Appendix 2

International Relations Through Popular Culture

PIED 5590

(20 Credits)

Taught by: Professor Cynthia Weber

Office: 13.43 ESS Building

Telephone: 0113 233 4875

Fax: 0113 233 4400

E Mail: C.L.Weber@leeds.ac.uk

Office Hours: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 11-12

 

Aims and Objectives of the Module

This is an interdisciplinary module which challenges students to think about how popular cultural media like film circulate, support, and deconstruct popularly held common sense knowledge about international relations (what the course refers to as IR myths). A central aim of this module is to help students to develop critical theoretical skills, particular in relation to how meanings or truths are constructed. These critical analytic skills will be developed through introducing students to techniques and strategies for reading films as well as through reading theoretical IR texts and critically reassessing IR texts through popular films.

On completion of this module, students should be able to apply critical analytical stills to IR theory, international politics generally, and to their daily analyses of popular visual media like film. Students should be able to identify, discuss, and critically analyze IR myths that form the foundations of classical IR traditions like Realism and Idealism and new IR traditions like Constructivism, Gender and Globalization.

Assessment is through essays that help students to transfer their skills in reading visual media to reading written media.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Teaching Arrangements: Seminars will be held at 11-1 on Wednesdays days in room ESS 11.16. There are no lectures for this course. You should attend ALL seminars. To facilitate students, public viewings of videos are scheduled for occasional Mondays from 4:30-6:30pm in room ESS 11.14. These viewings are optional.

Assessment:

One 6000 word essay to be handed in on 21 May 2001 (100% of the assessment). [See "Handing in work" below].

Two seminar presentations (non-assessed).

One (non-assessed) essay of 2000 words to be handed in on Wednesday, 21 March 2001.

Attendance

You are required to attend all seminars. Failure to attend at least two thirds of seminars without medical evidence or another acceptable excuse will result in exclusion from this module.

Seminar presentations

Presentations should last around 10 minutes, and be given in the style of a talk - they should not be read word-for-word from a prepared text. Presenters should address the specific seminar question, rather than simply offering summaries of items for the reading list. Presenters are encouraged to prepare handouts and visual aids (including overheads) to accompany their presentations.

Students who are not presenting will be asked to provide their feedback on the quality of the presentation as a means of introducing and discussing the principal issues.

Essays

You should choose your title from the list which will be supplied to you. The essay should be approximately 6000 words in length, double spaced and typed on a single side only of A4 paper using a 12 point font size or higher. The essay should be accompanied by a coversheet with the title of the essay, your name and a word count plus your seminar leader's name. Please see the notes below regarding constructing a bibliography and referencing.

Word limits will be strictly enforced (students may be asked to produce disks in case of doubt about the length of the work).

Submitting Essays

Your essay should be submitted on 21 May 2001 to POLIS Postgraduate Office,room 13.37, Economic and Social Studies Building. The following points are very important:

·

· The office will be open from 9 - 5 on the first day of the examination period.

· You are required to complete an academic integrity form. It is desirable from your point of view to obtain a receipt for work handed in.

· If you submit your work late without a good reason for the delay [see below], then you will lose 5 marks per working day. You should state the reason for lateness on the appropriate form.

·

Obtaining an Extension

Extensions of time can only be given by the Programme Director - neither the office nor your tutor can give permission. You will only be given an extension where there are medical or severe personal problems which can account for the delay. The penalty for lateness is fixed at 5 marks per working day. If you deliver work late you must state the reason for lateness on the appropriate form from the departmental office and attach any relevant medical evidence.

 

Examination

The examination time will be published at a later date. Please let the Institute know (( 0113 233 6843/4393) if you are ill and cannot attend the examination. You will need to produce a doctor's note if you miss the examination due to ill health. You should be aware that examinations may be scheduled for a Saturday. If you cannot take an examination on a Saturday for religious reasons, you must register this point with the Examinations Office.

 

Unsatisfactory Performance / Plagiarism

There are procedures and penalties relating to unsatisfactory performance in a module, and strict regulations concerning plagiarism (presenting the work of other authors as your own), laid out in the Institute and University Handbooks. You are strongly advised to read this information.

 

Outline Syllabus

(general blurb)

 

Date

  

Subject

Week One

January 30

Seminar

Introduction

Week Two

February 7

Seminar

Culture, Ideology, and the Myth Function of IR Theory

Week Three

February 14

Seminar

How to read a film

Week Four

February 21

No Seminar

Reading Week

Week Five

February 28

Seminar

‘International Anarchy is the Permissive Cause of War’

Week Six

March 7

Seminar

‘There is an International Society’

Week Seven

March 14

Seminar

‘Anarchy is what states make of it’

Week Eight

March 21

Seminar

‘Gender is a Variable’
 

March 26-April 22

No Seminar

Easter Holidays

Week Nine

April 25

Seminar

‘It is the end of History’

Week Ten

May 2

Seminar

How does IR theory make sense of the world?

Week Eleven

May 9

Seminar

Mobilizing Popular Culture to Make Other sense of IR

 

 

Books, Journals and Research Sources

 

General Reading

There is no major text for this course. Many general readings are listed under Weeks 1, 2, and 3.

 

 

Main Journals

Main journals include IR theory journals, like Review of International Studies, Millennium, Alternatives, International Feminist Journal of Politics, as well as specialized journals on film and film theory, like Screen and Sight and Sound. Go the the current periodicals section of the Brotherton library and look around in Politics, Sociology, English, and the general section.

 

Electronic Sources

The websites for the films used on this course can often be helpful, providing links to reviews and interviews. But this is an IR course, so always keep in mind that the course is about using films to ANALYZE IR theory, and that should always be your main goal.

 

Weekly Outline

Reading Lists

Items marked * are recommended reading.

CC means that the item is available at the Counter Collection in the Edward Boyle library

Items marked SEE ME are available from the module lecturer.

 

Week One beginning 30 January 2001

Seminar topic: Introduction

 

Reading list (this may be broken down into subject areas, required and recommended texts, required and recommended texts)

Roland Bleiker (1997) ‘Forget IR Theory’, Alternatives 22(1):57-85.

Yosef Lapid and Friedrich Kratochwil, eds. (1996) The Return of Culture and Identity in IR Theory. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner.

Jutta Weldes (1999) ‘Going Cultural: Star Trek, State Action, and Popular Culture’, Millennium 28(1):117-134.

 

 

 

Week Two beginning 7 February 2001

Seminar topic: Culture, Ideology, and the Myth Function in IR theory.

Question: What is meant by ‘the myth function in IR theory’, and how are IR myths related to ideology and popular culture?

 

Reading list (this may be broken down into subject areas, required and recommended texts)

Roland Barthes (1972) Mythologies, trans by Annette Lavers. New York: Noonday Press.

Roland Barthes (1974) S/Z: An essay, trans by Richard Miller. New York: Hill and Wang.

Craig J. Saper (1997) Artificial Mythologies: a guide to cultural intervention. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Jere Paul Suber (1998) Culture and Critique: An introduction to the critical discourses of cultural studies. Boulder, CO: Westview, esp. introduction, chapter 7, and conclusion.

Michel De Certeau (1988) The Practice of Everyday Life, trans by Steven F. Rendall. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Richard Dyer (1985) ‘Taking Popular Television Seriously’, in David Lusted and Phillip Drummond, eds. TV and Schooling. London: British Film Institute, pp. 41-46.

Clifford Geertz (1975) The Interpretation of Cultures. London: Hutchinson.

Stuart Hall, ed. (1997) Representations: Cultural representations and signifying practices. Milton Keynes: Open University Press.

Nicholas Mirzoeff (1999) Visual Culture. London: Routledge.

 

Week Three beginning 14 February 2001

Seminar topic: How to read a film.

Question: What techniques and strategies are available to us to read popular films, and how can these techniques and strategies be applied to reading the myth function in popular films?

 

Reading list (this may be broken down into subject areas, required and recommended texts)

 

Geoffrey Nowell-Smith (2000) 'How films mean, or, from aesthetics to semiotics and half-way back again', in Christine Gledhill and Linda Williams (eds) Reinventing Film Studies. London: Arnold, pp. 5-17.

Gill Branston (2000) 'Why theory?', in Christine Gledhill and Linda Williams (eds) Reinventing Film Studies. London: Arnold, pp. 18-33.

Bill Nichols (2000) 'Film theory and the revolt against master narratives',

in Christine Gledhill and Linda Williams (eds) Reinventing Film Studies. London: Arnold, pp. 34-52.

Steven Cohan (2000) 'Cast study: interpreting Singin' in the Rain', in Christine Gledhill and Linda Williams (eds) Reinventing Film Studies. London: Arnold, pp. 53-75.

Tessa Perkins (2000) 'Who (and what) is it for?', in Christine Gledhill and Linda Williams (eds) Reinventing Film Studies. London: Arnold, pp. 76-98.

Recommended:

Mark Jancovich (1995) 'Screen Theory', in Joanne Hollows and Mark Jancovich (eds) Approaches to Popular Film. Manchester: Manchester University Press, pp. 123-150.

Andy Willis (1995) 'Cultural Studies and Popular Film', in Joanne Hollows and Mark Jancovich (eds) Approaches to Popular Film. Manchester: Manchester University Press, pp. 173-191.

James Monaco (2000) How to Read a Film, 3rd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, Chapter 3 'The Language of Film: Signs and Syntax', pp. 152-227.

 

Week Four beginning 21 February 2001

No Seminar – Reading Week

 

Week Five beginning 28 February 2001

 

Seminar topic: ‘International Anarchy is the Permissive Cause of War’

Questions: What must go without saying in order for Waltz’ myth ‘international anarchy is the permissive cause of war’ to appear to be true? What does Lord of the Flies tell us about how Waltz’ myth ‘international politics is anarchical’ functions?

 

Reading list (this may be broken down into subject areas, required and recommended texts)

**Kenneth Waltz (1959) Man, the State, and War. New York: Columbia University Press.

**Kenneth Waltz (1979) Theory of International Politics. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.

Richard Ashley (1984) ‘The Poverty of Neorealism’, International Organization 38(2)225-286.

Richard Ashley (1989) ‘Living on Borderlines: Man, poststructuralism and war’, in James Der Derian and Michael Shapiro, eds. International/Intertextual Politics: Postmodern readings of world politics. Lexington: Lexington Books.

Barry Buzan, Charles Jones, and Richard Little (1993) The Logic of Anarchy: Neorealism to Structural Realism. New York: Columbia University Press.

David Campbell (1992) Writing Security. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

 

Week Six beginning 7 March 2001

 

Seminar topic: ‘There is an International Society’

Questions: How can Kegley be so optomistic about post-Cold War international politics? How are (neo)idealist concepts like progress, learning, and communcation combined with the traditional (neo)realist concept of fear in Independence Day to give us an international society?

Reading list (this may be broken down into subject areas, required and recommended texts)

**Charles Kegley Jr (1993) ‘The Neoidealist Moment in International Studies?: Realist myths and the new international realities’, International Studies Quarterly 37(June):131-46.

**Charles Kegley Jr (1995) ‘The Neoliberal Challenge to Realist Theories of World Politics: an introduction’ in Charles Kegley Jr. Controversies in International Relations Theory: Realism and the Neoliberal Challenge. New York: St. Martin’s Press.

 

Francois Debrix (1999) Reenvisioning Peacekeeping: The United Nations and the mobilization of ideology. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

On Independence Day:

Michael Rogin (1998) Independence Day. London: British Film Institute.

Julie Webber (under review) ‘Independence Day as a Cosmopolitan Moment: Teaching International Relations’ International Studies Perspectives

 

Week Seven beginning 14 March 2001

Seminar topic: ‘Anarchy is what states make of it’

Questions: How does Wendt’s myth ‘anarchy is what states make of it’ produce states as the authors of international anarchy? What does Wag the Dog tell us about the production of authors, and how does this help us to functionally critique Wendt’s myth?

Reading list (this may be broken down into subject areas, required and recommended texts)

**Alexander Wendt (1992) ‘Anarchy is what states make of it: the social construction of power politics’, International Organization 46:391-425.

**Michel Foucault (1984) ‘What is an Author?’ in Paul Rabinow, ed. The Foucault Reader. New York: Pantheon, pp. 101-20.

Alexander Wendt (1994) ‘Collective Identity Formation and the International States’, American Political Science Review. 88(2):384-96.

Alexander Wendt (1999) Social Theory of International Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

**Stephen M. Walt (1998) ‘International Relations: One world, many theories’, Foreign Policy. Spring:29-46.

On other Constructivisms:

Nicholas Onuf (1989) World of Our Making. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press.

Nicholas Onuf (1999) ‘Worlds of Our Making: the strange career of constructivism in IR’, in Donald J. Puchala, ed. Visions of IR. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press.

V. Kublakova, Nicholas Onuf, and Peter Kowert, eds. (1998) International Relations in a Constructed World. New York: M.E. Sharpe.

John G. Ruggie (1998) Constructing the World Polity. London: Routledge.

 

On Poststructuralism/Postmodernism:

Jean Baudrillard (1987) Seduction, trans by Brian Singer. New York: St. Martin’s.

Jenny Edkins (1999) Poststructuralism and International Relations: Bringing the political back in. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner.

Jim George (1994) Discourses of Global Politics: A critical (re)introduction to international relations. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner.

R.B.J. Walker (1993) Inside/Outside: International Relations as Political Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

 

 

Week Eight beginning 21 March 2001

***Nonassessed essay due at the beginning of the seminar, 11am on Wednesday, 21 March 2001. You must bring you essay WITH YOU to the seminar.

Seminar topic: ‘Gender is a Variable’

Questions: How does Jones place gender, and what makes his placement of gender appear to be so natural? What does Fatal Attraction tell us about the relationship between placing gender and the points of view of those doing the placing?

Reading list (this may be broken down into subject areas, required and recommended texts)

**Adam Jones (1996) ‘Does "Gender" Make the World go Round?: Feminist critiques of international relations’, Review of International Studies. 22(4):405-29.

**Terrell Carver, Molly Cochran and Judith Squires (1998) ‘Gendering Jones: Feminisms, IRs, Masculinities’, Review of International Studies 24(2):283-297.

**Adam Jones (1998) ‘Engendering Debate’, Review of International Studies 24(4):299-303.

On Feminism:

Berenice Carroll (1972) ‘Peace Research: The cult of power’, Journal of Conflict Resolution. 16(4):585-616.

Terrell Carver (1996) Gender is Not a Synonym for Women. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Press.

Jean Bethke Elshtain (1987) Women and War. New York: Basic Books.

Cynthia Enloe (1989) Bananas, Beaches and Bases: Making feminist sense of international politics. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Rebecca Grant and Kathleen Newland, eds. (1991) Gender and International Relations. Milton Keynes: Open University Press.

Robert Keohane (1989) ‘International Relations Theory: Contributions of a feminist standpoint’, Millennium 18(2):245-253. And the response by Cynthia Weber (1994) ‘Good Girls, Little Girls and Bad Girls: Male Paranoia in Robert Keohane’s Critique of Feminist International Relations’, Millennium 23(2):337-49.

Craig Murphy (1996) ‘Seeing Women, Recognizing Gender, Recasting International Relations'’ International Organization 50(3):513-38.

V. Spike Peterson, ed. (1992) Gendered States: Feminist (re)visions of international relations theory. Boulder: Lynne Rienner.

Christine Sylvester (1994) Feminist Theory and International Relations in a Postmodern Era. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

J. Ann Tickner (1992) Gender in International Relations: Feminist perspectivies on achieving global security. New York: Columbia University Press.

Marysia Zalewski (1995) ‘Well, what is the feminist perspective on Bosnia?’, International Affairs 71(2):339-356.

Marysia Zalewski (1999) ‘Where is Woman in International Relations? "To return as a woman and be heard"’, Millennium 27:847-67.

On Fatal Attraction:

James Conlon (1996) ‘The Place of Passion: Reflections on Fatal Attraction’, in Barry Keither Grant, ed. The Dread of Difference: Gender and the horror film. Austin: University of Texas Press, pp. 401-11.

On Masculinities:

Robert Connell (1995) Masculinities. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Lily Ling (2000) ‘Hypermasculinity on the Rise, Again: a response to Fukuyama on women and world politics’, International Feminist Journal of Politics 2(2)

Marysia Zalewski and Jane Parpart (1998) The ‘Man’ Question in International Relations. Boulder: Westview.

 

Week Nine beginning 25 April 2001

 

Seminar topic: ‘It is the end of History’

Questions: How does Fukuyama’s myth ‘it is the end of history’ make (neo)liberalism the unchallenged ideological stage for globalization? How does (neo)liberalism’s inability to contain desire in The Truman Show tell us about the limits of Fukuyama’s myth?

 

Reading list (this may be broken down into subject areas, required and recommended texts)

**Francis Fukuyama (1989) ‘The End of History?’, The National Interest. 16(summer)2-18.

Francis Fukuyama (1992) The End of History and the Last Man. London: Hamish Hamilton.

Elizabeth Deeds Ermarth (1992) Sequel to History: Postmodernism and the crisis of representational time. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

On Globalization:

 

John Baylis and Steve Smith, eds. (1997) The Globalization of World Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Colin Hay and David Marsh, eds. (2000) Demystifying Globalization. Boulder, CO: St. Martin’s Press.

Andres Herod, Gearoid O Tuathail and Susan M. Roberts, eds. (1998) An Unruly World? : Globalization, governance, and geography. London: Routledge.

Paul Hirst and Grahame Thompson (1996) Globalization in Question. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Fredric Jameson and Masao Miyoshi, eds. (1998) The Cultures of Globalization. Chapel Hill, NC: Duke University Press.

Elenore Kofman and Gillian Youngs, eds. (1996) Globalization: Theory and Practice. London: Pinter.

Andrew Leyshon (1997) ‘True Stories?: Global dreams, global nightmares, and writing globalization’ in Rodger Lee and Jane Wills, eds. Geographies of Economies. London: Arnold Press, pp. 133-146.

Marianne Marchand (2000) ‘Gendered Representations of the "Global": Reading/writing globalization’ in Richard Stubbs and Geoffrey R.D. Underhill, eds. Political Economy and the Changing Global Order, 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 218-228.

John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge (2000) The Future Perfect: The challenges and hidden promisees of globalization. New York: Times Press.

 

 

Week Ten beginning 2 May 2001

 

Seminar topic: How does IR theory make sense of the world?

Question: How does IR theory make sense of the world?

 

Reading list (this may be broken down into subject areas, required and recommended texts)

(a thinking week that considers all we have done. Very little reading)

Roland Bleiker (1997) ‘Forget IR Theory’, Alternatives 22(1):57-85.

 

Week Eleven beginning 9 May 2001

Seminar topic: Mobilizing Popular Culture to Make Other sense of IR

Questions: What does it mean to ‘mobilize’ popular culture? How might popular culture be mobilized to make ‘other sense’ of IR – in film as well as in other popular arenas?

 

Reading list (this may be broken down into subject areas, required and recommended texts)

No reading. A thinking week.

Film Viewing Schedule

All films will be shown in ESS 11.14 from 4:30-6:30pm. Viewings are options. Films are also available at the counter collection in the undergraduate library.

February 12 – Lord of the Flies

March 5 – Independence Day (likely to be followed by Mars Attacks!)

March 12 – Wag the Dog

March 19 – Fatal Attraction

April 23 and April 30 – The Truman Show