Body/Gesture/Cinema

Catalog description

Antonin Artaud once called the body “a language to which it seems we no longer have the key.” This course is an attempt to take up his challenge in light of our experience at the cinema. Two questions will guide our investigation: Do the bodies on film “signify”? If so, how does this signifying practice trigger our own corporeal unconscious? We will explore a wide range of texts across film studies, theatre, anthropology, linguistics, and critical theory. Topics include gesture, ethnography, disability, violence, horror, and phenomenology. Readings include Didi-Huberman, Benjamin, Ricoeur, Merleau-Ponty, Kristeva, Shaviro, Sobchack, Naremore, Clover, Linda Williams, etc.