Unit information: Impressions of Dictatorship in Argentine and Chilean Cinema in 2018/19

Unit name	Impressions of Dictatorship in Argentine and Chilean Cinema
Unit code	HISP30085
Credit points	20
Level of study	H/6
Teaching block(s)	Teaching Block 1 (weeks 1 - 12)
Unit director	Dr. Paul Merchant
Open unit status	Not open
Pre-requisites	None
Co-requisites	None
School/department	Department of Hispanic, Portuguese and Latin American Studies
Faculty	Faculty of Arts

Description including Unit Aims

Argentina and Chile spent much of the 1970s and 1980s ruled by military dictatorships, regimes which left a profound mark on society and culture. In this unit, students will analyse films that deal with the consequences of this period: from the disappearance, torture and murder of political opponents to the break-up of families and the violation of private spaces.

Covering a period from the 1980s to the 2010s, the unit will examine the changing aesthetic strategies employed to approach moments of trauma, from melodrama and allegorical narratives to experimental documentaries and postmodern fiction. Students will consider cinema’s potential to effect political change, and its relation to discourses of memory and ‘postmemory’ in the years and decades after violent dictatorial rule. Considerable emphasis is placed on political and economic contexts, and their impact on the modes of cinematic production and distribution.

Intended Learning Outcomes

By the end of this unit students will be able to:

1. Demonstrate an advanced knowledge of films that treat the topic of military dictatorship in Latin America.
2. Respond critically and analytically to the issues/debates raised by the films studied.
3. Demonstrate a firm grasp of theoretical and critical scholarship in the relevant fields of study, as appropriate to level H.
4. Formulate independent judgements and engage with ideas at a high level of complexity.
5. Demonstrate sophisticated visual analytical skills and an ability to use film terminology correctly.
6. Present independent judgements orally and in writing in an appropriate style and at a high level of complexity and demonstrate ability to work effectively in groups.

Teaching Information

1 x 2 hour seminar per week, including plenary presentation, class discussions and small group work.

Assessment Information

Group presentation (15-20 minutes) and individual 1,000-word write up (30%: 15% group mark for presentation, 15% for individual write-up) testing ILOs 1-6; 4,000-word essay (70%) testing ILOs 1-6.

Reading and References

Films

Luis Puenzo, La historia oficial (1986)

Pablo Perelman, Imagen latente (1987)

Fernando Solanas, Sur (1988)

Albertina Carri, Los rubios (2003)

Patricio Guzmán, Nostalgia de la luz (2010)

Benjamín Ávila, Infancia clandestina (2011)

Pablo Larraín, No (2012) (and, if desired, previous films in Larraín’s loose ‘Pinochet’ trilogy, including Tony Manero [2008])

Books

Gonzalo Aguilar, Other Worlds: New Argentine Film (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011)

John King, Magical Reels: A History of Cinema in Latin America (London: Verso, 2000 [1990])

Michael Lazzara, Chile in Transition: The Poetics and Politics of Memory (Gainesville: University Press of Floria, 2006)

Marianne Hirsch, The Generation of Postmemory: Writing and Visual Culture After the Holocaust (New York: Columbia University Press, 2012)

Ana Ros, The Post-Dictatorship Generation in Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay: Collective Memory and Cultural Production (London : Palgrave Macmillan, 2012)

Beatriz Sarlo, Tiempo pasado: cultura de la memoria y giro subjetivo (Buenos Aires: Siglo XXI, 2005)