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USLT 498A/AMST 498G, Fall 2012
U.S. Latino/as on the Silver Screen: the Silent Era to the Present Day
Instructor: Rob Chester
Office Phone: 301-405-7621
Email: rchester@umd.edu
Office: 0132 Holzapfel Hall
Office Hours: By Appointment
Class Time: T & Th, 2:00-3:15
Course Description
Since the early days of moving images, the cinema has held a prominent and influential position
in U.S. culture. In pursuit of commercial reward, Hollywood studios and independent filmmakers
create and disseminate powerful ideas about politics and culture to mass audiences in the
Americas and across the globe. Embedded in a culture in which race was and is always an issue,
the U.S. film industry remains a crucial arena in which representations of ethnoracial identity and
its relationship to national identity are produced, interpreted, debated, and reconceived.
Beginning with the era of silent film and concluding with contemporary films, this course
explores the ambiguous and shifting history of U.S. Latina/os both behind and in front of the
camera. Combining media theory and film history, we will consider the film industry’s
relationship to Latinidad, examining issues such as the shift from silent film to sound, the impact
made on Latino/a images by the Second World War and the “good neighbor” era, and Latina/os
in the Cold War Red Scare. In these periods, representational power remained chiefly in the
hands of white Hollywood producers, and Latino/as (most often Mexican Americans) were
subject to a series of demeaning representational strategies. As we move into the second half of
the course, we will turn attention to self-representation by Latina/o filmmakers and empathetic
images created by whites in and after the 1970s. How have Latina/os been depicted in
Hollywood history? How have inter-American foreign relations shaped the US Latino/a image?
How have Latina/o filmmakers confronted issues such as racism and sexism in the United
States? By taking active part in extensive classroom discussions and viewings, completing short
written assignments, and composing two analytical essays of their own devising, students will
explore these issues throughout the semester, in doing so gaining insight into both Latina/o racial
formations and the practice of film criticism.
Required Texts
Beltrán, Mary C. Latina/o Stars in U.S. Eyes: The Making and Meanings of Film and TV
Stardom. Urbana & Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2009.
Ramirez Berg, Charles. Latino Images in Film: Stereotypes, Subversion, Resistance. Austin:
University of Texas Press, 2002.
All other readings are available through ELMS Course Reserves. These are marked [CR] on
the syllabus.
Assessment
Grades will be calculated from a possible 500 points.
1) Regular, insightful contribution to every class discussion (100 pts)
2) Best four short assignments of five completed (25 points each, 100 pts total)
3) A mid-term essay of 5 pages (100 pts)
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4) A final essay of 10 pages (150 pts)
5) Final exam (50pts)
Grading for each assignment
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A = Demonstrates outstanding mastery of content and application of concepts in
completing the assigned work. Written work is clear and free from grammatical and
typographical errors, and exhibits original insight and ideas.
B = Demonstrates good understanding of content and concepts in completing the
assigned work, but does not meet the same standards of writing and originality as ‘A’
work.
C= Demonstrates acceptable familiarity and understanding of the assignment. ‘C’ grades
represent an average level of attainment.
D= Demonstrates only sketchy grasp of concepts and course content.
F= Does not demonstrate understanding or application of course material and concepts.
Fails to address the assignment in a coherent manner.
I will provide details as each assignment approaches, and we will spend some time in class
discussing the ins and outs of each particular essay or examination. The following schedule is
our outline, though I reserve the right to make some changes as we go.
Week 1 – Introductions
Thurs 8/30: Introductions, etc.
Week 2 – Setting the Scene
Tues, 9/4:
Read for today: Ramirez Berg, Latino Images in Film, 1-10, 38-65.
Beltrán, Latina/o Stars in U.S. Eyes, 1-16.
Film in Class: Stuart Hall: Representation and the Media
Thurs, 9/6:
Read for Today: Ramirez Berg, Latino Images in Film, 66-86.
Film in Class: The Bronze Screen: 100 Years of the Latino Image in American Cinema (2002)
Week 3 - Pre-War Hollywood: From Silence to Sound
Tues, 9/11:
Read for Today: Ramirez Berg, Latino Images in Film, 111-127.
Beltrán, Latina/o Stars in U.S. Eyes, 17-39.
Begin Film in Class: Bordertown (1935)
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Thurs, 9/13:
Read for Today: Beltrán, Latina/o Stars in U.S. Eyes, pp.1-39.
Film in Class continued: Bordertown
Week 4 - World War II and Liberal Hollywood
Tues, 9/18:
Read for Today: Richard Slotkin, “Unit Pride: Ethnic Platoons and the Myths of American
Nationality,” American Literary History, Vol. 13, No. 3 (2001): pp. 469-498. [CR]
Brian O’Neil, “The Demands of Authenticity: Addison Durland and Hollywood’s Latin Images
During World War II.” In Daniel Bernardi, ed., Classic Hollywood, Classic Whiteness
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2001), 359-385. [CR]
Begin Film in Class: A Medal for Benny (1945)
Thurs, 9/20:
Film in Class continued: A Medal for Benny (1945)
Week 5 – Latino/as and the “Social Problem” Film
Tues, 9/25:
Read for Today: Doug Dibbern, “The Violent Poetry of the Times: the Politics of History in
Daniel Mainwaring and Joseph Losey’s The Lawless,” from “Un-American" Hollywood: Politics
and Film in the Blacklist Era (New Brunswick, N.J: Rutgers University Press, 2007), pp. 97-112.
[CR]
Begin Film in Class: The Lawless (1950)
Thurs, 9/27:
Film in Class continued: The Lawless
Week 6 – Defying the Blacklist: Salt of the Earth (1954)
Tues, 10/2:
Watch for Today: Salt of the Earth (1954)
Read for Today: Steve Boisson, “The Movie Hollywood Could Not Stop,” American History,
36:6 (February 2002). [CR]
Jeffrey M. Garcilazo, “McCarthyism, Mexican Americans, and the Los Angeles
Committee for the Protection of the Foreign-Born, 1950-1954.” Western Historical Quarterly,
Vol. 32, No. 3 (Autumn, 2001), pp.273-295. [CR]
Thurs, 10/4:
Salt discussion continued
FIRST PAPER (5 pages) DUE IN CLASS
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Week 7 – “Life is Alright in America (If you’re a White in America)”
Tues, 10/9:
Watch for Today: West Side Story (1961)
Read for Today: Beltrán, Latina/o Stars in U.S. Eyes, pp. 62-85
Alberto Sandoval, “West Side Story: A Puerto Rican Reading of ‘America,’” Jump Cut 39
(1994), pp.59-66. [CR]
Thurs, 10/11:
West Side Story discussion continued
Week 8 – Border Troubles in Robert M. Young’s Alambrista!
Tues, 10/16:
Watch for Today: Alambrista! (1977)
Read for Today: Cordelia Candelaria, “Tightrope Walking the Border: Alambrista and the
Acrobatics of Mestizo Representation,” in Nicholas J. Cull and David Carrasco, Alambrista and
the US-Mexico Border: Film, Music, and Stories of Undocumented Immigrants (Albuquerque:
University of New Mexico Press, 2004). [CR]
Melissa E. Barth, “Alambrista! Walking the Illegal Tightrope,” in Leon Lewis, ed., Robert M.
Young: Essays on the Films (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2005), 74-86. [CR]
Thurs, 10/18:
Alambrista discussion continued.
Week 9 – The Cinema of Gregory Nava: El Norte
Tues, 10/23:
Watch for Today: El Norte (1983)
Read for Today: Josef Raab, “Latinos and Otherness: The Films of Gregory Nava.” From
Sebastian Thies and Josef Raab, eds. E Pluribus Unum?: National and Transnational Identities
in the Americas (Tempe: Bilingual Press, 2009), pp. 175-192. [CR]
Arthur Brakel, “El Norte, Deracination, and Circularity: An Epic Gone Awry,” Bilingual Review
(2004-2007), 166-175 [CR]
Thurs, 10/25:
El Norte discussion continued.
Week 10 – Transnational Identities and Crossover Dreaming
Tues, 10/30:
Read for Today: Ana Patricia Rodríguez, “Encrucijadas: Ruben Blades at the Transnational
Crossroads,” Latino/a Popular Culture, pp.85-101. [CR]
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Ana M. Lopez, “Greater Cuba,” in Chon Noriega and Ana M. Lopez, ed., The Ethnic Eye: Latino
Media Arts (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996), pp. 38-58. [CR]
Begin Film in Class: Crossover Dreams (1985)
Thurs, 11/1:
Film in Class Continued: Crossover Dreams (1985)
Week 11 - Inside and Out: American Me
Tues, 11/6:
Watch for Today: American Me (1992)
Read for Today: Beltrán, Latina/o Stars in U.S. Eyes, pp. 108-130
Ana Maria Dopico, “American Me (1992).” In Mandy Merck, ed., America First: Naming the
Nation in U.S. Film (New York: Routledge, 2007), pp. 214-243 [CR]
Thurs, 11/8:
American Me discussion continued
Week 12 – Gender and Power in Girlfight
Tues, 11/13:
Watch for Today: Girlfight (2000)
Read for Today: Beltrán, Latina/o Stars in U.S. Eyes, pp. 131-171.
Karen R. Tolchin, “‘Hey, Killer’: The Construction of a Macho Latina, or the Perils and
Enticements of Girlfight,” in Myra Mendible, ed., From Bananas to Buttocks, pp. 183-198 [CR]
Thurs, 11/15:
Girlfight discussion continued
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Week 13 – Tues, 11/20 & Thurs, 11/22: No Class
Week 14 – 21st Century Images, Part I
Tues, 11/27:
Read for Today:
Yvonne Tasker, “Bodies and Genres in Transition: Girlfight and Real Women Have Curves,” in
Christine Gledhill, ed., Gender Meets Genre in Postwar Cinemas (Chicago: University of Illinois
Press, 2012), pp.84-95. [CR]
Deborah Paredez, “All About My (Absent) Mother: Young Latina Aspirations in Real Women
Have Curves and Ugly Betty,” in Gina M. Perez, et al., ed., Beyond el Barrio: Everyday Life in
Latin America (NYU Press, 2010), pp.129-148. [CR]
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Begin Film in Class: Real Women Have Curves (2002).
Thurs, 11/29:
Film in Class Continued: Real Women…
Tues, 12/4:
Read for Today: TBA
Week 15 – 21st Century Images, Part II
Film in Class: Sleep Dealer (2008)
Thurs, 12/6:
Film in Class continued: Sleep Dealer
Week 16 – Final Paper and Wrapping Up
Tues, 12/11:
FINAL PAPER DUE in class.
Rules, Requirements, and the Like
Participation
Student participation is essential to maximize our exchange of ideas and get the most out of the
class. It also accounts for 20% of your final grade. Note: Simply turning up does not count as
participation; it is only its prerequisite. I expect to hear from everyone each week, and will be
taking note of who is contributing and, importantly, assuming a leadership role in facilitating
discussion between students. Class discussion must be conducted respectfully: there is room for
all viewpoints to be raised and debated. Participation also extends to watching films and clips,
both in class and as part of homework assignments. You should give undivided attention to the
screen, and all electronic devices, and newspapers, etc., should be turned off/put away
before the class begins (unless you have a very good reason that I have approved, laptop
computers, cellphones, etc., are prohibited in the classroom). In order to participate
effectively, you must complete all readings and viewings on time and come to class (also on
time) with points to make and questions to ask. The syllabus is the guide, unless you hear
otherwise, follow the syllabus to keep up.
Papers and format
I will distribute information on the specifics of each paper as we go along. However, there are
some matters of format that apply to each of them. All papers should be double-spaced, written
in 12 point font, and include page numbers and a title. All papers must include a works cited
page, and must be formatted to the conventions of a recognized academic citation style,
preferably Chicago or MLA.
Unexcused absences and lateness
Unexcused non-attendance means that students will not be eligible to receive participation points
for that particular class. Students should also be on time, which means being seated and ready to
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begin by 2:00. It is students’ responsibility to contact the instructor concerning potential missed
assignments and to make up missed classes by borrowing notes from a classmate.
Excused absences
Satisfactory documentation is required in order for an absence to be considered excused, and it
must be presented in a timely fashion (during the class period that you return). Please make a
copy of your documentation for me to keep. You are responsible for making up missed material,
assignments, and so on.
Late Work
Written work that is late without good reason will be penalized at the rate of 5 points a day
(weekends count as one day). If you are absent when an assignment is due, you must e-mail me
that assignment by class time and bring a hard copy to the next class to get credit. Late work may
be submitted via email in between classes, with a hard copy again due at the next class. These are
the only situations in which I will accept work electronically. Extensions on assignment
deadlines can, in extenuating circumstances, be agreed with me before the due date.
Additional Notes
Students with disabilities should contact the instructor at the beginning of the semester to discuss
any accommodation for this course. Students with scheduling conflicts due to university
activities, or with religious or cultural dates to observe, should also speak with instructor early in
the semester.
Academic Integrity
The University has approved a Code of Academic Integrity which prohibits students from
cheating on exams, plagiarizing papers, submitting the same paper for credit in two courses
without authorization, buying papers, submitting fraudulent documents, and forging signatures.
The plagiarism policy specifies that all quotations taken from other authors, including from the
Internet, must be indicated by quotation marks and referenced. Paraphrasing must be referenced
as well. The following University of Maryland Honor Pledge can be handwritten and signed on
the front page of all papers, projects or other academic assignments submitted for evaluation in
this course: "I pledge on my honor that I have not given or received any unauthorized assistance
on this assignment/examination." Potential instances of academic dishonesty will be referred to
the UMCP Student Honor Council. Penalties for cheating, plagiarism and other forms of
academic dishonesty can be severe. All members of the University Community share the
responsibility to challenge and make known acts of apparent academic dishonesty.
All the best for a productive and successful semester,
Rob.