Welcome! Here’s what we’ll spend our time doing this semester. The schedule below will evolve as we proceed. Watch regularly for more details, added activities, and stuff might change or move around as our conversation does.
Course Description
Why do documentary films get made? What do their makers hope these films will do in the world? Does the film released in a multiplex do something categorically different in the world from the one released online? How do stories get told across what might otherwise just be a series of talking heads? How can editing be used in didactic, conversational, or narrative ways? Once we’ve found a story to tell, once we’ve shot and edited a film, how do we get people to watch it? Does the way we draw viewers to a film change how they respond to or engage with it?
This course will explore these questions and more as we get our hands dirty in the filmmaking process. We’ll discuss documentary films of all shapes and sizes (short-form, feature-length, interactive, and audio). We’ll be ambitious throughout, erring on the side of taking risks and failing big, as we seek to uncover the hows and whys of documentary filmmaking.
A class is a process, an independent organism with its own goals and dynamics. It is always something more than even the most imaginative lesson plan can predict. ~ Thomas P. Kasulis
Required Films and Texts
There is not a traditional textbook for this course. We will do some reading and watch a few things, but the course will center around what we build and our discussions about what we uncover.
You will need to rent several films throughout the term. There may be a small rental charge for these. Many are also available on streaming services like Netflix. (You can get a free trial month of Netflix, if you don't already have an account.)
The Internet (the rest of our readings and films will be available openly online)
Recommended Texts
Depending on what motivates your interest in documentary and how you approach your work for this class, you may want to buy/read one or more of the following.
Patricia Aufderheide, Documentary Film: a Very Short Introduction
John Hewitt and Gustavo Vazquez, Documentary Filmmaking: a Contemporary Field Guide
Jon Fitzgerald, Filmmaking for Change
Kurt Lancaster, DSLR Cinema: Crafting the Film Look with Video
Gustavo Mercado, The Filmmaker’s Eye
Course Objectives
Nothing in this syllabus will be set in stone or taken for granted. The instructions and outcomes laid out here are a beginning, something we’ll treat roughly as the course proceeds. This is not a map, but rather a direction in which we’ll point ourselves at the outset with the goal of vigorously rewriting the syllabus as we go, discovering what we’ll learn together as we learn it, questioning what we’ll do even as we begin to do it.
In this course we will:
- Practice reading documentary films individually and collaboratively, analyzing and interpreting through and beyond our immediate impressions.
- Investigate the interconnections between documentary films and other genres, online and otherwise.
- Examine how documentary films have and can be put to use for more than just entertainment, but also as information, history, cultural documents, advocacy, and activism.
- Consider how notions of authorship work in (and are challenged by) a collaborative industry/art like filmmaking.
- Experiment as filmmakers ourselves. This is a course about critical thinking and also critical making.
- Have epiphanies.
Office Hours
I will be available for virtual office hours as necessary. Just reach out to schedule a video meeting, or feel free to engage via DM in Slack, which is the fastest way to get feedback or questions answered.
The Work of the Course
This course will be as much about breaking stuff as it is about building stuff. There will be discussions online and face-to-face. The final assignment for the course will be a film screening organized by us with 10+ films we’ve made individually and collaboratively.
Participation
This is a collaborative course, focusing on discussion and work in groups. The class will be a cooperative learning experience, a true intellectual community. And so, you and your work are, in a very real sense, the primary texts for this course. In order for us to work together as a community, we all have to come prepared to participate. If you can’t finish work for any reason, chat with me (and your collaborators) in advance.
Weekly Activities
Each week, the course schedule will walk you through the various activities of the week, including information about optional synchronous sessions. Watch our schedule and Slack for updates as we proceed.
The Feed
Throughout the term we’ll be using tools like Instagram, YouTube, and Soundcloud as our primary methods for sharing work outside our class. We’ll be using Slack for class communication and for sharing our work with each other.
Collaboration
You may collaborate with your peers on assignments you complete for this course. I've created a channel in Slack called #looking-for-group, which you can use to find collaborators. If you have questions about the various ways collaboration can work, feel free to chat with me at any point.
Assessment
This course will focus on qualitative not quantitative assessment, something we’ll discuss during the class, both with reference to your own work and the works we’re studying. While you will get a final grade at the end of the term, I will not be grading individual assignments, but rather asking questions and making comments that engage your work rather than simply evaluate it. You will also be reflecting carefully on your own work and the work of your peers. The intention here is to help you focus on working in a more organic way, as opposed to working as you think you’re expected to. If this process causes more anxiety than it alleviates, see me at any point to confer about your progress in the course to date. If you are worried about your grade, your best strategy should be to join the discussions, do the reading, and complete the assignments. You should consider this course a “busy-work-free zone.” If an assignment does not feel productive, we can find ways to modify, remix, or repurpose the instructions.
Digital Knowledge Center
If you run into technical difficulties at any point, you can get help from the DKC. The Digital Knowledge Center provides peer tutoring to UMW students on digital projects and assignments. Students can schedule one-on-one or small group tutorials with a trained peer tutor on a variety of subjects relating to common systems, technologies, and tools used in courses at UMW. Visit dkc.umw.edu for more info. or to make an appointment.
Community
A good amount of the work for this course will be done independently or with a small group, as you'll each be working on a major digital project. Think of the rest of your peers as an audience for your work, as well as a source for feedback and encouragement. If you run into snags, feel free to draw on the expertise of your peers. This class will be as much about you teaching yourselves and each other as it is about me teaching you.
Our Classroom
The work we do this term will be spread out across the Web. This site is our homeroom, so start off here at the beginning of the week, following the sequence of activities laid out on the schedule. Whenever you share anything related to our class on YouTube, Instagram, Soundcloud, Twitter, etc., use the hashtag #digdoc to contribute to our distributed conversation. Slack will give us a single place to share and get feedback on our work. Create a Slack account at umwdocumentary.slack.com as early as possible. The mobile app is handy.
Public Work
Much of your work for this course will live publicly on the web within open platforms. If you would like to remain anonymous, I encourage you to use a pseudonym. Think carefully about these choices. We will discuss issues related to privacy and the open web extensively during this class.
UMW Honor System
You can find extensive details about the UMW Honor System here.
Disability Accommodations
UMW’s Office of Disability Resources guides, counsels, and assists students with disabilities. If you have already met with the Office of Disability Resources and require accommodations for this class, feel free to chat with me about any modifications we can make to help your learning. I will hold any information you share with me in the strictest confidence unless you give me permission to do otherwise. If you would like to reach out to the Office of Disability Resources, click here or call 540–654–1266.
Title IX
University of Mary Washington faculty are committed to supporting students and upholding the University’s Policy on Sexual and Gender Based Harassment and Other Forms of Interpersonal Violence. Click here for resources or contact the Talley Center for Counselling Services, 540–654–1053.
Basic Needs Security
Any student who faces challenges securing their food or housing and believes this may affect their learning in this course is urged to contact the Dean of Students for support. And also let me know if you are comfortable doing so, because there may be ways I can help.
Plagiarism
Authorship is a hotly contested topic in the academy. At what point do we own the words we say and write or the images we create? In literature and digital media, creative influence, collaboration, and borrowing are usually acceptable (even encouraged). So, what sort of statement or warning about plagiarism would be appropriate in this class? Let me go out on a limb and say: in this class, I encourage you to borrow ideas (from me, from the authors we read, from the films we watch, from your classmates). But, even more, I encourage you to truly make them your own — by playing with, manipulating, applying, and otherwise turning them on their head. In the end, it’s just downright boring to rest on the laurels of others. It’s altogether more daring (and, frankly, more fun) to invent something new yourself — a new idea, a new way of thinking, a new claim, a new image. This doesn’t give you license to copy something in its entirety and slap your name on it. That’s just stealing. Instead, think very consciously about how you’re influenced by your sources — by the way knowledge and creativity depend on a sort of inheritance. And think also about the real responsibility you have to those sources.
Teaching Philosophy
Critical thinking is like eating, something lively and voracious, something that drips and reels. It isn’t (and can’t be) virtual. And yet, somewhat paradoxically, we must increasingly find ways for this work to happen online. We must bring our subjects to life for both ourselves and our digital counterparts. Learning must fire every neuron — must touch us at the highest levels of consciousness and at the cellular level. No matter where it happens, this is what learning must do. It must evolve — and revolt.
[/] January 25 - 31: Introduction
First, watch:
Pandemic, Episode 1: "It Hunts Us" (52 min) [Netflix]
Coronavirus Explained, Episode 1: "This Pandemic" (26 min) [Netflix]
In the Shadow of Ebola (27 min) [online]
Then, do some stuff:
1) Sign up for our Slack channel by clicking here, say hello in the #random channel, perhaps with a GIF. (Note: you'll need to use your UMW e-mail address to sign up.) Make sure to add an Avatar (a picture of you or something to represent you) so that we aren't all just a bunch of circle heads.
2) Make a short (less than a minute) video introducing yourself to us. This can be super simple (shot on your phone, no editing, etc.). Share your video in the #who-are-we channel in Slack.
- Don’t tell us your major, unless you have a story about it
- Don’t tell us what you're doing this Summer, unless it involves giant snakes, parachuting, a unicorn, a flash flood, or it will be documented in a viral video
- Don’t tell us where you grew up, unless you’re going to show pictures
- Do tell us what moves you, what you care most about
- Do tell us what you hope to get from taking this course, but only if you can do so in a limerick
- Do tell us where you are
- Do give us random facts we can come to know you by
- Do click here and answer the first would you rather question that catches your eye
To share a video in Slack, upload to YouTube (or any other site where videos live) and share with a link. Or click the little paperclip at the bottom of the message box in Slack, select a video file you created, and add a title/subject before you hit the upload button.
[/] February 1 - 7: What is Documentary For?
First, watch:
American Factory (110 min) [Netflix]
Then, do some stuff:
1) You'll need a space online to share your work for this course. A couple options: (a) Install Wordpress on your personal domain, which you can sign up for at umw.domains. (You can find steps for signing up here.) If you already have a domain, feel free to publish there, or use a subdomain for our class; (b) Sign up for Medium (all you need is a free account); (c) Prepare to publish anywhere else (YouTube, Instagram, Soundcloud, etc.), as long as you can post regularly and share your work for the class via hyperlinks.
2) Get started by writing (or recording) a brief response of any length to one or more of the films assigned for this week. This can be informal, and the shape your response takes is up to you, blog post, podcast, short video. Share a link in the #our-work channel in Slack.
Note: If you run into trouble with these or any of your digital work this term, you can make an appointment with the Digital Knowledge Center at dkc.umw.edu.
[/] February 8 - 14: Digital Storytelling
First, read and watch:
Stories We Tell (109 min) [YouTube Rental] [iTunes Rental]
StoryCorps [browse and listen to a handful of stories]
Angie Kordic, “Documentary Photography: Art as Life”
Then, do some stuff:
1) 7 days. 7 B&W photos of your life. No people. No explanation. Each this week, publish one photo tagged #digdoc to your Instagram, Facebook, or wherever.
2) Share the images in the #our-work channel in Slack, or share a link there to let us know where online we can follow you.
[/] February 15 - 21: The Camera
First, read and watch:
Cameraperson (102 min) [Amazon Prime]
Michael Koreski, “I Am a Camera”
Richard Brody, “Cameraperson and the Conventions of Documentary Filmmaking”
Is there a relation between “things and their filmed projections, which is to say between the originals now absent from us (by screening) and the new originals now present to us (in photogenesis) — a relation to be thought of as something’s becoming something (say as a caterpillar becomes a butterfly, or as a prisoner becomes a count, or as an emotion becomes conscious, or as after a long night it becomes light)?” ~ Stanley Cavell
Then, do some stuff:
1) Look ahead and begin work on your one-minute documentary, which will be due at the end of next week. There are a bunch of examples linked there. And a deceptively simple prompt. One of the goals is to get you thinking about how editing works, how it can be used to tell stories. Even the simplest footage can make meaning through the ways one shot is juxtaposed against another.
2) Either, Join a two-hour optional live chat of this week's film in the #cameraperson channel on Slack (Wednesday, February 17, at 6pm Eastern). We'll all hit play at the same time, and chat via text as we watch. You can rent the film for just a few dollars on Amazon or YouTube. It is probably my favorite of the documentaries I've assigned this term, but it's an odd film, so I highly recommend reading one or both of the short articles I included above, which offer some context for the film.
Or, Write/record a short piece responding to Cameraperson and publish it wherever you are doing your work for the class. As before, your response can be text, audio, video, multimedia. Share your work in the #our-work channel. The director of the film tells stories through editing but also in the way that she composes shots. Choose at least one frame (a single static image) from the film that moves you or captures your imagination. Respond to it. Describe what you're seeing? What does it do in the film? What can you say about its shape, geometry, colors, lighting, etc.? Incorporate more shots or frames in your response, if you want, and feel free to bring in thoughts from either of the readings for this week or anything else you find or learn about the film.
Note: You only need to do one of the two, but feel free to do both, if it's useful or if you missed one of the other assignments thus far.
[/] February 22 - 28: Human Subjects
First, watch:
Amanda Knox (92 min) [Netflix]
Then, do some stuff:
1) Write/record a short piece responding to Amanda Knox and publish it wherever you are doing your work for the class. As before, your response can be text, audio, video, multimedia. Share your work in the #our-work channel.
2) Look ahead to next week's activity, the one-minute documentary, because you might want to spend a bit more time thinking about it.
[/] March 1 - 7: One Minute Documentaries
First, read and watch:
One Minute Wonder, 1MinuteDoc, 1 Minute Meal, 1 Minute Short Films
Overview: How Does Cinematography Impact Tone?
Use Your Camera to Control Audience Perspective
Using Sound in Your Film
Film Lighting Basics
Then, do some stuff:
One-minute documentary. A single voice. 20 cuts. Upload to Instagram, YouTube, or elsewhere and tag with #digdoc. Share a link to your short film in the #our-work channel on Slack.
Note: Feel free to use any editing software, including iMovie, Final Cut Pro, OpenShot, Premiere, etc. There are even some pretty good video editing tools for iPhone and Android, but you may want to experiment with one of the others, in order to help you develop skills you'll find useful for the final project. Remember, if you need technical assistance, you can make an appointment with the Digital Knowledge Center at dkc.umw.edu.
[/] March 8 - 14: Politics
First, watch:
13th (100 min) [Netflix] [Free on YouTube]
Then, do some stuff:
1) Write/record a short piece responding to Amanda Knox and publish it wherever you are doing your work for the class. As before, your response can be text, audio, video, multimedia. Share your work in the #our-work channel.
2) Look ahead to next week's activity, the Midterm Self-reflection, because you might want to spend a bit more time thinking about it.
[/] March 15 - 21: Structure
First, watch:
The Great Hack (114 min) [Netflix]
Then, do some stuff:
1) Click here to complete your Midterm Self-reflection
2) Either, Join a two-hour optional live chat of The Great Hack in the #great-hack channel (Thursday, March 18, at 8pm Eastern). We'll all hit play at the same time, and chat via text as we watch. The film is available on Netflix.
Or, Write/record a short piece responding to The Great Hack, Citizenfour, and/or any of the interactive documentaries. Publish it wherever you are doing your work for the class. As before, your response can be text, audio, video, multimedia. Share your work in the #our-work channel.
Looking Forward:
The final project for this class will be a short documentary film. Begin considering your subject matter and deciding what shape your film will take.
[/] March 22 - 28: Activism
First, watch:
Citizenfour (113 min) [Amazon Rental]
Then, do some stuff:
1) Write/record a short piece responding to Icarus and publish it wherever you are doing your work for the class. As before, your response can be text, audio, video, multimedia. Share it in the #our-work channel.
2) Begin work on your final documentary, if you haven't already. The guidelines are simple, giving you lots of wiggle room. Your final film should be 3-10 minutes. I would encourage you to work toward the shorter end of this, using careful editing. Think of this as a way to practice at filmmaking and, perhaps, to create a portfolio piece.
You can use archival footage, images, voiceover, interviews. You can use footage you've already shot and/or new footage. Feel free to be as creative as you'd like with subject matter and approach. (You could even create a mockumentary, which is an amazing genre worthy of a whole other course.) Given the current restrictions related to COVID-19, you may need to get creative about how you approach filming for this project. Feel free to use yourself as a subject, record voiceover on your smart phone, record a conversation via video chat. Along with your film, you'll write an artist statement, a short introduction, analysis, or narrative of your process.
[/] March 29 - April 4: Narrative
First, watch:
Icarus (121 min) [Netflix]
Then, do some stuff:
1) Write/record a short piece responding to Icarus and publish it wherever you are doing your work for the class. As before, your response can be text, audio, video, multimedia. Share your work in the #our-work channel. And respond to the work of your peers.
2) For the rest of the term, the most important "project" is for you to work on your final films. Look at last week's activities for details.
[/] April 5 - 11: Identity
First, watch:
Crip Camp (108 min) [Netflix]
Then, do some stuff:
1) Write/record a short piece responding to Crip Camp and publish it wherever you are doing your work for the class. As before, your response can be text, audio, video, multimedia. Share your work in the #our-work channel. And respond to the work of your peers.
2) Continue working on your final film.
[/] April 12 - 18: Rhetoric
First, watch:
Blackfish (83 min) [Netflix] [Rent via YouTube]
Then, do some stuff:
1) Either, Join an optional live chat of Blackfish in the #blackfish channel on Slack (Sunday, April 18 at 8pm Eastern). We'll all hit play at the same time, and chat via text as we watch.
Or, Write/record a short piece responding to Blackfish. Publish it wherever you are doing your work for the class. As before, your response can be text, audio, video, multimedia. Share your work in the #our-work channel.
2) Continue working on your final film.
[/] April 19 - 25: The Digital
First, watch:
The Social Dilemma (104 min) [Amazon Prime]
Then, do some stuff:
1) (Optional): Write/record a short piece responding to The Social Dilemma and publish it wherever you are doing your work for the class. As before, your response can be text, audio, video, multimedia. Share your work in the #our-work channel. And respond to the work of your peers.
2) Feel free to just focus on working on your final film this week. No need to write/record a post this week, unless you want to make up for one or more missed posts earlier in the term.
[/] April 26 - May 2: Interactivity
First, watch:
“Hollow” [online]
“Bear 71” [online]
Watch at least one more from the National Film Board of Canada
[Browse and view more interactive documentaries]
Then, do some stuff:
Share your final film by midnight on May 2 in the #final-films channel in Slack. Remember, your final film should be 3-10 minutes, and include a 1-3 paragraph artist statement or narrative of your process wherever you "publish" your film (in the YouTube description, in a blog post with the video embedded, etc.).
[/] May 3 - 7: Final Film Screening
Do some stuff:
1) Comment on final films of your peers.
2) Join me and your classmates for an optional virtual screening. We'll gather in the #final-films channel in Slack (Monday, May 10 at 8pm Eastern). Bring popcorn. We'll pick a film to start with, hit play together, and then chat about each of your work as we watch. If you are not able to make it to this virtual screening, you can watch and comment on each other's films asynchronously anytime between May 3 - 10.
3) Submit your final self-reflection by midnight on May 7 (click here)