Category Archives: Events

Lecture: Pierre Sauvage, documentary filmmaker

Rescuers During the Holocaust: Their Challenge to Citizens Today
by Pierre Sauvage, Documentary Filmmaker

7:00 p.m., Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Dana Auditorium

Pierre Sauvage is a child survivor of the Holocaust and an Emmy Award-winning documentary filmmaker. He is the president of the Chambon Foundation, which he founded in 1982. His 1989 documentary Weapons of the Spirit, explored the French Village of Le Chambon during the Nazi occupation, where 5,000 Jews were sheltered by 5,000 Christians. Sauvage and his parents were among the rescued. The Chambon Foundation was the first nonprofit educational foundation committed to communicating the necessary and challenging lessons of hope intertwined with the Holocaust’s unavoidable lessons of despair.

He is currently working on a film about Varian Fry, an American teacher and journalist who traveled to France in August 1940 on behalf of the Emergency Rescue Committee with the assignment of bringing some 200 well-known intellectuals in imminent danger of arrest (including Marc Chagall, Hannah Arendt, and Max Ernst) to safety in the United States.

Sponsored by the Charles P. Scott Center for Spiritual and Religious Life, the Rohatyn Center for International Affairs, the Holocaust Remembrance Film Fund of the Film and Media Culture Department, Middlebury College Hillel, the Religious Life Council, Intervarsity Christian Fellowship, and the Department of Religion

Assistive listening devices will be available.

Clifford Symposium and Axinn Center Dedication

Over the next few days, FMMC will be joining in the dedication of our new home and attending events with a number of scholars highlighting the various disciplines housed in Axinn. The full schedule is online, but here are a few specific events that might interest FMMC students:

Wednesday, October 15

7:30 p.m.
Faculty Panel: “Sites of Memory”
Moderator: Jason Mittell; panelists: Rebecca Bennette, Dan Brayton, Rachael Joo, and Chris Keathley
Location: Axinn 229
A discussion about the relationship between memory and place in literature, art, and culture. This topic is inspired by the transformation of our old library—which was the College’s centennial building in 1900—into a center for literary and cultural studies.


Thursday, October 16

7:30 p.m.
Lecture by Marsha Kinder, of USC’s Labyrinth Project
“Dramatizing the Archive: Contested Sites of Memory and Erasure”
Location: Axinn 232
The Labyrinth Project is an art collective and research initiative on interactive cinema and database narrative at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg Center for Communication. Under the direction of cultural theorist Marsha Kinder, this initiative works at the pressure point between theory and practice. Kinder produces interactive narratives and installations in collaboration with visual artists and writers known for their experimentation with nonlinear forms.



Saturday, October 18

9:30 a.m.
Faculty Panel: “Looking Backwards: Milestones in the Field”
Moderator: Jay Parini; panelists: Leger Grindon, Brett Millier, Paul Monod, and Michael Newbury
Location: Axinn 229
The “greatest hits” in their respective scholarly fields.


AXINN DEDICATION


Saturday, October 18

11 a.m.
Poetry reading by Donald E. Axinn ’51, Litt.D. ’89
Location: Axinn Abernethy RoomNoon
Reception and Dedication
Location: Axinn Winter Garden

1:30 & 3 p.m.
Tour of building with discussion of building history by Professor Glenn Andres

2 p.m.
Screening of student films begins on continuous loop, until evening
Location: Axinn 232

8 p.m.
Reception for “Frostiana” and “Sound Investment”
Location: Axinn Winter Garden

8 p.m.
College Choir performs selections from “Frostiana”
Location: Abernethy Room

8:30 p.m. – 10:00 p.m.
Performance by Sound Investment
Location:  Reading Room

10 p.m. – 1 a.m.
Black and White Ball
Bands: Project DCQ and campus band, Yuzimi
Axinn Lawn


Lecture: John Storey on the Culture of Globalization

On Tuesday, Middlebury welcomes a prominent figure in the world of cultural studies, John Storey. Students who have taken my Theories of Popular Culture course know Storey as the author of the books Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: An Introduction and A Reader. Storey will be presenting a talk on the culture of globalization on Tuesday, Sept. 23, at 4:30 at the Robert A. Jones House. Hope to see some FMMC folks there!

Go see films!

One of the key elements of studying Film and Media Culture is continued exposure to film and media examples – faculty incorporate screenings into our courses to broaden the experiences of students beyond the conventional offerings at the mall, or to rethink how you look at Hollywood cinema. Middlebury has two free weekly film series in Dana Auditorium, and we certainly encourage students to attend as many as they can, as well as welcoming members of the college and town community.

The Friday night series is student run, featuring recent Hollywood hits. This fall’s offerings have a couple of highlights in Wall-E, another in the long line of great Pixar films, and The Dark Knight, an impressive example of blockbuster filmmaking that aims a bit higher than typical.

The FMMC department sponsors the Hirschfield International Film Series on Saturdays at 3 and 8 pm, focusing on independent and international films that are otherwise unlikely to play in Middlebury or Vermont. The flyer is below or downloadable, so please try to make a few screenings to broaden your horizons!

Event: Eric Schlosser lecture, 9/12, 4:30

To kick off the year-long calendar of events, screenings, and lectures, check out Eric Schlosser, Wed 9/12 at 4:30 in Dana Auditorium. Schlosser’s best known as the author of the book Fast Food Nation, but his FMMC connection is that he was one of the producers of the film There Will Be Blood as well as Richard Linklater’s adaptation of Fast Food Nation. Try to go and ask about his adventures in the film world!