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August 2000, Week 3

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Film and TV Studies Discussion List <[log in to unmask]>
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Fri, 18 Aug 2000 10:10:07 -0400
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Am I the only person that's bothered by the "students should take what we give" attitude that's been expressed in some of these posts?  As somebody who nearly failed a class in high school because I refused to watch first aid training films (odd as that sounds to anybody who knows me today) I'm too well aware that some people have very real problems dealing with this kind of material.  A close friend of mine is very well read, knows a phenomenal amount of history and is quite familiar with film history but she is genuinely disturbed by violence and "offensive" language.  This is much more common than generally acknowledged in the continual self-congratulating uproar over our open culture (at least in the US & I'll leave aside the question of how open it may actually be).  One post compared this to a med student recoiling from a wound but this analogy doesn't hold up at all:  Doctors by definition *must* deal with the body but we're discussing an art form(s) and however valuabl!
!
e or significant certain works/genres/periods may be they aren't necessary to understanding.  How many teachers are going to insist on showing "Birth of a Nation"?  If the class is on Griffith or a history of race in American film then it might be unavoidable just as a class on contemporary film will need Tarrantino and on horror "Night of the Living Dead" but for more general purposes (and perhaps even in those cases) there are good substitutes.  Several professors talked about how they worked with students to find an alternate which I think is not only fair but truest to a genuine spirit of education.

LT

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