Under the Spotlight: New 'Global Cinemas' Class

CPLT / SCRN 2203 - Socio-environmental Conflicts: Documenting, Filming, Writing

Instructor: Jacopo Aldrighetti

Time: T-Th 9:00-10:20 a.m.

Classrom: 248 Woodin Hall

Course Description: What are socio-environmental conflicts? How are they documented, portrayed, and discussed in diverse media? In the age of global extractivism and environmental degradation, conservationists and environmentalists have strived to promote nature conservation while denouncing or attempting to mitigate the displacement of local or indigenous populations worldwide. This course delves into the documentation of socio-environmental conflicts globally, examining their socio-economic origins and their impact on local communities and their environments. By investigating case studies from several continents through the analysis of ethnographic films and relevant environmental literature (including non-fiction, fiction, and poetry), the course will explore human-environment interactions from multifaceted perspectives to identify historical patterns, conservation strategies, and movements of local socio-ecological resilience. 

Required readings and films will be made available through Moodle.

For further information about the course, you are welcome to contact the instructor at [email protected].

For more information about the instructor and his research, click here.

Films and books to be studied include:

Books:

• Silent Spring (1962)
• Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice (1993)
• How Forests Think (2013)
• The Mushroom at the End of the World (2015)

Films:

• There Will Be Blood (USA, 2007)
• Sand Wars (Canada, 2013)
• The Good Life (Germany, 2015)
• The Path of the Anaconda (Colombia, 2019)