Affiliated Faculty: Professor Lembo (Chair) and Hastie; Associate Professor Van Compernolle; Assistant Professors Levine and Rangan; Visiting Professor Guilford.
Contributing Faculty: Professors Drabinski, Gewertz, Keller, Kimball, Parham, Rogowski, Rosbottom†, Sarat, and Woodson; Associate Professors Brenneis, Engelhardt, Gilpin, and Wolfson; Assistant Professors J. Robinson, and Shandilya; Five College Associate Professor Hillman.
*On leave 2016-17.
†On leave fall semester 2016-17.
‡On leave spring semester 2016-17.
The Film and Media Studies Program situates the study and practice of the moving image in its aesthetic, technical, and socio-cultural dimensions within a wider history of media. The program integrates formal, historical and theoretical analysis with various forms of creative and production experience in its required core courses. In courses in Critical Studies and Production, we explore the practice of constructing moving images through considerations of narrative, non-narrative and experimental structures, camera motion, editing techniques, music and sound design, mise-en-scène, and digital technologies. The dual emphasis on study and practice allows the historical, theoretical, compositional, and aesthetic issues to illuminate each other and thus to allow students to engage with both the depth and breadth of media production and analysis. The program interfaces with a variety of disciplines across the Liberal Arts spectrum, such as philosophy, social and literary theory, area studies, language study, visual culture, theater and dance, anthropology, computer science, and gender studies.
Major Program. The Film and Media Studies (FAMS) major requires four core courses, a minimum of five additional courses (electives) from a variety of related disciplines that reflect each student’s individual academic and creative interests, and a two-semester thesis project. The FAMS major is framed by three foundations courses: Foundations in Critical Media Studies (e.g. "Coming to Terms: Cinema" and "Knowing Television"), Foundations in Production (an introductory production workshop), and a Foundations in Integrated Media Practices. Foundations courses in Critical Media Studies and Production will serve as the prerequisites for the Foundations in Integrated Media Practices, which will be a team-taught course, and which FAMS majors should ideally complete by the end of their junior year. Majors will also be required to take at least one FAMS seminar in their junior or senior year. In addition, students will take at least five other courses as electives, including at least one course at one of the other Five Colleges. The FAMS program grants wide scope to students for creating an individualized program of study. When declaring the major, each student is required to make a contract for his or her program with the Faculty Committee on Film and Media Studies (which will function as a review board), as represented and coordinated by the Chair. Each student’s progress towards the completion of the contract will then be assessed, over the following semesters, by two faculty advisors from different departments appointed by the Committee. For the Capstone Requirement, students will either produce a two-semester thesis or will both submit a portfolio in the Fall semester of their senior year and will take at least one additional 400-level FAMS course.
Soviet filmmaker Dziga Vertov claimed that the movie camera is different from, even superior to, human vision and thus allows us to see in new ways. Many others have echoed this idea about cinema’s powerful impact on our ways of seeing and knowing the world. As an introduction to the study of cinema, this course cultivates in students what Vertov called “the Kino-eye.” Our emphasis will be on narrative film, but with some attention paid to experimental, documentary, and animated works as well. This course treats cinema as an international art form: we will examine a wide range of films from many countries over the past century and more. Through exposure to the great variety of filmmaking and writing about film around the world, from the silent era to the digital revolution, students will receive a comprehensive introduction to the key formal features of film and to the major debates that inform film studies.
Limited to 35 students. Spring semester. Professor Van Compernolle.
Other years: Offered in Spring 2025(Offered as FAMS 228 and ENGL 287.) This course will introduce students to basic Super 8 film and digital video techniques. The course will include workshops in shooting for film and video, Super 8 film editing, Final Cut Pro video editing, lighting, stop motion animation, sound recording and mixing. Students will learn to think about and look critically at the moving and still image. Students will complete three moving image projects, including one Super 8 film, one video project, and one mixed media project. Weekly screenings will introduce students to a wide range of approaches to editing, writing, and directing in experimental, documentary, narrative, and hybrid cinematic forms. Screenings include works by Martha Rosler, Bill Viola, the Yes Men, Jennifer Reeves, Mona Hatoum, Guillermo Gómez-Peña, Dziga Vertov, D.A. Pennebaker, Jean-Pierre Gorin, Cécile Fontaine, and Johanna Vaude.
Admission with consent of the instructor. Please complete the questionnaire at https://www.amherst.edu/academiclife/departments/film/major/major-requirements/forms. Limited to 13 students. Fall semester. Five College Professor Hillman.
2023-24: Not offered(Offered as FAMS 350 and ENGL 376). This course will introduce students to a diverse range of experimental approaches to narrative filmmaking. Students will gain skills in filmmaking and criticism through project assignments, readings and analysis of language, performance and visual structure within selected films. Workshops in cinematography, sound recording and editing will be offered. The course will concentrate on filmmakers who are working in a context of multiple languages, hybrid forms and transnational histories. Screenings will include works by Jia Zhangke, Mati Diop, Abderrahmane Sissako, Pedro Costa, Claire Denis, and Nagisa Oshima. Students will complete three film and video projects. Lab fee required. Course meetings include one three hour consecutive meeting per week and one screening time per week.
Recommended prior coursework: ENGL 287/FAMS 228, Introduction to Super 8 Film and Digital Video, or other introductory course in film and video, photography, or painting. Admission with consent of instructor. Please complete the questionnaire at https://www.amherst.edu/academiclife/departments/film/major/major-requirements/forms and submit to Prof. Hillman. Limited to 13 students. Omitted 2016-17. Five College Professor Hillman.
2023-24: Not offered
Independent Reading Courses.
Fall and spring semester. The Department.
Other years: Offered in Fall 2011, Spring 2012, Fall 2012, Spring 2013, Fall 2013, Spring 2014, Fall 2014, Spring 2015, Fall 2015, Spring 2016, Fall 2016, Spring 2017, Fall 2017, Spring 2018, Fall 2018, Spring 2019, Fall 2019, Spring 2020, Fall 2020, Spring 2021, Fall 2021, Spring 2022, Fall 2022, Spring 2023, Fall 2023, Fall 2024Admission with consent of the instructor. Spring semester.
Other years: Offered in Spring 2012, Spring 2013, Spring 2014, Spring 2015, Spring 2016, Spring 2017, Spring 2018, Spring 2019, Spring 2020, Spring 2021, Spring 2022, Spring 2023, Spring 2025