GSDF311C: The Movies Go to War, From World War II to Desert Storm SYLLABUS: SHORT (5-WEEK) SUMMER SESSION GSDF311C/AMSF315C/CLF305/EUSF307 (Unique numbers 80583/78398/79364/79924) Instructor: Sabine Waas This course will introduce some of the most famous war films, and some less familiar ones, from the US and Europe-- from The Longest Day through Saving Private Ryan and Jarhead. Each war has developed its own kinds of war movies, from World Wars I and II, through the Korean police action, and the Vietnam conflict. The class will engage war films as part of national history-making, and so it will introduce how to “read” films as part of cultural history and think critically about their content. Scenes from each war will be compared to the "real history" behind the film, to pose questions about how history can be written and rewritten in films, and how they might affect individual and group memory. Take a trip through cinematic battlefields, to see how films have helped their audiences think about the roles of the world's superpowers in world contexts! Topics to be addressed include: • cultural stereotypes of heroes, villains, and victims • different countries and their takes on the same war experience • the politics of war films • rewriting history through war movies (cultural memory and post-memory) • documentary, docu-drama • how to read point of view and national ideologies out of movies. BY THE END OF THE SEMESTER, you will be able to: • explain the rough contours of significant 20th-century military conflicts • understand the role that representation plays in making histories plausible to audiences • compare/contrast films from different national sites and made for different audiences, seeing how “editing” the facts of history is used to created national ideologies of victory and victim-hood around historical events, and • argue cases using film evidence — how to talk about what you see in historical context, and how to tie pictures to history/words GRADING AND ASSIGNMENTS: OVERVIEW • Online quizzes: 8 total, 20 minutes each = 30% of final grade o accessed through the "Quiz" link on Canvas o four on history; four on the films discussed o may only be logged into once -- if you click it, your timer starts, and that's it (contact the TA for genuine technical issues for a possible retake) o contain mostly T/F, matching, and multiple choice items; based on facts from readings (Goff, film plots, ppts) and clips viewed for daily assignments. o lowest two grades will be dropped in calculating the final class grade • Film Worksheets (Précis) = 4 x 10 % = 40 % of final grade (see details below) o A précis ('pray-see) is an assignment grid that helps you make an informed and consistent analysis of a text (book or film). o You will have to turn in FOUR one-page précis worksheets in the course of the class, each of which you will start in group work done in in-class (synchronous) break-out sessions in ZOOM. o The worksheets are available under FILES in CANVAS in their own subfile, labeled and with due dates listed in the syllabus. Remember to re-label them as noted above BEFORE you turn them in. o You may turn in the first TWO of the four working with a partner: two authors on a single worksheet, with both names indicated at the top. If you do it that way, label the file with your TWO LASTNAMES. • Online Final = 30 % of final grade (essay format; one-time login for a two- hour slot that will be available after the last class day and through the official exam time set by UT (noted on syllabus) o The final will be a 2-hour essay examination administered online through CANVAS, as above. It must be taken in one sitting from login through final writing. You will have a choice of questions, and it will be assumed that you will write for about an hour. o A "correct" answer must necessarily include a bibliographic entry on any film it refers to (as in a précis header); answers that use as examples only those clips shown in class will lose points -- you are expected to draw in other examples from films you have seen. IMPORTANT REMINDERS ON HOW TO USE THIS SYLLABUS: • *All readings are from Richard Goff, et al., The Twentieth Century and Beyond (pdf on CANVAS); texts marked READ = correlate with the day's ppt and may feature on the quiz on that topic • "REC" = readings that will help you make sense of the wars, but are not compulsory. • All FILMS available at Box links (indicated in the ANNOUNCEMENTS on CANVAS) as explained in first day PPT; sections specified on the syllabus as WATCH sections are fair game for the quiz on that topic, as are the basic details of plot and character that you should be looking up and reading on Wikipedia as linked to this syllabus. • All other assignments are either detailed on the syllabus or the assignments handout; electronic copies in the Canvas Files Link • Each class day has its own learning goals: what you should know or be able to do by the end of reading/viewing assigned materials • If there is a quiz for the day, it is indicated on the syllabus, along with its topic. • Every Class has a PPT in Canvas to complement /amplify the reading/listening goals. In some cases, there may be a few additional notes in a word document. PART 1: Setting up the course and the problems to be discussed Week 1: JUNE 4 & 5 THU Introduction to the Course: (Zoom) • logistics, texts, films, requirements CLASS GOALS: • Introducing the central questions about how wars are understood in the public mind: representations/stereotypes, memory, postmemory, and national memory. • Introducing what one "reads" out of a film -- introducing the "genre" of war films and what we have to look for in them • using a section from The Blue Max (one version of World War I (WWI) heroism, presented to a post World War II (WWII) audience, as an example of what we're talking about this semester READ (after class): Day1.pptx (in CANVAS Files, in a file marked "powerpoints") as recap of all assignments and basic issues to be discussed FRI The "Facts" of the Western War: From World War I (the "War to End all Wars") to WW II (the "Good War") in the European Theater (Zoom: Optional Lecture) READ: Day2.pptx READ (skim--not in detail): Goff, Chapters 11, 16, & 17 REC: Goff, Chapters 3, 7, 8, 10, & 12 CLASS GOALS: • Exemplifying how to use/read Goff or any history about wars o identifying which interest groups and causes drove WW II o identifying strategic allies on all sides, and their reasons for participating o identifying the motivations for supporting/resisting the wars from the point of view of the national governments • Introducing how to think with maps and timelines as influencing memory IN-CLASS QUIZ ON READING for sample question types (using POLL function): identifying strategic names and dates of WW I and WW II; questions to be posted after class PART 2: Building Public Memory through Film Stereotypes WEEK 2: JUNE 8 - 12 MO Western Heroes: Recent Memories about Stemming Nazi Aggression (Zoom) VIEW: • The Longest Day (first 9 minutes or up to 30; they hit the beach at 01:48:00) • Where Eagles Dare (first 10-12 minutes & 27-31) • Bridge at Remagen (first 20 minutes) READ: Day3.pptx CLASS GOALS: • An introduction on how to study films – what there is to discover in them, aside from content • Practice in situating films historically and for their audiences, so that stereotypes and limits on what can be shown emerge clearly (limited by "official stories of the war and individuals' HoEs) • This case: three films made when WW II was still a live memory for their audiences, who all believe in the story of "The Good War" and that they saved democracy in the world. • You'll be walked through a typical chain of "discovery" about how history and the films connect. TU Pearl Harbor and Beyond: When the Sleeping Giant Rises VIEW: • From Here to Eternity • Minutes 1- 8:30 • 50:00- 56:00 (optional) • 1:01:00-1:08:30 • 1:17:00-1:23:00 (optional) • 1:33:30-1:37:30 (if you can) • 1:43 to end of film (last 15 minutes) • Pearl Harbor (all disc 1) • 32:30- 55 (to end of Japanse ceremony -- stop whenever) • 1:16:00-1:36:00 READ: Day4.pptx CLASS GOALS: • Reading underlying ideologies: a film's point of view about "the military" as reveled through plot, stereotype, and images • From Here to Eternity: critique of the army through stereotyping • Pearl Harbor and post-memory: revisionism • Comparing how two films present the bombing of Pearl Harbor: two different takes on the homefront/military relationships • How other histories (more than battles and treaties) come into play WE POWs and the Asian Other VIEW: • Bridge on the River Kwai: start to 18:10 • King Rat: start to 11:30, 1:54:00- end (ca. 2:15:00) READ: Goff, Chapter 13 (and 7, if you're interested in the back story) READ: Day5.pptx CLASS GOALS: • Understanding an additional WW II stereotype: the Japanese enemy • its origins and use • How the treatment of POWs in the Pacific Theater was used to "justified" Hiroshima • Kwai as international film; King Rat as a much more inflammatory British one • Two films that make the Japanese even worse fascists/perpetrators of genocide than the Nazis (their allies) • What a WW II veteran would associate with “the Japanese enemy” HISTORY QUIZ 1 DUE (5 pm): WWI, interwar period, WWII Europe TH Two Sides of One War: Public Memory in Germany and the US (Zoom) VIEW: • Das Boot (German film, pronounced like "boat"): First 20 minutes • U-571: First 20 minutes READ: Day6.pptx CLASS GOALS: • Revisiting “official narratives” of WW II in different countries as creating blocks to memory and/or post-memory revision • Understanding how popular media rely on and/or reinforce these narratives, using the example of the submarine corps in Germany and US • Practice in identifying national variants of stereotypes, understanding what the differences and similarities for audience HoEs • Introducing précis / film worksheets as a tool for systematic analysis of texts.