Foundations of Film
For more than a century, movies have brought people together to laugh, cry, and connect. Whether it’s The Batman or Barbie, It or Interstellar, moving images have the power to shape our identities and worldviews. Are you curious what makes that possible? In this course, you will explore what makes a movie great, breaking down everything from modern blockbusters to Hollywood classics to understand how ideas are communicated through image and sound. You’ll explore topics of interest to you—from economics to science to politics—and see how they intersect with film. Through screenings, analysis, discussions, and hands-on experimentation, you’ll gain the practical knowledge and skills necessary to dig deeper into what you see on screen—and you might even find a new favorite movie in the process.
Crime Literature
Starting with the birth of detective fiction, one of the most popular literary genres, and moving to creative nonfiction, we will consider the appeal of stories about grisly murders and trace an arc from a more comfortable belief in the nature of justice to suspicion about police powers. Coinciding with this increased suspicion is a movement away from white detectives and white victims, to crimes targeting people of color, who were legally barred from giving testimony (and thus seeking legal redress) for much of the country’s history. Do stories give us cathartic release when a bad guy is punished? Is there some sort of poetic justice in exposing the inequities of the past even if the murderers have gone free? And what does crime fiction’s popularity suggest about our relationship to our criminal justice system, about our perception of its workings, and about the larger American tenet of equality before the law?
This class will have a particular focus on the skills of reading and creative writing.
Student Directed Project – SDP
Interests:
Architecture,
Business,
Design,
Engineering,
Film,
Hands On,
Health,
Law,
Literature,
Politics,
Psychology,
Research,
Social Justice,
Social Sciences,
Sports
A Student-Directed Project empowers students to do an in-depth exploration of a topic of interest throughout the term.
The student designs, plans, and leads their research project in collaboration and with the guidance and support of a coach (faculty advisor). It allows students to delve deeper into their passion and to be the designer of their own learning. There is a wide range of Student-Directed Projects; they are multi-disciplinary, non-linear, and most importantly, student-created and led.
That’s what makes them so interesting.
Here are some examples of past projects:
- Creating an architectural model using 3D architectural software
- Through their eyes: Photo and interview series of veterans
- Robosub electromagnetic linear accelerator
- Acoustic pinger for Robosub
- Virtual Reality game for visually-impaired persons
- Creating a concept album
- Dispute: Landlord-tenant board game
- Multimedia journalism: Producing a podcast series
- Perplex: English and Theater Study
- Sensors and fiber optics: Building a fiber optic dress
- Haptic technologies: Force-Feedback Virtual Reality
- Applications of integrals to analytical continuation of functions