Film and Media Studies is an integral part of all the specializations of the Bachelor’s program Film as well as the Master’s program in Serial Storytelling and Digital Narratives and consist of a number of subjects:
Comparative Media Studies
The central aim of Comparative Media Studies is to provide media and cultural knowledge as well as analytical-hermeneutical and creative-productive capabilities in the context of audiovisual culture. The thematic focus lies on the media theoretical and practical consequences of digitization. In the process, students are encouraged to strengthen their sense of critical self-reflection and their capacity for independent creative action. The foundation modules in the first half of the program provide a basic knowledge of the modern history of media and arts, as well as their theories. Through a historical cross-section that covers all media, the modules in the second half of the program then investigate the central issues of aesthetic production and reception: practices of adaptation, factual storytelling between documentary and fiction, as well as the construction and transmission of audio-visual conceptions of humanity.
In the sixth semester a BA colloquium takes place once a month, which accompanies the bachelor theses of the students in media theory. The “theory on demand” is also available to students as an option.
In the MA Serial Storytelling and in the MA Digital Narratives, case studies are supplemented by media science courses and courses on the history of audiovisual narration, in which students learn to critically analyze audiovisual formats – as well as their own works – and to locate them in media science terms.
Film History and Film Analysis
What do films offer us to see and understand? This question is at the heart of Film History and Film Analysis. It explores the different dimensions and elements that touch, cross and merge paths in film: space and time, perspective and montage, picture and sound, light and color, on-and off-screen, and the perspectives of the characters, the camera and the audience. The subject reflects on the media conditions for cinematic aesthetics and investigates their historical transformation. Theoretical investigation through film history and film analysis is regarded as a laboratory where film is broken down into its single components and then reassembled. It is a place where students can sharpen their analytical skills particularly by deepening their understanding of how film works.
The first year of studies starts with an introduction to film history, which offers an overview of central innovations in film technology and developments in film aesthetics. The second course serves as an introduction to film analysis and deals with the essential elements of film scientific work. In the second year of studies, the first task is to grasp the transformation of cinematic forms as a spectrum of aesthetic differentiation. The focus here is on the renewal efforts of different film cultures and movements as well as on the film aesthetic innovations associated with them and expressed through them. In the third year, film historical and aesthetic questions about the approach to new cinematic styles and new media combinations will be explored in depth. The focus is on the discussion of the development of the film medium from the 1970s to the present.
Parallel to the Comparative Media Studies department, a BA colloquium will take place once a month in the sixth semester with an additional option for “theory on demand”.
In the MA Serial Storytelling and in the MA Digital Narratives, case studies are supplemented by media science courses and courses on the history of audiovisual narration, in which students learn to critically analyze audiovisual formats – as well as their own works – and to locate them in media science terms.
