Università Roma Tre

In this course, students will apply a critical lens to representations of gender and identity in contemporary media. Taking gender and sexuality as a critical starting point, we will examine the construction of identities under the simultaneous influence of race, class, and nationality. By focusing on popular representations in both the US and France, we will gain a deeper understanding of identities as both culturally specific and influenced by global media. Instead of suggesting that contemporary identities are determined by what we see on TV screens, computers, and in local movie theaters, the course seeks to describe the complex interactions between national audiences and concrete media productions, and analyzes how
different audiences reproduce or challenge traditional concepts and stereotypes of gender, race, sexuality, and class. By combining the study of theoretical texts with examples from the advertisement industry, television, the movies, and other forms of contemporary cultural expression, it offers a comprehensive and thorough introduction to contemporary studies of the media and identity.

This course is taught in English.

The 1950s. From Martine Carol to Brigitte Bardot. Clips from Caroline Chérie (Richard Pottier, 1951) and Lola Montès (Max Ophüls, 1955); And God Created Woman (Roger Vadim, 1958) and Le Mépris (Contempt, Jean-Luc Godard, 1963). Cinema: Varda/Vadim (auteur vs mainstream film).
R. Gill, “Advertising and post-feminism.”
Rosello, Declining the stereotype, introduction and ch. 1
Jessica N. Pabon 'Ways of being seen. Gender and the writing on the wall'
Agnès Varda’s film Le Bonheur (1965).
Laubier, “The French Women’s Movement, 1968-80,” “Home Life” and “Language.”
Wendy Michallat (2006) “Marions-nous! Gay Rites: the Campaign for Gay Marriage in France,” Modern & Contemporary France
‘Girls, girls, girls’ and ‘When less is more’ from Bad Feminist
On-site study visit: Grayson Perry exhibition (Musée de la monnaie de Paris) (https://www.monnaiedeparis.fr/en/temporary-exhibitions/grayson-perry)
“L’Exception française? Utopia and dystopia in the debate on parity” by Susan Bainbrigge