All of our work in the course, from blogs to readings to discussions, will culminate in a research project that investigates a topic of your choice in world cinema. This paper should be a close analysis of a chosen film or two films that are significantly related in some way. Your chosen film(s) cannot be from North American cinemas! You may analyze the content of the film, its cultural context, or the film industry that produced it, or some combination of these as is pertinent to your interpretation of the film. You should use the blogs and activities to help you   continually work on the project on a weekly basis, so by the end of the course you have a complete 8 page paper. Here are the requirements:

1.   Minimum 8 pages (not including works cited), double-spaced, 12 pt Times New Roman font, 1” margins.

2.   Use MLA, APA, Chicago, or whichever citation style you are most familiar with. Be consistent.

3.   Use at least 4-5 sources including the film. At least 2 sources should be external scholarly sources (academic journal articles, books, etc., not news stories or wikipedia pages) located through the UB Library. Note that you may not find scholarly research written specifically on your chosen film—you will likely have to look more broadly at scholarship on cinema in the region and cultural context the film comes from.

4.   Must have an argument! Do not just summarize or report on the content of the film. Analyze and interpret it: how should we understand the film? What do we learn from it? What is its meaning, and why is it significant? What are its major themes and messages? Back up your argument with specific evidence from the film and your sources.

5.   Submit the paper through the Assignment submission in Week 16 of the course on UBLearns.

We will use your blog assignments throughout the course to help you work on your research project. The topics and content of the blogs are up to you, but they will contribute to the project in these ways:

Blog 3: Brainstorming. Come up with a number of different possible topics and world cinemas that you might want to research. More instructions on UBLearns.

Blog 5: Topic Proposal. Narrow down one topic to focus on, and write a short proposal for what your project will be. More instructions on UBLearns.

Blog 7: Locate and watch your chosen film(s). Begin research to find scholarly sources related to your topic. Take notes on what you watch and read.

Blog 9: Start to outline your project, and submit your outline as a blog post.