Changes in visual news A series of lectures about newsreels and the transition to television news Within the scope of current research on non-fiction, newsreels and television news, the Working Group Film and Television Studies organizes a series of lectures about newsreels and the transition to television news. In this series specialists will express their opinions about the subject. One of the foreign speakers is the Dutch film historian Bert Hogenkamp (University of Utrecht), who will talk about the workers’ film news in the twenties and thirties, while Stig Hjarvard (University of Copenhagen) will deal with the transition from newsreels to television news. John Corner (University of Liverpool) will shed light on the British context. These lectures will be intensively illustrated with authentic film/video material, including footage from the Imperial War Museum, the Bundesarchiv-Filmarchiv, the VRT Beeldarchief and the DR television archives.In relation to these lectures, the working group also organizes a series of master classes for university graduates as well as a series of films in Film-Plateau about the imagination of journalists and editorial staffs in the cinema http://www.psw.rug.ac.be/comwet/wgfilmtv/) PROGRAMME Introduction to lectures : DANIEL BILTEREYST (Ghent University, B) November 19, 2000 BERT HOGENKAMP (NIBG/University of Utrecht, NL) on workers’ film news in the twenties and the thirties November 26 ROEL VANDE WINKEL (Ghent University, B) on film news and propaganda in occupied Belgium December 3 STIG HJARVARD (University of Copenhagen, DK) Against the very nature of the medium (lecture in English) December 12 JOHN CORNER (Liverpool University, UK) Seeing Behind the news: the World in Action project (lecture in English) December 17 LIEVE DESMET (Ghent University, B) on the early beginnings of television news on the Flemish public broadcasting corporation ABSTRACTS BERT HOGENKAMPThe news differently or different news: workers’ film news in the 20s and 30s In the ‘20s and 30s, the need was felt within the left wing movement to introduce an alternative to the ‘commercial’ or ‘middle-class’ film news. Film editing was an important means with which even images from the middle-class news could be given a new meaning. Besides that, the workers’ news showed events which were left aside by the commercial news. ROEL VANDE WINKEL: Film news and propaganda in occupied Belgium This lecture, an introduction to a Ph.D. which will be defended in 2003, shows how the German occupying forces obliged the projection of propaganda film news. At first, these newscasts were made in Berlin, including the French or Dutch comments. After a few months though, a local editorial staff was installed in Brussels which was supposed to give a Belgian look to the German propaganda. Next to comparing the German original to the Belgian clone, the attention is focused on the way in which television producers use this material in historical documentaries nowadays. The material shown originates from the Bundesarchiv-Filmarchiv collections. STIG HJARVARD: the very nature of the medium It was not until 1965, that Danish television began its regular news programming, and although it was much awaited, it was met with harsh criticism. This way of reporting the news, the public verdict sounded, "was against the very nature of the medium". Earlier on, the factual programming on Danish television had consisted of newsreel formats and different kinds of documentaries and current affairs programmes. In this lecture particular attention is paid to the analysis of the non-personal, very formal and highly institutional mode of address that characterized the early years of news broadcasting in Danish television. How - and why - it departed from both earlier and later audiovisual news formats is discussed in relation to both aesthetic conventions, technological possibilities and institutional constraints. JOHN CORNER Seeing Behind the News: the World in Action project The series World in Action ran in Britain from the early 1960s and was a big influence on the development of television journalism. It set itself the challenge of crafting a new kind of pictorial reporting, drawing on the methods of broadcast news, the tradition of documentary film-making and new currents in newspaper feature-writing. It attempted to be both serious and popular, holding the audience within a strong narrative and scopic design. This lecture looks at some of the key elements of the WIA recipe, drawing particularly on the ways in which it often attempted to place itself ‘inside ’ the stories it told, opening up new pictorial space for reportage. Screenings will be from WIA material. LIEVE DESMET Start and development of television news on the Belgian PSB Processes of news production are aggregates of meaningful practices always embedded in a historical, social, political, technological and economic context. Television news can be considered as a culture form. The perspective is to see the newscast not only as a report of reality, but to examine it as reality unto itself. Three assumptions will be considered. Firstly, the long-term development of television news can’t be understood simply as a linear and continuous trend over time. Secondly, the impact and influence of political, cultural, economic, social and technological circumstances vary in time. Thirdly, the expansion, the monopolization and the protection of an own authority lead to common standards of what television news is and should be and to typical news formats, news contents and news representations. This lecture will discuss and illustrate those three topics for the television news on the Belgian PSB. PRACTICAL INFORMATION Place: Film-Plateau – Paddenhoek 3 – 9000 Gent - Belgium Entrance: free Information: Tel. : **/32/ 9 264 91 85 – E-mail:[log in to unmask] and website: http://www.psw.rug.ac.be/comwet/wgfilmtv/ ---- To sign off Screen-L, e-mail [log in to unmask] and put SIGNOFF Screen-L in the message. Problems? Contact [log in to unmask]