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Space available in FLEFF mini courses starting after spring breakContributed by Warren Schlesinger on 03/14/12 Last chance to sign up on Homer for 1 or 2 credit mini courses starting after spring break. Courses are below or can be seen at FLEFF mini courses.
Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival Mini Courses* Beyond Microtopias: Making Change from the Local to the Global This course will explore how people working for change work individually, locally, or in mass global movements. French art critic Nicolas Bourriaud helped focus ideas about the value of microtopias, saying, “It seems more pressing to invent possible relations with our neighbors in the present than to bet on happier tomorrows.” We’ll begin by asking, “Who are our neighbors in a globalized world?” We’ll ask what we can learn from Foucault’s call for a society with multiple “heterotopias”--complex spaces that link the imaginary with the space in which we live. Through short readings and film screenings we’ll look at how people work to re-imagine and reform their worlds. Utopias, Dystopias, and Microtopias Through readings and FLEFF films we will address the subject of utopias, dystopias and microtopias. If the Greek root, “topia” can be understood to mean ‘landscape’ or ‘place,’ then we will interrogate how small communities, particularly migrants traveling from one homeland to another, perceive various socio-politico-legal communities, repressive, police states as well as the migrant's place within these states. We will examine the underlying causes of migration from perceived dystopias to perceived utopias and the ways in which migrants come to negotiate hybrid identities within ever-changing socio-politico-legal landscapes. Seeking Sustainable Relationships Under War and Occupation This course will offer students an opportunity to study how films involving environmental issues under the constraints of war and occupation have born witness to repeated attempts to form sustainable communities in unstable conditions. The class will discuss a few common readings about documentary films and contemporary environmental issues in Palestine. The course culminates in final group presentations, for which students will interview film makers of the Palestinian documentaries featured at FLEFF.
Examines the philosophic, sociological and artistic issues surrounding the transmission and assimilation of cultures. Through the prisms of film, music and dance, we will question the relationship between cultural diversity, sustainability, assimilation, artistic integrity, authenticity & creativity. Healthutopias: Fantasy or Reality? Remember Ponce de Leon’s 16th century search for the “Fountain of Youth” in Florida to restore health? The search, however, is not over. This mini-course explores modern Microtopian Business This course will take a critical perspective through readings and film about the characteristics and attributes of a successful business enterprise and the environment which supports that success. Issues being discussed in the Occupy Wall Street Movement will also be discussed and evaluated relative to films shown in class and during the Festival. The Eschatology of Microtopias Students will read relevant journalism & attend FLEFF films to explore microtopias. Microtopias can be understood as a reaction to the overwhelming pressures of mass society and modernity. It is the utopian drive in a dystopian present and can take on many forms, from farmer’s collectives to communal living, from micro-economies to cult-like communities. We will investigate how our understanding of microtopias is determined by the media. * For additional mini course information contact Warren Schlesinger, warren@ithaca.edu. |
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