African American Film after the Civil Rights Movement

elective courses

Classroom

The work by African American directors serves as grounds for the discussion of the processes of claiming Black subjectivity, (re)configuring African American identity and challenging the (aesthetic, political) norms of classical Hollywood cinema. Analysis of specific films situated in the context of African American history and culture focuses on such issues as: deconstruction of racial stereotypes, Black politics, the Black aesthetic, the interconnections between gender, sexuality and race, African American icons (in music, film, sports, popular culture), the benefits and risks attending the entry of Black culture into mainstream American culture and our position as white audience.

The course examines selected movies made by African American film directors after the Civil Rights Movement. We will look at a variety of genres-from "blaxploitation" movies of the 1970's, through highly crafted feature films and documentaries of Spike Lee and independent cinema of Julie Dash, Cheryl Dunye and Haile Gerima, to John Singleton's Hollywood blockbusters, as well as the more recent work by Ryan Coogler, Ava DuVernay, Barry Jenkins, and Jordan Peele. We will address the processes of claiming Black subjectivity in film, (re)configuring African American identity and challenging the (aesthetic, political) norms of classical Hollywood cinema. Analysis of specific films situated in the context of African American history and culture focuses on such issues as: deconstruction of racial stereotypes, Black politics, the Black aesthetic, the interconnections between gender, sexuality and race, African American icons (in music, film, sports, popular culture), the benefits and risks attending the entry of Black culture into mainstream American culture and our position as white audience.

Topics discussed:

1. African American film in the 1970s: comedy, blaxploitation and African American new wave; African American film in the late 1980s/early 1990s: the new black aesthetic of Spike Lee, John Singleton; African American film in the 21st century: the new wave.

2. African American popular culture: the music video, hip hop, African American body/image

3. Race and the tradition of American Gothic

4. Political cinema

5. African American music in film

6. African American success in Hollywood

7. A critique of mainstreaming of African American culture

8. African American independent cinema

9. Gender and sexuality in African American film

10. Black documentary filmmaking

11. Racial violence and systemic racism in the United States

FILM:

Raisin in the Sun, 1961 (plus fragments from Raisin in the Sun, 2008, TV)

Watermelon Man 1970

Sweet Sweetback's Badassss Song, 1971

Shaft 1, 1971 (plus fragments from Shaft Returns, 2000)

The Spook Who Sat By the Door

Do the Right Thing

Mo' Better Blues

Boyz'n the Hood

Poetic Justice

Daughters of the Dust

Tongues Untied

Watermelon Woman

Bamboozled

When the Levees Broke

Precious

12 Years a Slave

Fruitvale Station

13'th

Selma

Moonlight

Get Out

Black Panther

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY:

Manthia Diawara, "Black American Cinema: The New Realism

Andrew Ross, "Hip and the Long Front of Color"

Kimmel, “Masculinity as Homophobia”

Castro, “Tongues Untied”

Toni Morrison, "Romancing the Shadow"; The Killer of Sheep

Baraka, "Spike Lee at the Movies"

Baker, "Spike Lee and the Commerce of Culture"

hooks, "Counterhegemoning Art"

Dyson, "Between Apocalypse and Redemption"

Bambara, "Reading the Signs"

Brouver, "Repositioning"

Interview: Dash with Baker

David Van Leer "Visible Silence: Spectatorship in Black Gay and Lesbian Film"

Spillers, "Uber Against Race"

Diawara, "Black Spectatorship"

hooks, "The Oppositional Gaze"

Christopher Lebron, "Black Panther Is not the Movie we Deserve"

Michelle Alexander, "The New Jim Crow"

1. Cultural studies: basic knowledge of film genres, film techniques and classical Hollywood conventions.

2. Tools for film analysis.

3. Knowledge of selected film theories.

4. Capacity for comparing/relating different cultural/esthetic models

5. Application of earlier knowledge of cultural studies, American history and esthetics.

6. Development of oral and writing skills in English.

7. Ability to define an appropriate research topic, locate secondary materials, construct a research paper.

Students will be asked to submit responses to sets of viewing questions related to the films discussed. Additionally, they will participate in group work, to be presented to the rest of the class. Each of the completed tasks will be graded as either Satisfactory or Unsatisfactory (S/U). The final grade will depend on the number of tasks the student undertakes PLUS class participation (or an alternative, such as a written response to the film).