Academic Catalog

ENGL 34C: LITERATURE INTO FILM

Foothill College Course Outline of Record

Foothill College Course Outline of Record
Heading Value
Effective Term: Summer 2024
Units: 4
Hours: 4 lecture per week (48 total per quarter)
Advisory: Demonstrated proficiency in English by placement via multiple measures OR through an equivalent placement process OR completion of ESLL 125 & ESLL 249.
Degree & Credit Status: Degree-Applicable Credit Course
Foothill GE: Area I: Humanities
Transferable: CSU/UC
Grade Type: Letter Grade (Request for Pass/No Pass)
Repeatability: Not Repeatable

Student Learning Outcomes

  • Situate film adaptations of novels, short stories, poems, and plays in global, historical, and literary contexts.
  • Apply basic literary terminologies, theories, categories, motifs, and genres appropriate to an introductory college-level discussion of literature.
  • Appraise the value, cross-cultural significance, and meaning of contemporary literature to film adaptations.

Description

Examination of the ways great world literature throughout world history has been adapted for the modern day moviegoing audience, from one medium to the other - from text to film or television series. Consideration of: 1. how filmmakers adapt literature to film, considering the conventions and artistic elements of each medium as well as the historical developments of each artform; 2. how film and literature may evoke similar or different meanings and emotional responses, considering historical, cultural, critical, theoretical, and other contexts for creation and reception, with attention to diverse artists in both literary and film genres, and stories representing experiences from across cultures, ethnicities, class, and genders; 3. how one artistic medium informs the other.

Course Objectives

The student will be able to:

  1. Understand connections between films, literature, and a range of cultural, ethnic, global, historical, and artistic contexts
  2. Apply and integrate film and literary terminologies, criticism, theories, aesthetics, and genres appropriate to an introductory college-level discussion of film and literature
  3. Appraise the value, artistic and aesthetic elements, cross-cultural significance, and meaning of contemporary literature and film adaptations

Course Content

  1. Understand connections between films, literature, and a range of cultural, ethnic, global, historical, and artistic contexts
    1. History of narrative and visual communication
      1. Evolution of communication toward writing
        1. Speech/symbols
        2. Cave painting, petroglyphs, pictograms, ideograms, writing, alphabet
        3. Focus on the early pictographic forms as sequential narrative art
      2. History of film
        1. Early narratives in cinematic art (19th-20th century)
        2. Defining film
        3. Evolution: silent, sound, color, digital
        4. Variety of forms and emerging forms
        5. Artistic movements in film, from French Impressionism to Mumblecore
    2. Social and cultural issues in film and literature
      1. Connections between film, literature, and social issues, justice, gender and sexuality, and social class, in literary and film representation
      2. Cultural issues, multicultural identities, popular culture expressions, and diverse authors and film directors, such as Latinx, Asian-American, African American, Native American, etc.
      3. How films, art, and literature are shaped by and shape culture and politics
  2. Apply and integrate film and literary terminologies, theories, aesthetics, and genres appropriate to an introductory college-level discussion of film and literature
    1. Emphasize the integration of history, theory, aesthetics, and criticism in discussion and analysis of film and literature
      1. Modern criticism: New Critical and Structural criticism
        1. Plot, theme, structures
        2. Imagery, symbol, metaphor
      2. Criticism as applied to film and literature: Deconstruction, Feminist, Marxist, Psychoanalytical, and other literary theories
        1. Multiplicity of meanings when analyzing texts and films from different theoretical perspectives
    2. Film analysis
      1. Composition, contrast, point of view, framing, sound, music
    3. Genre analysis, such as memoir, tragedy, comedy, science fiction, crime, epic, animation, and other genres
  3. Appraise the value, artistic and aesthetic elements, cross-cultural significance, and meaning of contemporary literature and film adaptations
    1. Critique and analyze film design and narrative
      1. Using film adaptations as an introduction to the arts as a creative and aesthetic endeavor
      2. Recognize artistic elements of text and film, including but not limited to:
        1. Film terminology, e.g., cinematography, lighting, mise-en-scene, editing, macguffin, and sound
        2. Auteurism in film
        3. Imagery, symbolism, and metaphor
    2. Visual-only storytelling and silent film
    3. Reading cinema vs. reading text; conflict and synergy
    4. Intertextuality/metatextuality between literature and film
    5. Socio-cultural, race, and gender issues addressed through film adaptations and how society is influenced by film adaptations
    6. Compare/contrast similar forms or themes across cultures in films

Lab Content

Not applicable.

Special Facilities and/or Equipment

Access to internet when offered online.

Method(s) of Evaluation

Methods of Evaluation may include but are not limited to the following:

At least two critical papers and/or essay exams
Quizzes, journals, midterm, oral reports, and/or final exam
Participation in classroom discussion
Social justice/service learning project

Method(s) of Instruction

Methods of Instruction may include but are not limited to the following:

Lecture
Discussion of course topics and film in relation to real life examples drawn from students' experiences and observations
Small group activities
Writing analytical responses to course materials
Actively engaging in social justice/service learning

Representative Text(s) and Other Materials

Carty-Williams, Candice. Queenie. 2019.

Corrigan, Timothy. Film and Literature: An Introduction and Reader. 2012.

Bluestone, George. Novels into Film. 2003.

Cahir, Linda Costanzo. Literature into Film: Theory and Practical Approaches. 2006.

Wilson, August. Fences. 1985.

Selvadurai, Shyam. Funny Boy. 1994.

Ginsberg, Allen. HOWL (available as OER). 1956.

Donoghue, Emma. Room. 2010.

Strayed, Cheryl. Wild. 2012.

Austen, Jane. Emma (available as OER). 1815.

Chiang, Ted. Story of Your Life. 1998.

Moore, Alan. V for Vendetta. 1989.

Larsen, Nella. Passing. 1929.

Although some of these texts are older than the suggested "5 years or newer" standard, they remain seminal texts in this area of study.

HOWL available as OER: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/49303/howl

Emma available as OER: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/158/158-h/158-h.htm

Films:

Fences. Directed by Denzel Washington. 2016.

Funny Boy. Directed by Deepa Mehta. 2020.

HOWL. Directed by Rob Epstein. 2010.

Room. Directed by Lenny Abrahamson. 2015.

Wild. Directed by Jean-Marc Vallée. 2014.

Emma. Directed by Autum de Wilde. 2020.

Clueless. Directed by Amy Heckerling. 1995.

Arrival. Directed by Denis Villeneuve. 2016.

V for Vendetta. Directed by James McTeigue. 2005.

Passing. Directed by Rebecca Hall. 2021.

Types and/or Examples of Required Reading, Writing, and Outside of Class Assignments

  1. Reading and analyzing literary texts
  2. Formal essays
  3. Informal writing projects, such as journal entries, reader responses
  4. In-class examinations
  5. Class participation, student presentations

Discipline(s)

English