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but most discourses today talk about films as
cognitive objects, and i suppose, to put my own questin differently, i'm
asking about the epistemic differences between different modes of delivery
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I think this is the heart of the matter. When Mike says "most discourses
today", he is clearly referring to the predominance of "signification" in the
academic community. That view has so dominated our community that we find
ourselves in the present contretemps.
 
A generation has grown up and is now teaching which is under the thrall of
this, to my mind, extremely limited and literary view of a great and
all-encompassing art form. It has, in my opinion, had a reductivist effect on
experiencing film.
 
I have no problem with anyone having any view thay please, but to present it
as the ONLY alternative in looking at film is extraordinarily limited and
inevitably leads to a situation in which the "textual" elements of the film
become so central that the VISUAL experience has been denigrated (and even
dismissed).
 
Gene Stavis, School of Visual Arts - NYC
 
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