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Cinema Studies Institute

Faculty

Cinema Studies Institute

At the dawn of the twentieth century cinema emerged as a new mass entertainment and a source of information and economic and social power. Cinema adapted to and absorbed novel technologies, such as sound, color, 3-D, and later, digital techniques, at a rapid pace. As shifting political and economic forces came into play, cinema continued to play a key role in moving-image culture. During its history, cinema has absorbed seismis shocks in ideas and ideologies, and responded to the shifting politics of race, gender, class, and sexuality that have defined modern society. Now, in the early years of the twenty-first century, an evolving mediascape driven by digital technologies offers exciting opportunities to assess the ever-changing role of cinema across global cultures.

Because of its status as a major art form and a vital social practice, cinema has assumed a crucial place within the university. The Cinema Studies Institute has, over nearly four decades, developed into a major area of academic research, study and teaching at the University of Toronto and has contributed in pivotal ways to the development of the discipline both in Canada and internationally.

Cinema Studies offers courses that reflect the diversity of cinematic experience: film analysis, history, social practice, and theory are at the core of the program. Other topics also receive emphasis, including distinct types of film (such as documentary, animation and the avant-garde), film genres, media cultures, and new media forms. Our courses explore the global dimension of cinema, investigating national and transnational cinema. They raise issues of how race, class and gender operate in moving image culture. Cinema Studies offers a range of research methods, scholarly frameworks, and learning opportunities; all are designed to develop students’ abilities to understand cinema within a wide range of contexts - critical, economic, cultural, technological, and aesthetic. Graduates of the Cinema Studies Institute achieve learning outcomes that include a strong historical and theoretical foundation coupled with advanced analytical and critical skills. Our graduates are well-equipped to apply their knowledge to a variety of media-related careers and avocations. They have become arts and entertainment journalists, film programmers, and image archivists, and have found a diversity of positions within the film, television, and new media sectors. Cinema Studies does not offer filmmaking, but numerous graduates have successfully pursued professional work in different facets of film and media production.

Since its inception, Cinema Studies has had its administration, teaching, and research home at Innis College, which also houses its faculty. Innis offers specially-equipped facilities and a cordial and intimate setting for cinema students. For more information about Innis College, go to http://www.utoronto.ca/innis/.

Enquiries: Undergraduate Program Assistant, Room 122 Innis College (416-978-8571),  cinema.studies@utoronto.ca, or the Cinema Studies website http://www.utoronto.ca/cinema/.

Cinema Studies Institute Programs

This is a limited enrolment program that can only accommodate a limited number of students.  Enrolment in the Cinema Studies programs requires completion of CIN105Y1 'Introduction to Film Study,' and three additional full-course equivalents. Admission will be determined by a student’s mark in CIN105Y1. It is expected that a final mark of at least 70% be required for admission in the coming cycle. Students can be considered for admission if they do not meet the minimum grade requirement in CIN105Y1 by achieving a minimum grade of 70% in CIN201Y1.

Meeting these minimum requirements may not guarantee admission.

Note: All Cinema Studies programs are Type 2L (limited enrolment) programs. See the Subject POSt Enrolment web site for instructions.

(10 full courses or their equivalent (FCEs), at least 8.0 of which must have a CIN designator)

First Year:
CIN105Y1
Second Year:
CIN201Y1
Third Year:
CIN301Y1
Second, Third and Fourth Year:
CIN230H1 or 0.5 FCE from Breadth Category 5; in addition at least 5.5 FCEs from Groups B through G, of which 3.0 FCEs must be at the 300/400 level
Fourth Year:
1.0 FCE from the following: CIN410H1, CIN411H1, CIN412H1, CIN420H1, CIN430H1, CIN431H1, CIN432H1, CIN440H1, CIN450H1, CIN451H1, CIN452H1, CIN460H1, CIN470H1, CIN471H1, CIN472H1, CIN480H1

Students must complete CIN105Y1, CIN201Y1 and CIN301Y1 before taking any fourth-year courses.

This is a limited enrolment program that can only accommodate a limited number of students.  Enrolment in the Cinema Studies programs requires completion of CIN105Y1 'Introduction to Film Study,' and three additional full-course equivalents. Admission will be determined by a student’s mark in CIN105Y1. It is expected that a final mark of at least 70% be required for admission in the coming cycle. Students can be considered for admission if they do not meet the minimum grade requirement in CIN105Y1 by achieving a minimum grade of 70% in CIN201Y1.

Meeting these minimum requirements may not guarantee admission.

Note: All Cinema Studies programs are Type 2L (limited enrolment) programs. See the Subject POSt Enrolment web site for instructions.

(7 full courses or their equivalent (FCEs), at least 5.5 of which must have a CIN designator)

First Year:
CIN105Y1
Second Year:
CIN201Y1
Third Year:
CIN301Y1
Second, Third and Fourth Year:
CIN230H1 or 0.5 FCE from Breadth Category 5; in addition at least 3.0 FCEs from Groups B through G, of which 2.0 FCEs must be at the 300/400 level
Fourth Year:
0.5 FCE from the following: CIN410H1, CIN411H1, CIN412H1, CIN420H1, CIN430H1, CIN431H1, CIN432H1, CIN440H1, CIN450H1, CIN451H1, CIN452H1, CIN460H1, CIN470H1, CIN471H1, CIN472H1, CIN480H1

Students must complete CIN105Y1, CIN201Y1 and CIN301Y1 before taking any fourth-year courses.

This is a limited enrolment program that can only accommodate a limited number of students.  Enrolment in the Cinema Studies programs requires completion of CIN105Y1 'Introduction to Film Study,' and three additional full-course equivalents. Admission will be determined by a student’s mark in CIN105Y1. It is expected that a final mark of at least 70% be required for admission in the coming cycle. Students can be considered for admission if they do not meet the minimum grade requirement in CIN105Y1 by achieving a minimum grade of 70% in CIN201Y1.

Meeting these minimum requirements may not guarantee admission.

Note: All Cinema Studies programs are Type 2L (limited enrolment) programs. See the Subject POSt Enrolment web site for instructions.

(4 full courses or their equivalent (FCEs), with at least one at the 300+ level)

First Year:
CIN105Y1
Second Year:
CIN201Y1
Second, Third and Fourth Year:
2.0 FCEs from Groups A through G

Students must complete CIN105Y1, CIN201Y1 and CIN301Y1 before taking any fourth-year courses.

Group A: Foundations
CIN105Y1, CIN201Y1, CIN301Y1

Group B: Genre and Modes
CIN210H1, CIN211H1, CIN212H1, CIN213H1, CIN310Y1, CIN312Y1, CIN314Y1, CIN320H1, CIN410H1, CIN411H1, CIN412H1, CIN420H1

Group C: Social and Cultural Practices
CIN230H1, CIN330Y1, CIN332Y1, CIN334H1, CIN340H1, CIN349H1, CIN430H1, CIN431H1, CIN432H1, CIN440H1

Group D: Theory and Criticism
CIN250Y1, CIN260H1, CIN350Y1, CIN352H1, CIN353H1, CIN360H1, CIN369H1, CIN450H1, CIN451H1, CIN452H1, CIN460H1

Group E: History and Nation
CIN270Y1, CIN370H1, CIN372Y1, CIN374Y1, CIN376Y1, CIN378H1, CIN379H1, CIN380H1, CIN389H1, CIN470H1, CIN471H1, CIN472H1, CIN480H1

Group F: Independent Studies
CIN490Y1, CIN491H1, CIN492H1

Group G: Cross-Listed
EAS242H1, EAS243H1, EAS431H1, FCS310Y1, FCS331H1, FIN250H1, FIN260H1, GER250H1, GER261H1, HIS335H1, HIS345H1, HIS459H1, HIS460H1, HIS467H1, ITA240Y1, ITA340H1, ITA341H1, ITA347H1, SLA225H1, SLA226H1, SLA333H1, SLA244H1, SLA424H1, SMC354H1, SMC355H1, SPA375H1, UNI325H1

Cinema Studies Institute Courses

The 199Y1 and 199H1 seminars are designed to provide the opportunity to work closely with an instructor in a class of no more than twenty-four students. These interactive seminars are intended to stimulate the students’ curiosity and provide an opportunity to get to know a member of the professorial staff in a seminar environment during the first year of study. Details can be found at www.artsci.utoronto.ca/current/course/.

Introduction to film analysis; concepts of film style and narrative. Topics include:  Documentary, avant-garde, genres, authorship, ideology, and representation.

Examines the practices, theories and debates surrounding the emergence of cinema through to the development of studio system filmmaking in the first half of the 20th Century. Topics include: Film's relation to the other arts; formalist and realist traditions; technological innovations; audiences and reception; and cultural industries.

Examines film theory and practice from the 1950s onward, and the impact of media change on earlier film cultures and aesthetics. Topics include: New Waves; the politicization of theory; spectatorship; counter-cinemas; transnational film and “Global Hollywood”; and media theory from the analog to the digital.

Horror film as a genre, focusing on three types of international horror: The un-dead, body horror, and the supernatural. The genre's popular appeal, affective power, unique means of producing pleasure, and its current global resurgence will be emphasized. Topics include: The aesthetics of gore and violence; technologies of fear; J-Horror, new French extremity; cult fandom and paracinema; and media convergence.

This course is the study of science fiction films in their cultural and political contexts and the genre's narrative and conceptual components. The goal of the course is to familiarize students with the science fiction films as popular film genre texts emphasizing the period between 1950 and the present.

Action cinema holds a dominant place in our contemporary era of the blockbuster and CGI effects. This course examines the modes and function of this popular genre, while also tracing Action's longevity and diversity to include its significant precursors, its social contexts, and forms of spectatorship.

Sex and eroticism and their various representations have long been central and controversial components of filmic pleasure. This course examines how sex and its regulation in cinema suggest broader ideas and concerns. Topics include: Obscenity laws and the history of film censorship; the emergence of sexploitation and pornography; porno chic and art cinema.

Film experimentation in the context of modern art and poetry from the 1920s through the 1990s.  Influences range from Cubism and Dada-Surrealism to late-era modernism and postmodernism.

Critical survey of documentary practice including newsreels, direct cinema, cinema verité, ethnographic films, and various hybrid narrative forms, with emphasis on the rhetorical, aesthetic, and political dimensions of the "art of record." Topics include: Poetics, argument, and modes of address; evidence, authenticity, and persuasion; filmmaker/subject/audience nexus; historiography, hagiography, and memory; reflexive irony and performance.

Study of theoretical and analytical models of film genres and narratology; structuralist, cognitive, and semiotic approaches to filmic narration. Genres to be studied include: Westerns; crime films; gothic and fantastic; and art cinema.

Courses in special topics designed for Specialists and Majors in Cinema Studies. Past courses include: "Fantasy Film/Cinéma Fantastique," "B Movies and Cult Cinema," and "American Animation after 1950."

See course description for CIN412H1 listed below.

See course description for CIN412H1 listed below.

Consideration of the status of a selected film genre from historical and theoretical perspectives.  Past seminars include: “Comedy,” “Melodrama,” “Film Noir,” and “The End in Cinema.”

Seminars in special topics designed for advanced Specialist and Major students in Cinema Studies.

Examines cinema as a commercial enterprise, a technology and a formal system, with an emphasis on devising numerically-based approaches to amplify the study of cinema.

This course is a Breadth Category 3 course but has been specially-designed to fulfill the Quantitative Reasoning requirement for Cinema Studies Specialists and Majors.

Gender politics of feminist film culture since the 1970s.  Topics include:  Apparatus theory and its legacy, models of spectatorship, feminist historiography, stardom, the cinematic (re)production of identity, the relationship between social movements and cinema; "postfeminism."

How race functions in cinema. Topics include: the foundational role of racial inscription and its expansion beyond the black/white paradigm; visual ethnography, 'the primitive,' and Orientalism; aboriginal media; the 'Black Atlantic' and Diaspora; Banlieu and exilic film practice and theory; border aesthetics; race and urban space; 'post-race'; and the evolving racial imaginary in the Obama era.

An introduction to early animation, considering its vaudeville roots, its industrialization, its emerging aesthetics and representational tropes. Examination of the early corpus of animation from 1900-1950 and in-depth study of the artistic, social and cultural milieux from which animation derived.

Courses in special topics designed for Specialists and Majors in Cinema Studies.

Students will develop screenwriting skills under the guidance of a renowned screenwriter-in-residence through a combination of writing workshops and individual consultations. Like the course, the Universal Screenwriter-in-Residence is a biannual appointment.

See course description for CIN432H1 listed below.

See course description for CIN432H1 listed below.

Consideration of cinema and its social relations.  Past seminars include: “American Independent Film,” “Children in the Movies,” “Sub-Saharan African Cinema,” “International Film Festivals” and “The Revolution Will/Will Not Be Televised.”

Seminars in special topics designed for advanced Specialist and Major students in Cinema Studies.

This course takes four selected directors' films and examines them analytically as the expression of their "personal visions." The purpose of the course is to apply and test the auteur theory in the context of concepts of film style and film conventions.

Course on selected topics in Cinema Studies. Topics vary each year.

Analysis of contemporary screen cultures to assess the cinematic in our digital age.Topics include: assessing theoretical frameworks for understanding new forms of aesthetics and spectatorship within multimodal cross platform contexts of digital media; sound; medium specificity; comparison of cognitive and phenomenological models, with an emphasis on theories of bodily affect.

Advanced study of issues in film authorship through intensive examination of two major filmmakers.

Advanced study of issues in film authorship through intensive examination of one or more major filmmakers.

Courses in special topics designed for Specialists and Majors in Cinema Studies.

The practice of film criticism: studies of examples of journalistic and scholarly critical writing; practical sessions of process writing; and collaborative editing. Course includes regular film screenings.

See course description for CIN452H1 listed below.

See course description for CIN452H1 listed below.

Advanced study of select approaches to film theory and criticism. Past seminars include: “Corporeality and the Cinema,” “Godard,” “The Cinematic City: Urban Spaces in Film,” “Sound and Music in Film,”  and “Neoformalism.”

Seminars in special topics designed for advanced Specialist and Major students in Cinema Studies.

The examination of popular American cinema through its social, political, and commercial practices, and through the study of selected popular films from the 1970s to the present.

History and diversity of Canadian and Québécois cinemas. Analyses of film and critical frameworks examine how co-productions, multiculturalism, and post-national arguments are re-shaping the production and reception contexts of national cinema. Annual emphasis will be placed on one of the following topics:  the emergence of the feature film, documentary or experimental cinema.

Major contemporary developments beyond Hollywood and European filmmaking, examining a select number of national/regional cinemas: Africa, Asia, Iran, India (Hindi cinema) and Latin America, outlining generic and stylistic conventions, cultural contexts, distribution networks and reception within a global economy.

Industrial, economic, ideological and aesthetic dimensions of the American studio era.

Examination of recent Chinese films in their three production centres: The People's Republic of China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. Production, commercial and aesthetic trends and international reception; major auteurs and genres. Directors include Chen Kaige, Zang Yimou, Edward Yang, John Woo, and Wong Kar-Wai.

In-depth treatment of a national cinema. Past courses include: "British Cinema," "Australian and New Zealand Cinema" and "The Other Europe."

Examines historical trends, influential filmmakers, and social and cultural factors influencing the development of Hungarian cinema, assessing its impact within the context of Eastern Europe and internationally.

Courses in special topics designed for Specialists and Majors in Cinema Studies. Past courses include: “Quebec Cinema.”

An overview and analysis of Canadian television's history, its current role within the so-called "multi-channel universe," and its future prospects within evolving delivery systems and changing consumption patterns. Issues include:  The CBC as official public broadcaster, the future of domestic production, the prospect for niche carriers, and the impact of the internet.

See course description for CIN472H1 listed below.

See course description for CIN472H1 listed below.

Seminars in historiography and questions of national cinema. Past seminars include: “Film Historiography,” “Early Cinema,” “Reviewing Hollywood Classicism,” “Women Pioneers” and “Emergent Technologies.”

Seminars in special topics designed for advanced Specialist and Major students in Cinema Studies.

See course description for CIN492H1 listed below. Ineligible for CR/NCR.

See course description for CIN492H1 listed below. Ineligible for CR/NCR.

Independent research projects devised by students and supervised by Cinema Studies faculty. Open to advanced Specialist and Major students in the Program. Submit applications to the Undergraduate Program Office: Fall 2013 courses, June1/ Winter 2014 courses, November 1/ Summer 2014 courses, April 1. Ineligible for CR/NCR.

EAS242H1, EAS243H1, EAS431H1, FCS310Y1, FCS331H1, FIN250H1, FIN260H1, GER250H1, GER261H1, HIS335H1, HIS345H1, HIS459H1, HIS460H1, HIS467H1, ITA240Y1, ITA340H1, ITA341H1, ITA347H1, SLA225H1, SLA226H1, SLA333H1, SLA244H1, SLA424H1, SMC354H1, SMC355H1, SPA375H1, UNI325H1