College Catalog
Cinema Studies
Description and requirements Faculty Courses
Faculty
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Associate Professor of Cinema Studies and HistoryDirector of the School of Film and Media Studies
- PhD, University of Maryland
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Lecturer of Cinema StudiesLecturer in Media Studies
- BA, Washington University, St. Louis
- PhD, CUNY Graduate Center
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Associate Professor of Cinema Studies
- BA, Brock University, Ontario
- MA, Ryerson University and York University, Ontario
- PhD, University of Chicago
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Associate Professor of Cinema StudiesChair of Cinema and Television Studies and Co-Chair of Playwriting and Screenwriting
- BA, Universidad Iberoamericana (Mexico)
- MA, New York University
- PhD, University of California, Los Angeles
Contributing Faculty
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Associate Provost for Academic Affairs
- BA, University of Toronto
- MA, PhD, University of Wisconsin, Madison
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Associate Professor of Philosophy
- BA, University of California, Santa Cruz
- PhD, University of Pennsylvania
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Lecturer of Screenwriting
BA, SUNY Purchase
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Visiting Assistant Professor of Screenwriting
BFA, SUNY Purchase
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Associate Professor of Screenwriting
- BA, City College of New York
- MFA, Yale School of Drama
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Lecturer of Film
- BFA, SUNY Purchase
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Associate Professor of Practice in Screenwriting
BFA, SUNY Purchase
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Associate Professor of Film and Cinema StudiesDean for Global Strategy and International Programs and Director of the Center for Engagement
- BA, University of Wisconsin, Madison
- MA, University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee
- MPhil, PhD, Yale University
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Professor Emerit of Literature
- BA, Yale University
- MA, PhD, Rutgers University
- Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching
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Lecturer of Film
- BA, Vassar College
- MFA, Columbia University
-
Lecturer of Film
- BA, University of Notre Dame
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Adjunct Assistant Professor of Screenwriting and Film
BA, SUNY Purchase
Courses
An overview of the development of film as an art and as an industry from silent to digital cinema. Students learn the stylistic, narrative and industrial developments of cinema through the analysis of classic films.
Credits: 4
An overview of the international development of television as a cultural form and zone of political struggle. Students learn to examine television as a mass medium, with a focus on its critical role in mediating the relationships between the state and society, and between commerce and art.
Credits: 4
An intensive study of film history with analysis of specific films that represent stages in the evolution of the formal aspects of cinematic expression. Film showings, lectures, seminars.
Credits: 4
A continuation of CIN 1500.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500
The techniques of filmic expression are examined through a focused, detailed analysis of cinematography, editing, lighting, mise-en-scène, and soundtrack in celebrated cinematic works from around the world. Course content is organized around the establishment or subversion of narrative, generic, and stylistic conventions through the works of one director, a particular genre, or a film movement.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Examines the history of music videos, studying their effectiveness as a sales mechanisms as well as their influence on how today’s movies, television and commercials are photographed. Students are required to shoot practice exercises throughout the semester, complete a final paper, and shoot a music video on their own for a campus band or musician. Students must have experience operating a video camera and have access to a digital editing platform or be familiar with Final Cut Pro.
Credits: 4
Research and practice in film programming practices and histories. Students research historical and contemporary case studies in film programming and exhibition while engaging in their own on-campus programming. They organize film series and screenings, gaining hands-on experience with and studying diverse perspectives on programming, distribution, curating, fundraising, advertising, engaging in audience outreach, event managing, researching, and writing.
Credits: 4
Third cinema was a movement proposed by Latin American directors in the 1960s and further developed by African directors in the 1970s. It addresses important questions about independent national cinemas, colonialism, race, and identity. This course examines the movement and its global influence, with emphasis on the cinemas of Latin America, Africa, black Britain, and American minorities.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
An intensive focus on the intersection between cinema and history. Students examine the debates around cinema’s status as historical document, surveying different approaches to the relationship between cinematic formal traditions and social history. The course emphasizes the analysis of primary sources, such as reviews, posters, magazine and newspaper articles, personal correspondence, trade publications, and blogs.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Through a historical survey of documentary and ethnographic film, this course explores documentary theory, aesthetics, and ethics. Topics include early cinema, World War II propaganda, cinema verité, radical documentary, the essay film, counter-ethnographies, and contemporary mixed forms. Films by the Lumières, Flaherty, Marker, Rouch, Minh-ha, and others.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Asian cinema is often rechanneled by the socio-political and cultural situations created by colonialism, wars, revolutions, and global capitalism. This course examines Asian cinemas within the context of international film history and explores significant genres, movements, and themes from the 1920s to the present. The course investigates how the transnational cinematic flow engages with discourses on nationalism, internationalism and cosmopolitanism.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1510 Or CIN1030
Students in this course will write, shoot and edit short documentary and/or fiction films reflecting the culture and country where the films are shot. International student teams work together on locations in USA, Haiti and Africa to produce films which will be screened at cultural events and film festivals.
Credits: 1
An intense focus on sound technology, with careful attention to the way image, dialogue, music, and sound interact in both film and video. The history of sound technology and sound theory are explored by comparing sound innovations in other fields (music, radio, television) to developments in film/video. Films include The Jazz Singer, The Conversation, Pi, and Run Lola Run.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
The history of moving images is marked by class struggle, on screen and behind the camera. Cinema, in turn, has itself both upheld and helped to reveal class relations. Students will learn key Marxist concepts related to capitalism and class, and how these concepts are activated within film history and practice.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1510
Examines the state of television today, with special attention to new genres, narratives, technologies, audiences, and corporate practices, with special attention to the growth of cable networks, online sites, streaming serials, new modes of spectatorship, and new forms of fan culture.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
A survey of the development of broadcasting and electronic media in the United States. It emphasizes the cultural and institutional history of the medium, as well as the aesthetic of televisual genres.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
A survey of the history of Mexican cinema from the early 1930s to the present. Students examine popular genres like la comedia ranchera (Mexican cowboy musical), el género cabaretil (dancehall film), and el cine de luchadores (wrestling film) as well as the work of the most prominent Mexican filmmakers (e.g., Arturo Ripstein, Jaime Humberto Hermosillo, Nicolás Echeverría, María Novaro, Guillermo del Toro).
Credits: 4
An exploration of Canada’s film and television culture, from its contributions to the art of documentary and animation at the National Film Board to its role in the formation of the 1980s slasher cycle, IMAX, and 1990s sketch comedy. Students examine indigenous representation and self-representation, Canada’s linguistic divides, and the nature of public media funding through the works of David Cronenberg, Alanis Obomsawin, the Kids in the Hall, and the Degrassi Extended Universe.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
A survey of animated filmmaking from the inception of cinema to the contemporary era.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Explores the role of cinematic representation in shaping the urban imagination. Taking both a historical and a comparative approach, students study the figuration of American, European, and non-Western cities from the silent era to the digital age. Discussions include how cinema has portrayed these metropolitan areas and their people, cultures, and public and private spaces.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
An examination of improvisation in scripts, performances, and the directorial design and production process. Students study the techniques of such filmmakers as John Cassavetes and Mike Leigh, the basics of improvisation taught by Viola Spolin and others, and theories of aleatory form; participate in improvisatory scenes; and make a film using improvisational techniques.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
As people migrate across the globe, their media forms move with them—sometimes following them, documenting their movement, other times traveling with them, as traces of their home cultures. Focusing on a variety of transnational media forms, this course examines how media producers treat themes of home, nation, belonging, migration, immigration, displacement, alienation, border crossing, and mobile identities.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: (CIN1500 And CIN1510 ) Or MSA2200 Or NME2100
Sophisticated works in the heterogeneous genres of personal documentary and essay film re-situate self and environment, subverting dominant practices to produce new meaning. Students examine projects from diverse cultural contexts transgressing categories of narrative, documentary, and avant-garde, critical texts from cinema and media studies to feminist theory and disability studies, producing moving image exercises in addition to written texts.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1510 Or CIN1030
A detailed examination of a filmmaker’s career. Students analyze films in light of a filmmaker’s entire output while situating the artist’s creative process in relation to the industrial and historical context. The course also introduces students to the tradition of auteur criticism.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
In this course, affect is considered as a form of power—the embodied capacity to affect and be affected. Students explore affective genres of visual culture, such as horror, comedy, melodrama, and pornography. The course draws on a range of theoretical perspectives on affect and emotion, emphasizing work from psychoanalysis, philosophy, feminism, and queer theory.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
This hands-on class introduces students to theories and practices in film and media preservation. Working with the College’s 16mm film collections, students engage in research, print-inspection, and minor repairs, as well as projection and programming activities. Class may involve visits from professional archivists and field trips to local theaters and archives.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: (CIN1500 Or CIN1030 ) And CIN1510
A study of contemporary global cinema and recent trends in cinematic style and narrative. The course focuses on non-American/non-European cinemas and co-productions and on important developments in the regional cinemas of Africa and Latin America. The final quarter examines “cinema” from a global perspective, particularly the extent to which new technology and cultural circuits have fostered techniques, styles, and narrative forms.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Examines recent debates in media theory, offering critical frameworks to understand the complexities of what a “medium” is, its forms and aesthetics, how it circulates and interacts with subjects and objects, and how it culturally signifies. Critical inquiry is grounded in a range of media texts, from films to reality TV, video games, and artworks.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
A survey on the history and practice of non-academic film criticism. The course follows the history of film criticism, including newspaper reviews, cinema-focused journals, online communities, video essays, and podcasts. Students produce several pieces of film criticism throughout the semester, contributing to an online journal.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Networked computing has reconfigured cultural production, distribution, textual practices, and consumption. Students investigate how cinema registers these shifts by analyzing films that address the internet and by examining the ways that computing technologies renew film’s significance. Readings cover the latest conversations in media theory, addressing such issues as photographic indexicality, database narratives, digital aesthetics, software studies, and social media.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Historical trauma has characterized the 20th century. Traumatic events return in unexpected forms, haunting communities and shaping both collective memory and mourning practices. Taking a comparative approach across national cinemas, this course analyzes the historical context, style, and narratives of films that circle around the question of trauma. The course covers German, Israeli, Chilean, Japanese, Russian, and American cinemas.
Credits: 4
An exploration of the intertwined histories of cinema on all sides of the Mediterranean, from the age of European imperialism to WWII, and from the processes of decolonization to the migrations that have transformed the region in recent decades. Students discover the common iconography, themes, and styles that have given shape to this multilingual regional cinema.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Emerging queer cinema is explored in its historical contexts and its relation to contemporary theories of gender, sexuality, and their intersection with race, class, and nationality. The course focuses on the “queering of the gaze,” interrogating conventional notions of representation, desire, identification, filmmaking, and spectatorship. Featured directors: Warhol, Fassbinder, Haynes, Von Trotta, Akerman, Rozema, La Bruce, Araki, Denis, Jarman.
Credits: 4
An in-depth look at French-language cinema “beyond the hexagon”—that is, film and media originating from regions of the world outside of France, including Africa, the Middle East, the French Caribbean, Belgium, Switzerland, and Québec. The impact of diverse geographical settings, cultural histories, and conditions of production and exhibition are addressed, along with such factors as colonialization, hybridity, diaspora, and globalization.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Stanley Kubrick was one of the most original and cinematic of all film directors. His films were highly original in form, with an innovative use of the medium’s primary elements, including editing, composition, and camera movement. Most were also adaptations of classic and contemporary literature. His ability to transform an author’s literary vision into his cinematic vision was one of the keys to his genius. This course analyzes his films on their own terms and in comparison to their literary sources.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
A detailed examination of the notion of film genre, and consideration of one or more classical Hollywood genres, including the western, musical, melodrama, and film noir.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
In light of a resurgence of the western in film and television, this course spans the history of the genre, from the earliest silent screen versions of dime store novels to its contemporary manifestations. While paying careful attention to the western as myth, epic, and landscape art, the course also explores themes of freedom, justice, and individualism as embedded and transformed in the genre.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: (CIN1500 And CIN1510 ) Or CIN1030
Film noir represents the intersection of theme and style that gave American films from 1941 to 1955 a new cynicism, moral ambiguity, and atmosphere of terror. This course attempts to define and explore the concept of film noir by close analysis of films like The Big Sleep, Double Indemnity, Detour, The Big Heat, The Big Combo, Somewhere in the Night, and Kiss Me Deadly.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
An examination of the political imaginary of 21st century Hollywood film. Drawing on the writings of Siegfried Kracauer, students place contemporary American cinema in a comparative historical framework in order to understand the complex ways that ideological formations (imperialism, authoritarianism, racism, neoliberalism, leftism/progressivism) are encoded within the imagery and narratives of popular film and related media.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1510
In this course on internationally acclaimed auteurs of East Asian cinema (Japan, China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Korea), emphasis is placed on the concepts of “national cinema” and “new waves.” In particular, the critique of nationalism via a radicalization of both content and form in the various new waves is examined.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
American cinema underwent significant upheaval during the 1950s with the crumbling of the studio system, the proliferation of television, fallout from the McCarthy hearings, and the Cold War. This course examines how such directors as Minnelli, Fuller, Welles, Preminger, Sirk, and Ray responded to these extremes, with attention to the historical circumstances and formal innovations that defined the era.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
A study of American mainstream films of the “New Hollywood” or “New American” period of cinema, c. 1965 to the present. Students explore the evolution of American popular cinema in relation to stylistic innovation in international cinema, shifting audience demographics in the domestic market, and industrial and social change in the U.S.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Survey of Italian cinema of the postneorealist era, with special focus on the films of Michelangelo Antonioni and Federico Fellini.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
An advanced seminar focusing on the criticism of André Bazin, a co-founder of the influential magazine Cahiers du Cinéma and prolific author (What is Cinema? Vol. 1 and 2); the cinema that he championed, including Italian neorealism; his influence on post–World War II film studies and criticism; and his current renaissance in contemporary filmmaking and criticism.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
An examination of cinema in the Israeli and Palestinian context, from the Lumière brothers’ actualities to contemporary productions by Ari Folman, Amos Gitai, Michel Khleifi, and Elia Suleiman. What role has the medium played in articulating ethnoreligious identity, national ideology, traumatic historical experience, and conflicting territorial claims? How do Middle Eastern films challenge traditional conceptions of cinematic space and time?
Credits: 4
The French refer to filmmaking as the seventh art, i.e., an art form on the level of other fine arts. This course examines French cinema from the silent era to 1970, with special focus on poetic realism and the French New Wave. Films by Vigo, Carné, Renoir, Melville, Truffaut, Godard, Rivette, Rohmer, Resnais, Marker, Varda, and others.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Melodrama is both a historical genre and a mode of imagination that operates across media. To bridge these two aspects of melodrama, the course examines its theatrical origins, the film genres that employ its rhetorical devices (the woman’s film, action and disaster films, horror), and its further development in television series and soap operas.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
An examination of how environments are represented across media forms and how they mediate cultural practices. Media forms include landscape painting, nature photography, art installations, music, nature writing, science fiction writing, and eco-cinema. Cultural practices include romantic, philosophical, and aesthetic traditions; indigeneities, nationalism, environmentalism, warfare, eco-mafias; and the arts and sciences of biomedia.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: (CIN1500 And CIN1510 ) Or MSA1050 Or ANT1500
A survey of the most important developments in film theory. The goal is to familiarize students with the diversity of critical approaches in film studies and increase understanding of both the aesthetic qualities and social forces at work. Topics include the relationship of film to other forms of media and alternative or counter-hegemonic conceptions of cinema.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
Global Feminist Cinema examines how filmmakers across Asia, Africa, Latin America, Europe, and the United States have represented gender, labor, sexuality, colonialism, war, and social movements. Emphasizing transnational circulation and anti-colonial solidarity, the course explores feminist aesthetics, political activism, and cross-cultural exchange while asking how cinema can challenge patriarchal structures and imagine alternative forms of collective life.
Credits: 4
Prepares cinema studies majors for the conception and writing of their senior project. The course emphasizes research skills, the formulation of a prospectus and a literature review, the development of a bibliography and a filmography, and the outline of a schedule for completion of the project.
Credits: 2
PREREQ: CIN1500 And CIN1510
An introduction to the craft of digital filmmaking: cinematography, lighting, staging, sound mixing, and editing. Students work in groups on short exercises to develop their skills and collaborate on a final short film.
Credits: 3
In this introduction to the basics of documentary filmmaking, students learn what it means to construct a visual argument, with attention to process, place, documentary ethics, and good interviewing techniques. Production is complemented by screenings, class discussions, and demonstrations.
Credits: 3
PREREQ: FLM1050 Or COM1400
An intensive production-oriented course designed to familiarize students with the fundamentals of storytelling in narrative film. The course covers dramatic and stylistic elements of filmmaking. Students direct and edit three short films during the semester, each assignment demonstrating specific principles covered in class.
Credits: 3
PREREQ: FLM1050 Or COM1400 Or PSW1010
Students explore the underlying historical narratives of films from 1930 to 1960 that address topics from early America. These narratives are compared to the ways Hollywood recast historical lessons to suit modern circumstances and to promote “American values” challenged by economic depression and the rise of fascism and communism. Special emphasis is on the works of Ford and Capra.
Credits: 4
Surrealist literature, films, and art in France, Spain, and Latin America. Artists include Aragon, Breton, Buñuel, Césaire, Char, Dali, Eluard, and Lorca. Works are read in translation and lectures given in English; students with French and/or Spanish are encouraged to read in the original language.
Credits: 4
In 1991, The Real World pioneered a genre of “unscripted” television that reshaped national media culture, culminating in the reality of the 2016 election. Students study theories of Hall, Habermas and Gramsci to explore how the genre reflects and shapes attitudes of U.S. audiences to surveillance, class conflict, and the performance of truths. Examples include Jersey Shore and American Idol.
Credits: 4
Familiarizes students with the possibilities and techniques of 2D animation. The goal of the course is to guide students through various ways in which 2D animation can be made and used to express artistic ideas. The course has been designed to lead students along a path of technical and creative growth through exercises and projects.
Credits: 4
Familiarizes students with the possibilities and techniques of 3D animation. The goal of the course is to guide students through various ways in which 3D animation can be made and used to express artistic ideas. The course has been designed to lead students along a path of technical and creative growth through exercises and projects.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: NME1440
Students will complete a series of projects conceptualized by the students with feedback and checkpoints provided by the instructor. Screenings, lectures, group discussions and individualized meetings with the instructor will guide students along the way as they explore their unique interests and voices in animation.
Credits: 4
PREREQ: NME3310
Learn the fundamentals of television (episodic/serial) writing. All aspects of dramatic storytelling in the episodic/serial form will be covered - from proper formatting to television's various dramatic structures and genres. Students will complete exercises that reinforce the concepts and present these for in-class workshops.
Credits: 4
Official Catalog: Published August 12, 2026
Course Frequencies
Since actual course offerings vary from semester to semester, students should consult the myHeliotrope course schedule to determine whether a particular course is offered in a given semester.
Information Changes
In preparing the College Catalog, every effort is made to provide pertinent and accurate information. However, information contained in the catalog is subject to change, and SUNY Purchase assumes no liability for catalog errors or omissions. Updates and new academic policies or programs will appear in the college’s information notices and will be noted in the online catalog.
It is the responsibility of each student to ascertain current information (particularly degree and major requirements) through frequent reference to current materials and consultation with the student’s faculty advisor, chair or director, and related offices (e.g., enrollment services, advising center).
Notwithstanding anything contained in the catalog, SUNY Purchase expressly reserves the right, whenever it deems advisable, to change or modify its schedule of tuition and fees; withdraw, cancel, reschedule, or modify any course, program of study, degree, or any requirement or policy in connection with the foregoing; and to change or modify any academic or other policy.