From cinema to society: Understanding Europe in a global context

Elective Course

This survey course will introduce students to key global issues of the 20th and 21st centuries from a European perspective as portrayed in a selection of European films. The course will be tackled in two ways. First, students will learn about socio-cultural developments and historical events that were instrumental in shaping the diverse European attitudes towards gender and sexual identities, welfare, the precarization of labour, migration, colonialism and imperialism, the Communism-Capitalism dichotomy, democracy, ecology, and the tension between regional, national and supra-national identities, among other questions. Second, films are studied both as texts to be critically analysed by taking into account global aesthetic trends, and as products funded by private and public transnational platforms based within and outside Europe. Another significant topic in this course will be the role of European film festivals in the promotion and production of World Cinema beyond Europe. The language of instruction is English.

Non-permissible combination:  EUST2015

[Note to students admitted in 2023-24 and before: Students who have successfully completed “EUST2015. From cinema to society: Understanding Europe through film” are not allowed to take this course. For those who have not yet done so, they can take GLAS2107 to fulfil the relevant requirement in the academic year 2024-25 and thereafter.]