING BREAK
14 Nov 26,28,30	Truth-Telling, and Human Rights		Work on presentations
15 Dec 3,5,7	Truth-Telling, and Human Rights		ESSAY #3 DUE Dec. 3 Presentations
16 Finals week		Presentations TUESDAY DEC. 11, 9:45-11:45	Presentations during final exam time