Documentary Rhetorics

In this course students will explore the rhetorical performances of documentary film—in terms of production, ethics, and editing—and how documentaries are used for different means: investigation, activism, and even propaganda. After watching contemporary documentaries and reading reviews, interviews, analyses, and theories of filmmaking, students will analyze specific films (with cultural rhetorics and social consciousness lenses), conduct and transcribe interviews, and write a code of ethics for documentary filmmakers. The final project has students either produce or storyboard their own short documentaries.