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Cultural and Cinema Studies

COURSES

Postgraduate Programme in “Cultural and Cinema Studies”
Academic Year 2024–2025

WINTER SEMESTER

Compulsory course:

  • Introduction to Film Studies
  • Instructor: Afroditi Nikolaidou
  • Course Description
  • This course introduces students to the three core fields of film studies—theory, history, and criticism—and to the ways in which they interact with one another. Through the study of texts by major film theorists, including A. Bazin, K. Metz, L. Mulvey, T. Elsaesser, D. Bordwell, among others, the course engages with key films and filmmakers and raises questions concerning cinematic narrative and style, as well as cinema’s relationship to reality, ideology, and other art forms. Each academic year, emphasis may be placed on different approaches to reading the cinematic text and phenomenon, broadening our theoretical inquiries through the work of thinkers such as Barthes, Foucault, Benjamin, and others.
  • Indicative thematic axes that may be explored include:
    A) The interrelation of film history and theory: early cinema as an archaeology of new media; Soviet montage theory and Soviet cinema; the concept of realism and Italian Neorealism; auteur theory; the French New Wave and its influence on contemporary art cinema.
    B) Genre as a category of analysis and its semantic/syntactic analysis, from classical Hollywood to hybrid forms in the period of postmodernism.
    C) Comparative textual analyses of the relationship between classical and post-classical cinema.
    D) Third Cinema and postcolonial theories (as well as more recent terms such as transnational cinema and cinema of small nations), among others.

 

Selection of two out of the following three elective courses:

  • Issues of Archives and Cinephilia
  • Instructors: Maria Komninou, Ioulia Mermigka
  • Course description
  • This course offers a theoretical overview of the concept of the archive, drawing on the approaches of Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, Mary Anne Doane, and others, and seeks to connect it with notions of temporality, memory, and history in cinema. Regarding cinephilia, the course examines its periodisation and its links to the cinematic avant-gardes of the interwar period, to the aesthetics and politics of postwar film movements and auteur cinema and explores its role in the new digital environment shaped by the dominance of streaming services.
  • Through an in-situ study of the Hellenic Film Archive and the new Museum of Cinema, the course first introduces students to the concept of the archaeology of cinema and to the intersections of technology, science, and popular spectacles. Second, within the framework of the restoration and digitization of significant films from both early and more recent Greek cinema by the Film Archive—such as the first Greek sound musical film The Apaches of Athens (1930) by Dimitris Gaziadis and Face to Face (1966) by Roviros Manthoulis—the role of archives and their collaboration in fostering cinephilia in the new digital era is discussed.
  • Overall, the course aims at the theoretical and cultural exploration of archives as custodians of memory, as digital databases, as museums, and as spaces for the development of a new form of cinephilia.
  • Basic Principles of Directing
  • Instructor: Vivian Papageorgiou
  • Course Description
  • The course focuses on artistic expression and on the development of skills in visual storytelling through an introduction to the basic principles of directing and an understanding of the aesthetic and technical parameters of cinema, with emphasis on practice. During the course, students are introduced to the concept of film language so as to understand the importance of using the camera as an expressive medium, through shots, camera angles, and camera movement. The basic principles of screenwriting are also discussed, with particular emphasis on the importance of sound and music in film narration. A significant part of the course is devoted to an introduction to the basic principles of editing as a fundamental tool in shaping the outcome.
  • The aim of the course is for students to understand the stages of filmmaking through theory, but primarily through practical exercises, and to create their own short duration works as a final practical project.

 

  • Analysis of Literary Texts: Modern Greek Literature in Relation to History (1920–2020): Reflections, Refractions, Tensions
  • Instructors: Elli Filokyprou and Nadia Fragouli
  • Course Description
  • This year, the course “Analysis of Literary Texts” focuses on the relationship between Literature and History. We shall address questions concerning the ways in which historical events inform literary creation, as well as the mechanisms through which History—whether experienced firsthand or not—is transformed into literature. At the same time, we will discuss how historical and cultural conditions, as well as specific factors such as critical reception, influence the dialogue between Literature and History.
  • The course consists of two distinct yet complementary parts, devoted to poetry (taught by Elli Filokyprou) and prose (taught by Nadia Fragkouli).
  • Poetry
  • The poetry component includes the discussion of poems by:
    K. G. Karyotakis, Giorgos Seferis, Yannis Ritsos, Manolis Anagnostakis, Aris Alexandrou, Tasos Livaditis, Rena Chatzidaki, and Eleni Tzatzimaki.
  • We will use an anthology in which the poems will be grouped by poet; however, we will follow a more or less chronological sequence so as to highlight the relationship between poetic work and historical developments. The aim is to explore the different transformations that historical events or conditions undergo as they pass from the realm of lived reality into that of the text. We will read poems written in the heat of the moment, as well as poems in which historical trauma haunts memory and continues to shape human relationships with others and with the self. Some poems foreground historical experience clearly, while in others it is only faintly discernible. We will observe poets condemning, resisting, despairing, seeking communication, questioning the value of poetic practice, and persisting in the task they have undertaken, viewing it as a duty toward their fellow human beings.
  • Covering the period from 1927 to 2015, we will examine poetry not merely as a mirror of History but as a dynamic confrontation with it, appreciating the insight of Manolis Anagnostakis when he wrote: “And this chess game has no end.”
  • Prose
  • The prose component includes the teaching of excerpts from the following works:
    …And Behold a Pale Horse (1963) by Tatiana Gritsi-Milliex,
    Where the Wolf Lives (1982) by Rea Galanaki,
    Imaginary Adventure (1985) by Alexandros Kotzias, and
    Victoria Does Not Exist (2013) by Yannis Tsirbas.
  • The aim is to comment on different literary modes of thematizing History through a prose-based exploration of twentieth-century Greek history. Thus, from the image-centered and largely modernist narrative of Gritsi-Milliex on the Occupation and the Resistance, we move to the elliptical, allusive, and experimental narration of youthful anti-dictatorship activity in Galanaki’s novella. In Imaginary Adventure (1985) by Alexandros Kotzias, fictional textual documents, together with the distorting interior monologue of the antihero Alexandros Kapandais, present the accumulated dysfunctions of modern Greek society as they unfold alongside the historical milestones of the second half of the twentieth century and crystallize in the Greek 1980s.
  • Finally, in the novella Victoria Does Not Exist (2013) by Yannis Tsirbas, we will discuss Greece during the early years of the economic crisis. In counterpoint to the novella, we will also examine its film adaptation by Yannis Sakaridis (Amerika Square, 2016), giving us the opportunity to discuss the thematization of History not only across different literary modes, but also across different artistic codes.
  • Assessment
  • As part of the seminar, students are required to submit two short written assignments (one on poetry and one on prose, each 1,800–2,000 words) and to present orally one or both of their papers (depending on the number of participants). The final grade will consist of 30% participation in weekly discussions and 70% based on the two written assignments.
  • Guest Speakers
  • At the conclusion of the seminar series, we aim to invite Eleni Tzatzimaki and Yannis Tsirbas and engage them in a discussion on the relationship between History and literary creation.

 

SPRING SEMESTER

Compulsory course:

  • Introduction to Cultural Studies
  • Instructors: Eleni Tzoumaka, Despina Chronaki
  • Course Description
  • The scholarly paradigm of (British) Cultural Studies emerges from a dynamic coexistence and dialogical relationship among different academic approaches, including media theories, critical theory, feminist approaches, literature, film and television theory, approaches to the information society, and aesthetic theory. The aim of this course is to familiarize students with the history of the Cultural Studies paradigm, its epistemological framework, and the research agenda of this school of thought through case studies.
  • The topics to be covered include, indicatively:
    a) the history and epistemological trajectories through which the Cultural Studies paradigm has developed from the 1960s to the present;
    b) the philosophical foundations of Cultural Studies regarding the political nature of culture (the politics of culture);
    c) discussions of identity, gender, sexuality, popular culture, media audiences, and media production from a Cultural Studies perspective;
    d) intersections and articulations with related theoretical fields (such as urban cultural studies, postcolonial studies, among others), as well as with approaches from the broader field of cultural theory and criticism.

 

Selection of two out of the following three courses:

  • Issues of Artistic Creation
  • Instructor: Evangelia Diamantopoulou
  • Course Description
  • Portraiture
  • This course focuses on portraiture in its various manifestations within artistic creation, such as painting, sculpture, and photography, as well as in contemporary art forms including video art and performance. Portraiture is approached in relation to issues of identity and communication within its specific historical, social, and cultural contexts.
  • As an initial approach to portraiture, the course examines methods for interpreting artistic creation in a broader way. Using methodological tools derived from different interpretive approaches, students will proceed to the analysis of works centered on portraiture, along two main axes:
    a) the face/figure as form and as personality within its spatio-temporal environment; and
    b) the process of creation, visual staging, techniques, and materials of production.
  • To complete the course, students will be assigned written projects focusing on the in-depth investigation of artistic narrative and visual direction in specific thematic units.

 

  • Observational Cinema
  • Instructor: Giorgos Kravvaritis
  • Course Description
  • This course offers a practical introduction to Observational Cinema, a documentary style that uses simple recording tools and focuses on everyday human stories. The genre draws inspiration, among others, from the works of Robert Flaherty, Italian Neorealism, Jean Rouch, Direct Cinema, Cinéma Vérité, the French New Wave, and ethnography.
  • Through lectures, weekly exercises, and film screenings, students will study in detail the methodology, style, and narrative techniques of this approach, with the goal of producing a short documentary film individually.
  • Enrollment in this course does not require attendance of the Winter Semester course Basic Principles of Directing, although familiarity with some practical skills taught in that course will greatly benefit students who wish to take this course.
  • Creative Writing
  • Instructor: Anna Griva
  • Course Description
  • The course has a dual aim: on one hand, students will engage with the fundamental principles that have governed poetic language across time and will understand its multi-layered functioning in terms of language, form, and content; on the other hand, they will be encouraged to experiment creatively in poetic writing so to express thoughts, emotions, and reflections.
  • Since a poem emerges from the successful combination of inner processes and inspirations with a deep engagement with poetic tradition and its methods, it is essential to approach poetry through the study of texts that reveal its structure and facets. Accordingly, alongside creative experimentation and instruction in the basic principles of poetic language, significant works of Greek and international poetry will be analyzed, with interpretive perspectives offered to deepen understanding of the unique nature of poetic discourse.
  • Within this framework, key issues and terms will be examined, including estrangement, polysemy, poetic condensation and abstraction, metaphor and imagery, the function of figures of speech, dramatic and narrative elements in poetry, intertextuality, metered and free verse, objective correlative, allegory and analogy, the mythical method, the use of symbols, parody, irony, and word creation.
  • During the course, students will participate in writing workshops, presenting their poetic work as practical exercises applying the theoretical knowledge they have gained. The seminar will conclude with the preparation and presentation of a final project, which will involve analyzing a selected poetic work from Greek or international poetry and engaging in creative experimentation with its form, content, and technique.