I wrote a book about the uses of film in college writing classes.
Cruel Auteurism: Affective Digital Mediations Toward Film-Composition
This book explores some of the rhetorical dimensions and pedagogical implications of film in college writing classrooms. It is also shaped by reflection upon the practice of making short films as digital scholarship. Using affect theorist Lauren Berlant's concept of "cruel optimism" to articulate the findings of my archival, analytical, and experiential methods, I describe a cultural shift within college writing classes. Once defined largely by desires to impose “order” through grammatical skill and Standard Written English, today’s increasingly cinematic rhetorics and technological advances invite college writing classes toward a fuller complexity — from the primacy of “correct” print based arguments, through an evolving desire to engage with and make films as forms of effective and intensely moving forms of writing.
n.b., For Berlant, cruel optimism “exists when something you desire is actually an obstacle to your flourishing” (p. 1). In my experience, making short, DIY films meant working far beyond the constraints of my job’s essential functions. Few material rewards manifested. Prestige — in the form of promotions or job offers — wasn’t part of the deal. The work was isolating and demanding. I am nevertheless soul-level grateful for the experience. It might have gone differently; perhaps this work, along with others arguing for more collaborative making and the emergence of collectives and makerspaces, will see to it.
Berlant, L. (2011). Cruel Optimism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Image: Gibson + Recoder, Untitled (2008); courtesy of SoS Editions and the artists.