Truth Well Told: Representing Reality in Documentary Film

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label Diverse autorenew 2025-09-29, 17:01 history_edu Cristian Ion
"Every cut is a lie. It's never that way. Those two shots were never next to each other in time that way. But you're telling a lie in order to tell the truth." - Wolf Koenig Documentary has never been more popular. Successful films such as Michael Moore's Roger and Me and Bowling for Columbine, Morgan Spurlock's Super Size Me, Kevin Macdonald's Touching the Void, and James Marsh's Man on Wire have found large worldwide audiences and wide critical acclaim.

Yet as a genre, there has been much debate as to what can legitimately be considered 'documentary' and how documentary films go about portraying truth and reality. Documentary is perhaps best described as a hybrid film genre, which attempts to represent the real in a creative art form. This course will focus on our struggles with the real and our attempts to represent it. We will look at the history of documentary film and consider how documentaries address the reality they set out to portray.

Key theoretical formulations will be examined, with particular reference to documentary truth claims, ethics and representation as well as the impact of technological change on modes of production, distribution and consumption. You will learn to analyse documentary films according to their 'modes' and will critically examine elements such as cinematography, editing, sound design and narrative structure. You will also begin to familiarise yourself with the production processes involved in making a documentary in a series of practical projects / demonstrations.

Period
23-06-2014 - 16-07-2014 (4 weeks)

Target group
The University of Sussex International Summer School welcomes applicants from a wide range of educational backgrounds. Although most of you will be currently enrolled at a university or college, we also welcome applicants who have been away from education for some years, as well as highly committed senior high school students - for some courses a good general education, an open mind and lots of enthusiasm are the main qualifications. For some other courses you will see that prerequisites are listed - applicants for these courses are expected to submit transcripts to

Course aim
The International Summer School provides an opportunity to meet and study with people from different countries and cultures, on a cosmopolitan campus. The large range of courses on offer allows you to get ahead with credit in core courses, or simply to experiment with something new.



Credits
7.5 ECTS credits

Summer School courses carry 15 credits and last for four weeks. Since the standard annual load for a Sussex student is 120 credits, this means that each course is equivalent to 4 semester hours or 7.5 ECTS credits. Students can take only one course per session, as the courses are intensive. You can expect to spend 30 to 45 hours each week on your course between attending classes, labs and workshops, as well as time spent outside class preparing the readings and assignments. You can find information about the courses offered by the International Summer School through our course directory or courses by subject pages of our website.

Course fee
GBP 1435: Tuition only (one four week session).

GBP 2670: Tuition only (both four week ISS sessions). Some courses have a lab or field trip fee. A non-refundable application fee of 150 is to be paid when accepting an offer of a place. Payment in full (less the application fee) and payment for accommodation (146/week) is required by 15 June.

Course leader
Jack Zenieweski

Scholarships
The University of Sussex offers a limited number of scholarships for participation in the ISS in the form of partial fee waivers to students from developing countries who have high potential for future leadership in their field of study or career.

University of Sussex
Address: University of Sussex Brighton
Postal code: BN1 9RF
City: Brighton
Country: United Kingdom
Website: http://www.sussex.ac.uk/iss/
E-mail: issoffice@sussex.ac.uk
Phone: 00441273678406