Fall 2007
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View schedules for



AIS 199
Undergraduate Open Seminar

Credit:  1 to 5 hours.


May be repeated to a maximum of 6 hours.


Section Information
CRNTypeSectionTimeDays Location  Instructor
50230  lecture- discussion  UG 10:00 AM - 11:20 AM MW  room 385
Education Bldg 
Ngo, F 
3 hours
Race, Gender and Sexuality

47168  lecture- discussion  UH 03:00 PM - 04:15 PM TR  room 150
English Bldg 
Byrd, J 
3 hours
AIS American Indians in Film
This course will focus on the ways in which Hollywood and other national cinema have portrayed the native "other" in films produced primarily between the 1950s and the present. We will begin with explorations of images and stereotypes of American Indians, focusing on how they have developed and changed over the years. Then, building on those understandings, we will question the narrative function of the native "other" in films, their relationship to plot, theme, and character, and how films about Indians play into the myths and imagination of the dominant society. Of particular concern will be the historical and material contexts for these movies and the cultural and political climate from which they emerge. By contextualizing the movies through the concerns of both the dominant society and of indigenous communities at the time these movies are produced, we can understand how representations of indigenous peoples serve not only to misinform but also speak on some fundamental level to the historical obsessions of the society that has produced them. Some of the questions we will focus on throughout the course include: How do anxieties about particular historical moments inflect the ways that Hollywood returns to the recurring trope of Cowboys and Indians? How do these images and films connect to empire buildings and extend the work of Manifest Destiny? How have Westerns been translated to Pacific settings? Finally, we will look at the ways native filmmakers have been and are attempting to intervene into the different movie genres to transform and control media images of Indians.