Climate Fiction and Film Syllabus

English 3504, Film and Literature:

"Emerging Genres and their Implications: Climate Literature, Film, and Media"

Dr. Robin L. Murray                                                   Fall 2019: TR Online

Office: CH 3351                                                         Phone: 549-0199 before 10

Office Hours:  T 1-2, W 1-3, and R 1-3 & by appointment by phone, Skype, or Facetime

Course Description:

The Fall 2019 section of ENG 3504 will highlight “cli-fi,” a term coined by Dan Bloom for climate fiction literature, film, and media. These ''cli-fi'' texts in print and on cinema and other screens engage with the local and global impact of human caused climate change. In a May 2014 interview, however, Bloom takes this definition further, claiming that “cli fi novels and movies can serve to wake up readers and viewers to the reality of the Climapocalypse that awaits humankind if we do nothing to stop it” (Vemuri).  As Margaret Atwood asserts, “Dystopic novels used to concentrate only on hideous political regimes, as in George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. Now, however, they’re more likely to take place in a challenging landscape that no longer resembles the hospitable planet we’ve taken for granted.” This section of ENG 3504 will begin to explore this emerging genre and its possible implications. Online

Themes for this course include the following:

Identity & Culture, Genre, Form, & Poetics, Media, Technology & Popular Culture

Please note: We will be using D2L for this class.

• D2L Student Orientation: https://online.eiu.edu/d2l/home/6909
• For IT Help, please call the Help Desk at 217-581-HELP.

Texts:

About Genre:

Grant, Ed., Film Genre Reader III

Cli-Fi Novels read individually and/or in groups

Atwood, Year of the Flood

Bacigalupi, Shipbreaker

Butler, The Parable of the Sower

Kingsolver, Flight Behavior

McCarthy, The Road

Watkins, Gold, Fame, Citrus

Course Objectives: The following outlines the course objectives:

Students completing this course will:

1. Identify and analyze the historical forces that helped shape the development of various national and world cinemas, including industrial, technological, and cultural influences through both readings and film screenings related to climate fiction literature and film.  (quizzes, discussion posts, presentation, and paper)
2. Identify and analyze the emergence of prominent world film movements related to cli-fi. (quizzes, blog posts, and exams)
3. Evaluate the uses of camera, editing, lighting, sound, and acting, as well as their contributions to the construction of meaning for audiences. (blog posts and exams)
4. Analyze how cli-fi cinema and literature reveals and responds to the social, economic, and cultural contexts of their production. (discussion posts, presentation, and paper)
5. Examine how meaning in cli-fi cinema and literature is filtered through various cultural contexts through both readings and film screenings. (discussion posts, presentation, and paper)
6. Identify, critique and apply genre theories in relation to global historical contexts through both readings and film screenings. (discussion posts, presentation, and paper)
7. Write analytically and effectively about cli-fi literature and film in relation to its historical and cultural contexts. (presentation, paper, and exams)

Learning Goals: Course objectives are designed to help students achieve each of four learning goals of general education and university-wide assessment as follows:

I. Critical Thinking

EIU graduates question, examine, evaluate, and respond to problems or arguments by:

• Asking essential questions and engaging diverse perspectives.
• Seeking and gathering data, information, and knowledge from experience, texts, graphics, and media.
• Understanding, interpreting, and critiquing relevant data, information, and knowledge.
• Synthesizing and integrating data, information, and knowledge to infer and create new insights Anticipating, reflecting upon, and evaluating implications of assumptions, arguments, hypotheses, and conclusions.
• Creating and presenting defensible expressions, arguments, positions, hypotheses, and proposals.

II. Writing and Critical Reading

EIU graduates write critically and evaluate varied sources by:

• Creating documents appropriate for specific audiences, purposes, genres, disciplines, and professions.
• Crafting cogent and defensible applications, analyses, evaluations, and arguments about problems, ideas, and issues.
• Producing documents that are well organized, focused, and cohesive.
• Using appropriate vocabulary, mechanics, grammar, diction, and sentence structure.
• Understanding, questioning, analyzing, and synthesizing complex textual, numeric, and graphical sources.
• Evaluating evidence, issues, ideas, and problems from multiple perspectives.
• Collecting and employing source materials ethically and understanding their strengths and limitations.

III. Speaking and Listening

EIU graduates prepare, deliver, and critically evaluate presentations and other formal speaking activities by:

• Collecting, comprehending, analyzing, synthesizing and ethically incorporating source material.
• Adapting formal and impromptu presentations, debates, and discussions to their audience and purpose.
• Developing and organizing ideas and supporting them with appropriate details and evidence.
• Using effective language skills adapted for oral delivery, including appropriate vocabulary, grammar, and sentence structure.
• Using effective vocal delivery skills, including volume, pitch, rate of speech, articulation, pronunciation, and fluency.
• Employing effective physical delivery skills, including eye contact, gestures, and movement.
• Using active and critical listening skills to understand and evaluate oral communication.

IV. Responsible Citizenship

EIU graduates make informed decisions based on knowledge of the physical and natural world and human history and culture by:

• Engaging with diverse ideas, individuals, groups, and cultures.
• Applying ethical reasoning and standards in personal, professional, disciplinary, and civic contexts.
• Participating formally and informally in civic life to better the public good.
• Applying knowledge and skills to new and changing contexts within and beyond the classroom.

Course Requirements:

1.     Responses for Small-Group Discussions: For these frequent responses, you will answer questions about the film(s) screened and/or text read for that class and share them with your small group. Responses should be approximately 150 words. Replies to peers should add connections with other films, literature, or experiences or offer an alternative perspective.

2.     Group Presentations and Full-Class Discussions: Members of four groups will present one (or half) of cli-fi novel to the rest of the class. A handout will be provided. These will serve as starting points for discussions throughout the semester. For these, those folks outside the group presenting will share a response to one of the questions the group members provide in their multimedia presentation. Everyone will participate in a discussion and will respond to at least two of their peers.

3.     Midterm: This exam will include information up to the middle of the semester. It will provide an opportunity to internalize material read for class as a group and as a class, as well as apply what you’ve learned to the films viewed in the class. You may use your film log for this exam!

4.     Final Exam: This exam will be cumulative after midterm. It will provide an opportunity to internalize material read for class as a group and as a class, as well as apply what you’ve learned to the films viewed in the class. You may use your film log for this exam!

5.     One traditional or digital “paper” with a proposal and draft: You will write one “paper” due near the end of the semester. A handout will be provided for this project. This project will allow you to look beyond films screened for class to examine a cli-fi novel and/or film sub-genre in a paper of approximately 1500 words or its digital equivalent. This can come in the form of a traditional essay or a video essay, a wiki, a podcast with script, or some other digital format (as long as it meets the criteria on the handout).

6.     Film Blog: This blog will offer a place for you to write brief responses to the films we watch for class. These should be informal and approximately 150 words and can be completed on the film analysis worksheets. Respond to them in relation to Film Narrative and Style or our class theme (cli-fi). You will use the blog on D2L for these responses.

Grades: Grades will be determined as follows for a total of 100%:

Small Group Responses-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 15%

Group Presentation and Discussions-----------------------------------------------------------------20%

Midterm----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------15%

Final Exam------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------15%

Final “Paper” and Proposal----------------------------------------------------------------------------20%

Film Log---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------15%                                                                                                                                           _________

                                                                                                                                                  100%

Grading of Discussions, Presentations, and Papers:

Discussion grades will be based on analytical complexity and completed criteria. Please see rubric on D2L

“Paper” grades will be based on the following areas in relation to the media chosen for the projects: Audience awareness, organization, development, sentence structure, word choice, grammar/usage/mechanics. The first three areas will be weighted more heavily than the second three (60% vs. 40%). I will also distribute the English Department’s grade analysis in class and a paper rubric in class and on D2L.

Presentations will be evaluated according to a rubric I will distribute in class and on D2L.

Students with Disabilities: If you have a documented disability and wish to receive academic accommodations, please contact the Coordinator of the Office of Disability Services (581-6583) as soon as possible.

Plagiarism:  The English Department states, "Any teacher who discovers an act of plagiarism -- `The appropriation or imitation of the language, ideas, and/or thoughts of another author, and representation of them as one's original work' -- has the right and the responsibility to impose upon the guilty student an appropriate penalty, up to and including immediate assignment of a grade of "F" in the course."

Electronic Writing Portfolio: This class is a writing intensive class, so you may submit your paper as a writing portfolio sample, following the instructions on the CASL Website. Submissions must be made during the course of the class to receive my approval. Please note that the Writing Center is available for help with all writing assignments, as well. Take advantage of this free service.

Writing Center: Ambitious students can also seek help from the Writing Center. Call for an appointment (581-5920) or visit ((CH3110) at any point in the writing process, from brainstorming, planning and drafting, to final editing. Bring your assignment sheet and any written work and/or sources with you. The Writing Center is open Monday-Thursday, 9-3 and 6-9, and Friday from 9-1.

Please Note: Students seeking Teacher Certification in English Language Arts should provide each of their English department professors with the yellow form, “Application for English department Approval to Student Teach.” These are available on a rack outside the office of Dr. Melissa Ames. 

Also Note: You must complete all major assignments to complete this course.