Daniel Boyd, film teacher at West Virginia State College, describes his life and career as an independent filmmaker, including his educational background in film, efforts to market his films within the film industry, and development of scripts and films. (TES)

Describes a study of the reactions of 5- to 7- and 9- to 11-year-old children to frightening films. Reports that prior knowledge of happy outcomes for such films reduces enjoyment, as do unresolved endings. Suggests that the ability to enjoy fear-inducing media increases with age. (SG)

Election of a Labour government in Britain has seen the emergence of a new educational discourse blending certain cultural, economic, and social themes. Focusing on two government reports on cultural and nonprint media influences, this article identifies discourse components and explores their deployment in arguments for educational change.…

Movies are a pervasive cultural influence on the lives of young men and women. One only has to utter the words, "double secret probation" to a college audience to understand the extent of this influence. Yet the large body of research in film does not draw on higher education research. We explore how college choice and adolescent development…

"The Lord of the Rings" continues Hollywood's recurrent theme of good triumphing over evil. The viewer is supposed to identify with the heroes, whiteness, and goodness, which of course triumphs over evil and blackness. Although the cast is made up almost entirely of White people, people also do not question this narrative of White supremacy. To…

While in some respects it has never been easier to teach film and video production, in other respects it has never been more difficult and beset with inconsistencies. For instance, pervasive advertising products of the video networks (i.e., epic scale commercials and music videos) frequently engage in the anarchy of postmodern excess, making it…

This collection of essays takes the question of pedagogy into a variety of places, including film studies, psychoanalytic literature criticism, dialog, and readings of educational documentary films and web sites. Part 1, "Teaching as a Scene of Address," includes chapters 1-6. The chapters introduce the concept of mode of address and…

This paper examines the portrayal of shopping malls in the films of the 1980s and attempts to "narrativize" the trend found between the films as the story of a subculture as it adopts and develops a belief system based on consumerism. The paper begins with an exploration of the evolution of the mall as a modern meeting place and center…

Testifying to the virtues of teaching at an all-women's college (Mills College, Oakland, California), a male tenured professor of communication and film acknowledges the necessity of making difficult decisions concerning course content and focus. Through several uncomfortable experiences, he has learned what it is like to be gender conscious; he…

The classic film, "Twelve Angry Men," where a lone dissenting jury member (Henry Fonda) implores his fellow jurors not to make a quick decision in a murder trial, is often cited as a resource for analyzing decision-making processes in groups. The film, used in group-process courses to show how conformity pressures can hamper effective…

There are numerous ways to structure the introduction to film course so as to meet the needs of the different types of students who typically enroll. Assuming there is no production component in the course, the teacher is left with two major approaches to choose from--historical and aesthetic. The units in the course will typically be built around…

Rhetorical studies of the media during the past decade have tended to focus upon specific types of media such as music, television, film, and radio. Most recently, however, rhetorical studies such as James Chesebro's "The Media Reality" suggest that rhetorical critics are moving toward an examination of the collective influence of the media in…

Media advocates too often obscure the extent to which media production is dependent on print. (JH)

Teachers often impose old, literary perceptual patterns on the visual arts. (JH)

Students can see more in motion picture and television productions once they realize that they are already quite knowledgeable, and these ten discovery-experience lesson units on film and television productions provide teachers with a means to let them discover for themselves that they already know several characteristics of the moving media as…