On Thu, 28 May 1998, Kristine T. Utterback wrote:
> How apt from my point of view that this discussion of videos in the
> classroom came up. I had suspended it for a couple of months, and I just
> rejoined a couple of weeks ago. I'm thinking seriously about developing a
> western civ. course based on films. I have two purposes in mind.
>
> 1. Teaching history using videos.
> 2. Teaching the students to evaluate videos as history. After all,
Kristine, and other listmembers,
I just finished teaching, for the second time, a summer course on "The
Middle Ages in Film". The purpose was not so much to show medieval history
through filmic eyes, but to show students how historical representation
can work, and how we can discover the limits and possibilities of
historical representation in the medium film. I think one ought to be
extremely careful using films in teaching history; because film is a
graphica and visual medium, it often is taken as "truth" more readily than
books. This also means that, no matter how much explaining you do,
students will still have a very direct and basic response to films, and
they will not always get out of the film what you, as a teacher, intend.
I found this particularly frustrating in teaching "The Name of the Rose";
no matter how much explaining I did, the main conclusion most students
drew was "the medieval church was a corrupt and repressive institution".
This is why I suggest introducing a course like Kristine proposes with a
couple of lectures on "how do historians arrive at 'truth' ".
I taught this course using The Seventh Seal, The Name of the Rose, Brother
Sun Sister Moon, Decameron, Excalibur, Monty Python's Holy Grail,
Jabberwocky, and Eric the Viking. Not all of these are particularly
"historically accurate", but that was as said not the point of the course.
I think there are three types of use of history in film. First, films can
use history as "fantasy"; the historical background is nothing but a
scenic background for a romance. Historical accuracy does not matter, as
long as the plot takes place 'in a far-away country, a long time ago".
The second type is comparable to the ancient genrew of the swashbuckler
novel: some of the historical characters may be "accurate", and some of
the events in this film may be found in the history books, but
essentially, the characters speak and act not all that differently from
twentieth-century people (Braveheart comes to mind, or Titanic). Finally,
the good historical films may take events and persons that are completely
fictional, but still convey a sense of the mentality and culture in a
particular time period. For the eighteenth century, I found "Ridicule" an
excellent film, for the Middle Ages perhaps "The Advocate", or
Pasolini's "Decameron". (my classification is adapted from Eco's
postscript to The Name of the Rose).
But ultimately, the question is: will your satudents see these films in
the same way as you ??
I hope this is a uaseful contribution to the discussion ...
Sorry for the typos. I hit my left middle finger with a chisel yesterday
:)
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Frans van Liere
Department of History
College of Charleston
Charleston SC 29424
NEW ADDRESS as of 7/15
home: 336 Rosewood Ave. SE
East Grand Rapids MI 49506
phone: (616) 458-7160
work: Department of History, Calvin College
3201 Burton Street SE
Grand Rapids MI 49546
e-mail: [log in to unmask]
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