Spring 2010 Course Schedule & Material
Instructor: Matteo Bittanti
This schedule is tentative and may change as needed.
Links, audiovisual material, and extras will be added onto the AVS class blog on a weekly basis
WEEK #1
1/15 Introduction to Advanced Visual Studies
What is Advanced Visual Studies?
Screening: excerpts from "Norman Mailer and Marshall McLuhan in conversation" (1968)
WEEK #2
1/22 Fashion Studies (1 of 2)
Readings:
Lars Svendsen, “The Origins and Spread of Fashion" in Fashion. A Philosophy, London: Reaktion Books, 2006, 36-63.
Roland Barthes, "Clothing History", in The Language of Fashion, New York: Berg, 2004, 3-41
Douglas Haddow, "Hipster: The Dead End of Western Civilization", Adbusters, July 2008. [highly recommended - the users' comments published online]
Assignment:
Write a critique of the fashion photoblog The Sartorialist .
WEEK #3
1/29 Fashion Studies (2 of 2)
Readings:
"Fashion, Clothing and Social Revolution" by Malcom Barnard from Fashion as Communication, New York: Routledge, 1996, 121-144.
Tom Reichert, "Designer Desire: Jeans", in The Erotic History of Advertising, New York: Prometheus Books, 2003, 203-231.
Ken Gelder, "Anachronistic Self-Fashioning. Dandyism, tattoo communities and leatherfolk", in Subcultures, London: Routledge, 2007.
Optional:
Kawamura, Yuniya, "Adoption and Consumption of Fashion", in Fashion-ology. An Introduction to Fashion Studies, New York: Berg, 2005, 89-103.
Lars Svendsen, “Fashion and Consumption" in Fashion. A Philosophy, London: Reaktion Books, 2006, 111-137.
Screening
Excerpts from Just for Kicks (Lisa Leone, 2005)
Assignment
Describe the fashion style of a specific subculture of your choice: geeks, nerds, drag-queens, gamers, metrosexuals, ganguro girls... Feel free to collect and use images to support your explanation/illustration. If you can, explain the rationale behind their choice of garment (hint: Douglas Haddow' essay on hipster could be helpful here - ditto for Gelder's).
WEEK #4
2/5 Celebrity Studies (1 of 3)
Readings:
“Spending Time With (a) Celebrity: Sam Taylor's Wood's video portrait of David Beckham" by Catherine Fowler, in Sue Holmes and Sean Redmond (Eds.), Framing Celebrity, New York: Routledge, 2006, 241-252.
Momin Rahman, "Is Straight the New Queer? David Beckham and the Dialectics of Celebrity", in P.D. Marshall (Ed.), The Celebrity Culture Reader, London: Routledge, 2006, 223-229.
Clive Thompson, “The Age of Microcelebrity: Why Everyone's a Little Brad Pitt”, WIRED, November 2007.
Assignment:
Write a critique of the photoblog LastNightParty.
WEEK #5
2/12 Celebrity Studies (2 of 3)
Readings:
P.D. Marshall, "The Meanings of the Popular Music Celebrity: The Construction of Distinctive Authenticity" in The Celebrity Culture Reader, London: Routledge, 2006, 557-580.
Sheila Whiteley, "The Killing Fields of Popular Music", in Sue Holmes and Sean Redmond (Eds.), Framing Celebrity, New York: Routledge, 2006, 241-252.
Hugh Barker and Yuval Taylor, "Where Did You Sleep last Night? Nirvana, Leadbelly, and the Allure of the Primeval", in Faking It. The Quest for Authenticity in Popular Music, New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2007, 1-29.
Chuck Klosterman, "Oh, The Guilt", in Eating the Dinosaur, New York: Scribner, 2009, 25-51.
Screening
Excerpts from Last Days (Gus Van Sant, 2005)
Assignment
Write a critique of Lady Gaga's iconography - your analysis should focus in these three music videos, but could be augmented by looking at other visual elements (photos, magazine covers, tv appearances etc.). By critique I mean a visual deconstruction of the motifs, themes, and recurring elements in her aesthetics.
Lady GaGa "Poker Face"
Lady GaGa "Just Dance"
Lady Gaga "Bad Romance"
Highly recommended: Ann Powers, "Frank Talk With Lady Gaga", LA Times, Dec 13 2009.
WEEK #6
2/19 Celebrity Studies (3 of 3)
Readings:
Kathy Davis, "Beauty and the Female Body", in P. David Marshall, The Celebrity Culture Reader, London: Routledge, 2006, 557-580.
Despina Kakoudaki, "Pinup: the American Secret Weapon in World War II", in Linda Williams (Ed.), Porn Studies, Durham: Duke University Press, 2004, 235-370.
Roosemary Coombe, "Author(iz)ing The Celebrity. Engendering Alternative Identities", in P. David Marshall, The Celebrity Culture Reader, London: Routledge, 2006, 721-769.
Jackie Stacey, "Feminine Fascinations. A Question of Identification?", in P. David Marshall, The Celebrity Culture Reader, London: Routledge, 2006, 253-285.
Screenings:
Excerpts from Beauty in a Jar (A&E, 2008), America the Beautiful (Darryl Roberts, 2007).
Assignment:
Pick your favorite celebrity and explain why you find him/her so captivating and charismatic. The celebrity has to bee human (sorry, no cartoon characters or videogame avatars this time). Once again, use the readings as a starting point for your critique, that is, if pertinent, reference ideas, models, and explanations provided by the authors - feel free to use all the readings in the celebrity studies cluster.
WEEK #7
2/26 Advertising (1 of 2)
Readings:
Chuck Klosterman, "It Will Shock You How Much It Never Happened", in Eating the Dinosaur, New York: Scribner, 2009, 177-188.
Judith Williamson, Decoding Advertising, London: Marion Boyars Publishers. (excerpt). Chapter 1 ("A Currency of Signs") and 2 ("Signs Address Somebody") (15-40).
Tom Reichert, "Intimate Intimations 1950-1975", in The Erotic History of Advertising, New York: Prometheus Books, 2003, 166-190.
Screening
Various clips from Mad Men, series 1, 2 and 3.
Assignment
Write a critique of the Absolut Ad campaign “In An Absolut World”
WEEK #8
3/5 Advertising (2 of 2)
Readings:
“Calvin Klein Jeans_A case study”
“Benetton’s Campaign”
“The King is Naked. Advertisement and Fashion. The Benetton's Phenomenon” by Annamaria Silvana De Rosa from Representations of the Social by Kay Deaux, Gina Philogène, 2002 (Download DeRosaBenetton)
Screening
Excerpts from The Production of Meaning (Adbusters), The Persuaders (PBS)
Assignment
Examine and critically discuss the American Apparel ad campaigns - one and two.
Recommended reading: Christopher Palmeri, "Living on the Edge at American Apparel", Business Week, 2005.
WEEK #9
3/12 Porn Studies (1 of 2)
Readings:
“Above the Pulp Line. The Cultural Meaning of Erotic Art" by Linda Nead, from More Dirty Looks. Gender, Pornography and Power edited by Pamela Church Gibson, London: BFI Books, 1993, pp. 216-223;
Alyce Mahon, "Eroticism and the Culture Wars of the 1980s and 1990s", Eroticism & Art, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005: 227-229.
"The Prehistory: The Frenzy of the Visible", by Linda Williams, from Hard Core, Power, Pleasure and The Frenzy of the Visible, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989, 34-58.
“Big Red Son” by David Foster Wallace, from Consider The Lobster and Other Essays, New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2005.
Screenings
Excerpts from: Pornography. The Secret History of Civilization (BBC), Slavoj Zizek’s The Pervert’s Guide to Cinema (Part 2)
Assignment:
Write a critique of Justine Lai's Sex With Presidents series
WEEK #10
3/19 Porn Studies (2 of 2)
Readings:
Alyce Mahon, "Erotic Fragmentation and Abjection" in Eroticism and Art, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005: 261-272.
Jennifer Boyle, "White Sex: Vaginal Davis Does Vanessa Beecroft" in Sex Object, Minneapolis: The University of Minnesota Press, 2006, 121-140.
Linda Williams, "Fetish and Hard Core: Marx, Freud, and the' Money Shot'", in Hard Core, Power, Pleasure and The Frenzy of the Visible, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989, 93-120.
Ara Osterweil, "Andy Warhol's Blow Jon: Toward Recognition of a Pornographic Avant-garde" in Linda Williams, Porn Studies, Durham:m Duke Unievrsity Press, 2006.
Optional:
Josh Sides, "The Unspoken Sexuality of Golden Gate Park" in Erotic City. Sexual Revolutions and the Making of Modern San Francisco, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009, 123-141.
Screening:
Excerpts from Thinking XXX (Timothy Greenfield-Sanders, 2004), Pornography. The Secret History of Civilization (BBC).