Combining different media to disseminate knowledge
Cherryl Hunt (Theology and Religion)
Connecting with the world of the Bible through film representations
People have been viewing representations of biblical accounts and personalities for centuries. Indeed, for much of this time, for those outside the literate minority, it was the only way to enter into the texts apart from hearing them read aloud. When cinema was invented it was not long before it was seen by some as having potential for disseminating the Christian story more widely, even among a more literate population.
In a recent case-study, Christian viewers of two BBC productions reported that the biblical stories ‘came alive’ and they felt a sense of participation in them. On the negative side there was predictable concern when the filmed accounts did not match their prior understanding of the texts. However, this concern was exacerbated in some cases by their feeling that film versions tend to override the memories and plots of original textual materials.
This paper considers the possible effects of TV and film presentations of the Bible on how it is read by ordinary Christians. It explores some of the ‘Bible and Film’ literature and begins to unpack the potential value and possible pitfalls in viewing these presentations in relation to furthering understanding of and engagement with the texts themselves.
Acatia Finbow (English)
Performance and the Museum: embodied knowledge in the world of the object.
The intersections of the traditionally object-based museum and apparently ephemeral performance art has proven a fertile ground for research into overlapping ways of creating, collecting and sharing knowledge of art. This paper, a work-in-progress discussion of two case studies, aims to suggest how the museum’s engagement with non-traditional documentation and object-free performance could create different knowledge and research value for the institution. Musée de la danse brings the embodied dance archive into the framework of the museum by overlapping the Dancing Museum with the visual art museum. By bringing a process which combines embodied knowledge with photography and film documentation, the Musée provides a unique opportunity to explore how to best document this complex intersection of ways of knowing. Tino Sehgal’s constructed, object-free situations are created within the context of the museum and can be found in significant collections across the world. Leaving only memories behind, research around this type of embodied or memory-based documentation has the potential to uncover new knowledge value for the museum when dealing with challenging performance works. Both case studies will look to expose how documentation, as a practice and process, can deal with embodied knowledge based art to create new value for the museum.
Gemma Edney (Film Studies)
Navigating Generations: Cover Songs, “Listening Histories,” and Nostalgic Adolescence in Clueless (Heckerling, 1995)
The concept of the "teen film" is not new: since the emergence of "the teenager" as a distinct social group identity in the 1950s, and thus as a targetable media audience, films representing, and aimed at, young adolescents have become a standard in the Hollywood movie industry. However, the representation of this group, as with any socially-constructed identity, brings with it certain difficulties: how is it possible, as an adult filmmaker (working with potentially adult actors), to successfully evoke adolescence on screen? This paper explores this question through the lens of soundtrack study, paying particular attention to the inclusion of cover songs within teen compilation soundtracks. Using Amy Heckerling's wildly popular film Clueless (1995) as a case study, I examine the use of cover songs to aid the representation of "teenagehood" in contemporary film. Through an exploration of the relationship between cover song and memory, I argue that, when used in teen film, these tracks provide nostalgic generational connections, thus allowing for a presentation of adolescence accessible to all ages. As such, the representation of adolescence becomes, rather than a realistic venture, a non-generationally specific, affective (and thus emotional) evocation of youth.