It Takes a Design and Research Village: The Executive Creative Technology Team
25 Thursday Apr 2013
Posted SpARC, Uncategorized
in25 Thursday Apr 2013
Posted SpARC, Uncategorized
in27 Friday Apr 2012
Posted German Studies, Political Science, SpARC
in“Why is it that almost 40% of the representatives in the US Senate are millionaires?”
This was the question that motivated first-year student Kaija Lazda to begin a research project comparing campaign financing in the United States and in Germany. As a future German Studies major with a strong interest in political science and international relations, Kaija used her knowledge about German contemporary politics and her language skills to read through the policies of the German Bundestag and to research background material on German websites in addition to researching the US side of the matter.
In a clear and concise presentation Kaija then led the audience through her findings. One of the most intesting aspects of her investigation of US campaign financing structures was a comparison of the contributions by PACs in the 2008 presidential campaign with the role PACs have played in the 2012 campaign sofar. The millions spent by PACs in 2008 look miniscule in comparison to this year’s numbers.
One of the main differences between the US and Germany is that in Germany the government contributes almost all of the election financing and parties–not individuals–are funded based on the percentage of votes the received in the previous election. This is not to say that donations do not play a role in German politics, and the country has certainly seen its share of scandals in the last couple of years. However, as Kaija pointed out, the wealth of a candidate is generally viewed with more suspicion than in the United States.
Kaija acknowledged that her research did not yield the clear-cut superiority of one campaign-financing model over the other that she had envisioned at the outset. While she generally considers the German model to allow for a better political representation of all social groups, she does not see it as the perfect model either. Kaija plans on continuing her research during the ASC in Germany seminar in May and will use some of her findings in future IR and Political Science courses.
26 Thursday Apr 2012
Posted Film Studies, German Studies, SpARC
inTags
Agnes Scott College, Charlotte Kubicz, Gundolf Graml, Josef von Sternberg, Marlene Dietrich, SpARC
With her talk “Creating the femme Fatale: Marlene Dietrich Under the Gaze”, Charlotte Kubicz, German Studies major at Agnes Scott College, introduced an attentive audience to the investigation of gender representation in popular cinema.
Kubicz compared and analyzed Marlene Dietrich’s role in the films “Blue Angel” (1930) and “Shanghai Express” (1932). Both were directed by Austro-American director Josef von Sternberg, but while “The Blue Angel” was produced during the German Weimar republic, “Shanghai Express” was produced in Hollywood. Part of Kubicz’ project is to see if the different cultural and national context of production for these two films also resulted in a different manifestation of the femme fatale or vamp concept.
After introducing and the concept of the femme fatale as a female role that disrupts the traditional boundaries between masculine and feminine identities, Kubicz focused on the different ways in which “Shanghai Express” presented the character of Shanghai Lili, played by Marlene Dietrich, as a vamp. Charlotte highlighted the lack of depth in many shots of Dietrich, the framing of her character in doors and windows, a strategy that almost made her look pasted into the mise-en-scène.
Charlotte’s presentation was a great example for close film analysis. In order to discuss the often quickly changing power dynamics between the female and the male leads, she showed the following sequence from “Shanghai Express” (scene begins at 5:55):
Charlotte pointed out how Marlene Dietrich’s character, despite her verbal declaration to not “detain” her former love intereest, arrests his attention nonetheless.
The presentation concluded with Charlotte comparing the marriage of the femme fatale in “Shanghai Express” with the tragic ending of “The The Blue Angel,” where the femme fatale Lola Lola (M. Dietrich) eventually drives her bourgeois lover to commit suicide. Charlotte discussed how different historical circumstances might have let to different resolutions to the conflicts between the sexes and the genders. While Lola Lola’s resistance to marriage in “The Blue Angel” can be read as a reflection of the gender discourses of the Weimar republic in Germany, the eventual marriage of Shanghai Lily might indicate the conservatism of 1930s America and the attempts at censoring Hollywood.
Charlotte’s clear and decisive presentation prompted several good questions and made me want to go back and watch these two films.