Social Documentary, COMM 512.001

Syllabus by Prof. Pat Aufderheide, American University

Instructors: Pat Aufderheide and Robin Smith
Spring 2004, American University School of Communication

This is a class to familiarize you with audio-visual production for social action, including nonprofit, advocacy, institutional, and museum display. You'll analyze case studies of successful work, map the economic and social environment for media, meet professional media producers, and develop a proposal.

This kind of audiovisual production is distinctive. It is produced for instrumental purposes--teaching, triggering debate, motivating political actions, fostering group identity. Such work to be compelling must be artful, engaging, and within the expectations of your viewers for an audiovisual experience.

But it also is special because such work participates in a relationship with viewers as members of the public, as citizens, as people who can and will make choices about not just their own lives but about their government, school system, environment, immigration policy, and so on. In that sense, especially, this work is critical to shaping public life.

PROFESSORS:

The lead professor for this class is Prof. Pat Aufderheide, a full-time and senior faculty member since 1989, and the codirector of the Center for Social Media. Prof. Aufderheide is responsible for the course as a whole and for the majority of the evaluation.

Team-teaching is Prof. Robin Smith, the founder and president of Video/Action, a leading national producer of strategic media in conjunction with nonprofits. Kindly consult Staff Information on Blackboard for more biographical information, for an extensive bio and filmography please check Course Documents in Blackboard. Prof. Smith will be responsible for evaluation of her portion of the course.

REQUIRED READING:

• Pat Aufderheide, In the Battle for Reality [1]
• Karen Hirsch, ed., Making Television Matter [2]
• Karen Hirsch, ed. Why Fund Media [3]
• And assigned weekly readings (on Blackboard, either within the e-reserves file in Course Documents or as a document within Course Documents)

SCHEDULE

Jan. 14: Introductions and viewing

Speaker: Christof Blackman Putzel, filmmaker of Left Behind [4]

WORKING WITH PROGRAMMERS

Jan. 21: Producing for US Television
READING FOR TODAY:

• Aufderheide, In the Battle for Reality [1], Introduction AND Squeezing through the Gates
• http://www.benton.org/publibrary/mtm/Pages/two.html [5]
• Patricia Thomson, "The Documentary in Action" and "The Catalytic Role of Documentary Outreach," Chaps. 6 & 7 of Why Fund Media pp. 37-47 [6]
• Interview with Gordon Quinn [7]
• Visit the website for New Americans [8] enter and check out the different sections

VIEWING FOR TODAY: New Americans: Episode I
DUE FOR TODAY: Summary paper

Jan. 21, CSM Event: Citizen King, with Orlando Bagwell, 5:30 Wechsler Theater

Jan. 28: International development and television
READ FOR TODAY:

• Nashe Maalo [9]
• Visit the website for Steps for the Future [10]; read in the different sections, including interviews with producers and international mentors

VIEWING FOR TODAY:

• Local Voter on Prime Time South Africa (VHS 5950)
• Steps for the Future TBA;
• Nashe Maalo

DUE FOR TODAY: Summary paper

Feb. 4: Nonprofits and Television
READING FOR TODAY:

• Aufderheide, In the Battle for Reality [11], In the Toolkit: Nonprofit Production
• Aufderheide, "Blood Lines" [12]
• Conciatore, "Take This Heart: A Coalition Model," [13] in Hirsch, ed. Making Television Matter, pp. 28-35
• "Reaching the MTV Generation," [14] (and then click on the report)

VIEWING FOR TODAY:

• Take This Heart (VHS 6876);
• sample in Blood Lines

DUE FOR TODAY: Summary paper
GUEST LECTURER: Ellen Spiro, independent filmmaker

Feb. 4, CSM Event: Photographer Leonard Freed, 5:30 Wechsler Theater

WORKING WITH NONPROFITS
A PRACTICUM WITH PROF. ROBIN SMITH

Feb. 11 Video/Action: Partnering with Nonprofits (Case Study: Women of Substance)
VIEWING FOR TODAY: Women of Substance (30-min and 10-min versions) (VHS 7376)
DUE FOR TODAY: Screening summary

Feb. 18 Video/Action: Providing a forum for stories rarely heard (Case Study: We Are Not)
VIEWING FOR TODAY:

• We Are Not Who You Think We Are
• Que Pasa

DUE on MONDAY before CLASS: E-mailed draft of pre-meeting background memo
DUE FOR TODAY:

• Screening summary
• Research memo on client

IN-CLASS ACTIVITY: Role play meeting with nonprofit client in need of a video

Feb. 21-22: National Gallery of Art, "The Flaherty" screenings

Feb. 25 Video/Action: Special Event Video Productions (Case Study: Through My Eyes)
VIEWING FOR TODAY:

• Through My Eyes (VHS 7373)
• Angie's Story
• Louis Martin Tribute

DUE FOR TODAY:

• Screening summary
• Post-meeting letter

IN-CLASS ACTIVITY: Role play pre-production brainstorm meeting

March 3 Video/Action: Gov't-funded Opportunities (Case Study: Terrorism and Hate Crime)
VIEWING FOR TODAY:

• Extraordinary Response to International Terrorism
• Special Courage in the face of Hate Crime
• A Balance to Maintain

DUE FOR TODAY:

• Screening Summary
• Three-page Proposal (initial draft)

IN-CLASS ACTIVITY: Students will present proposals to each other for feedback

March 17: Video/Action: Presenting proposals to clients
VIEWING FOR TODAY: Why Walk When You Can Fly?
DUE FOR TODAY:

• Screening summary
• Proposal (final draft)
• Exec Summary

IN-CLASS ACTIVITY: Students will present proposals to nonprofit client

WAY BEYOND BROADCAST

March 24: Media in Museums
READ FOR TODAY:

• Thomas and Mintz, The Virtual and the Real: Media in the Museum, 1-35, 57-70
• Wallace, "The virtual past: media and history museums," in Mickey Mouse history and other essays on American memory, 101-113

VIEW FOR TODAY:

• Something Strong Within
• Refugees: The Last Resort

VISIT FOR TODAY: One museum using audio-visual media within exhibits rather than as a movie (any of the Smithsonian complex, for example)
DUE FOR TODAY:

• Summary paper
• Museum visit paper

March 24-27: Environmental Film Festival at the Center for Social Media! [15] Check website for details, including the Saturday panel with filmmakers and industry leaders!

March 31: Documentary and human rights
READ FOR TODAY:

• Aufderheide, In the Battle for Reality [1], In the Toolkit: Nonprofit Production
• "Calling the Ghosts" [16]
• Visit the witness.org [17] website and view Rule of the Gun in Sugarland, noting different sections of the website
• TBA, by Ronit Avni

VIEW FOR TODAY:

• Books not Bars
• Trembling before G-D

GUEST LECTURER: Ronit Avni, formerly associate producer, WITNESS
DUE FOR TODAY: Summary paper

March 31: CSM, Ronit Avni and the Just Vision project, 5:30 Wechsler Theater

April 7: Video Activism
READ FOR TODAY:

• Aufderheide, In the Battle for Reality, No Gatekeepers: Alternative Media
• Harding, The video activist handbook, 1-28

VIEW FOR TODAY:

• Breaking the Bank (VHS 7319)
• Oneworld TV [18]; watch a film to be assigned in class
• Five trailers in Big Noise Media [19]
• Copwatch, Mediarights Film Festival DVD [20]

DUE FOR TODAY: Summary paper

April 14: Broadcast Outreach and Strategic Campaigns
READING FOR TODAY:

• Pam Calvert, "Media and Metanoia" [21]
• Ashkinaze, "The Television Race Initiative: Sparking dialogue that can lead to action," in Hirsch, ed., Making Television Matter, 21-28
• Robert West, Report from the Road: Two Towns of Jasper [22]
• "Not in Our Town," [23] Communications Initiative

VIEWING FOR TODAY:

• Not in Our Town II (VHS 4364) plus discussion guide and website [24]
• Uprising of '34 (VHS 3524) (sample in this!)
• sample in Two Towns of Jasper (VHS 7330)

DUE FOR TODAY: Summary paper

April 14: CSM, The Impact of Outreach: The Not In Our Town Project, 5:30 Wechsler

April 21: Participatory media
READ FOR TODAY:

• Aufderheide, "Videomaking by and with Brazilian Indians," on Blackboard Course Documents
• Aufderheide, In the Battle for Reality, Build It and They Will Come: Public Platforms for New Speakers
• Hunt, A Voice of Their Own: Youth Media, in Hirsch, ed. Why Fund Media [25]
• Alfonso Gumucio Dagron, "Making Waves," pp. 1-8, [26] (several more clicks through to end of p. 8)
• Teen Video in Nigeria [27]
• Video and Community Dreams: Egypt [28]
• Orton, Lights, camera, community video : engaging citizens in creating a community documentary and vision, pp. 1-15

VIEW FOR TODAY:

• Lipstick (VHS 7280)
• Nightmare on AIDS Street on scenariosusa.org website
• Black Georgetown Remembered (VHS 1579)
• Spirit of TV (VHS 1825)

DUE FOR TODAY: Summary paper
Take home final handed out today!

April 29: Finals due by 11 am (or beginning of class time as later determined!); final discussion and feedback session