Teaching Team
Jeff Harder, Laura Herman, Dr. Elizabeth Lozano, Dr. Bren
Ortega Murphy
Curriculum
Loyola's -ISM (N.) course, "Critical Ethnography of Communication" was
offered through the Communication Studies department.
The overall objectives of this course were to have the knowledge to
reflectively respond to the role of the media in the process of
production, reproduction and legitimization of discourses on identity and
difference; to study documentaries that critically respond to the
mainstream media construction of social identities/differences; to gain
the knowledge necessary to explore video representations of self and
other; to produce video diaries of personal, social and cultural value;
to produce a final video text informed by a critical understanding of
multiculturalism and of the politics of representation in the USA; and to
study and reflect on the dynamics of cultural diversity, difference, and
identity within the contexts of classroom, college and community.
The course led students to identify and evaluate their own social
positioning as those who are signified, across the lines of gender, age,
class, ethnicity and sexual orientation. Students deconstructed given
images of identity (particularly those generated by the mainstream media)
by bringing to light their ideological assumptions, cultural limitations
and contradictions. Students explore subject positioning, and through
fieldwork, consider alternative ways of imagining, living, experiencing
and articulating identity and difference as they emerge from communities
or groups of people with diverse backgrounds. Students also re-construct
and re-present such lived forms of identity/difference, through video
production, in ways that are reflexive and reflective.
Community Educational Activity
Loyola University has not yet planned a CEA.
Resources Used In Course
Gutman, A. (1994). Multiculturalism: Examining the Politics of Recognition. Princeton University Press. (Loyola)
Rosenthal, Alan. (1987). New Challenges for Documentary. Berkeley: University of California Press. (Pitzer) (Loyola) (CCD)
Erens, Patricia. "Women's Documentary Filmmaking: The Personal is Political," New Challenges for Documentary. Ed. Alan Rosenthal, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988. (UMD) (Loyola)
Hall, Stuart. "Media Power: The Double Bind", New Challenges for Documentary. Ed. Alan Rosenthal, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988. (Pitzer) (Loyola)
Pryluck. "Ultimately We are All Outsiders", New Challenges for Documentary. Ed. Alan Rosenthal, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988. (Pitzer) (UMD) (Loyola)
Winston Brian. "Documentary, I Think We're in Trouble", New Challenges for Documentary. Ed. Alan Rosenthal, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988. (Pitzer) (UMD) (Loyola)
Bohlen, Anne; Rafferty, Kevin; Ridgeway, James. (1991). Blood in the Face. New York, NY: Right Thinking Productions. (Loyola)
Friedman, Peter; Joslin, Ton. (1993). Silverlake Life. Betelgeuse Productions. (Pitzer) (Loyola)
Livingston, Jennie. (1992) Paris is Burning. Off White Productons. (Loyola)
Student Video Topics
gay identity