Bodies represent a fundamental site where power is negotiated. Looking at how bodies are controlled, regulated, narrated, historicized, weaponized, institutionalized, and theorized can offer critical insights into American culture. By exploring, for example, how differently looking bodies can be constructed as monstrous, how male bodies can be militarized for the benefit of a war narrative, or how non-white bodies can be subjugated or exoticized in a colonial context, we can try to understand the cultural politics expressed in diverse narratives around bodies. In this seminar, we will examine different conceptualizations of bodies and we will look at how bodies are represented in American (popular) culture through different lenses, such as gender, queerness, race, class, and disability.
In this seminar, we will discuss and theorize different conceptualizations of bodies. We will analyze a variety of films with the use of critical theory, discussing aspects such as gender, queerness, race, class, and disability. The seminar will enable students to deepen their understanding of American culture, to explore various canonical theories, to analyze and develop an original argument about a film of their choice in a portfolio exam.
- Trainer/in: Eleonora Ravizza