FILM 4502

This course asks how Chinese-language and Japanese performance and visual arts feed into animated film, and how animation today is shaped by but also extends these traditions. With a focus on aesthetics, it is centred around the theoretical question of when/how we can define “animation” in opposition to other arts and technologies, and when/how these overlap. Secondary questions include the concept of “nation” in relation to animation and the extent to which causality can be attributed to connections between aesthetic forms; no doubt additional questions and themes will arise as we discuss. The aim of the course is not to answer these definitively, but to use these as starting points for conversation and analysis. This course does not go deep into any one form or style but rather gives an overview of many in order to enable students to look more closely, in their own research, into those that interest them most.