GSWS 100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Sigmund Freud, Sexology, Circular Motion
27 Apr 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
GSWS – Lecture 4
Sex & The Cinema
Introduction
- A case study of a medium-specific language of sex
- How a century of cinema has structured our way of seeing
- The highly developed analytical and interpretive models in film studies can inspire us to
apply close reading techniques to other media
Knowledge Framework (Revision of the semester)
- Discourse > individual speech
o The social process of making sense of and reproducing reality and thereby of
fixing meanings
Theoretical Knowledge vs. General Attitude
- Theoretical knowledge = the general ways in which sex is thought about in society at
large
- Circular motion of knowledge and social change
- A fashion analogy
- Observations of people in the public
Early Discourse on Sex in Film
The Cieati Potetial of Freud’s Coepts
- Sigmund freud (unconscious desire)
- The return of the repressed
- The competition between socialization and transgressive desire
Sexology (provides a vocabulary of sexual practices)
Nationalist/racist Discourse on Civilization
- Barbarism and degenecy are opposed to civilization and associate with uncontrollable
and aggressive sexual appetites
- Such sexuality is often projected into racialized bodies.
Marxist Approaches
- Shows how mainstream films popularize and naturalize exploitation and
commodification
1) Demonstrates the gendered inequality in film history as well as many contemporary
films
2) Influence on film content and generic conventions
3) Concerned with the works of female filmmakers and the challenges the face in the
industry
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