Courses > 2022 Fall

Electives

CIMS 3661 - FILMING THE FUTURE OF PHILADELPHIA

ANTH 3661 | COMM 3661
401 | SEM | STAFF | R 3:30-6:30pm | DRLB 2N36

This workshop is a rare opportunity to learn to use film to engage Philadelphia and its future from personal, political, social, and historical perspectives. Over one semester, we will simultaneously think, learn, and imagine Philadelphia through music, dance, anthropology, art, theater, architecture, literature, history, night life, day life, school life, social life, and life after school. We will read, we will write, and we will learn how to make films with an anthropologist. We will also approach Philadelphia from the perspectives of race, gender, sexuality, wealth, democracy, urban life, suburban life, job prospects, creative projects, industrial boom, post-industrial decline, activism, police violence, and gentrification. In thinking about the future, we will think about the extent to which Philadelphia is representative of American futures more broadly, and to what extent it is an exceptional city. We will also examine Philadelphia's place in the world. This project will be a collaboration between activists and artists from Philadelphia, and students from Penn. It will end in public screenings on campus and in the city.