Teach cinema to children
“Who is the father of computer?” I asked my 9-year-old niece. “Charles Bab-bage,” she replied promptly. Then I asked her, “And who is the father of cinema?” “What is cinema?” the fourth grader asked me. “It’s the art of films.” The little girl, of course, was soon perplexed. We changed the topic and started talking about ants that had found their way into a cupboard where she had kept her candies. There can never be an art greater than the man’s expression. The first thing that a man learns is the language of his people. The language of other arts is an acquired and a required skill. When I was in school, I also learned about many great personalities and none of them were filmmakers. “Why don’t we teach cinema to children?” It was at this precise moment that the question finally hit me. We have not understood this modern man’s expression yet. There are not many who can ‘read’ films. While old expressions are seriously taught as part of school curriculum, the film history is yet not one of them.
I am not that old but I didn’t discover cinema on television. If anything, the idiot box was just a major distraction until my discovery of the cinematic language came along with my discovery of the p2p and torrents. The Apu Trilogy was my first download, The Bicycle Thief was second. While Ray was a redefinition of what cinema could be, it was Ingmar Bergman’s Persona, his partnership with cinematographer Sven Nykvist that really convinced me that cinema is the art of all arts and one which warrants a serious study like other ‘expressions.’ And I didn’t know whom to thank for the inspiration or the creation of this great art form, for cinema had no such patron deity. Cinema was modern in true sense.
We can teach cinema to children today. The technology that limited the faculty from talking about pictures are no longer an issue. While doing some research for this article, I came across this news report on The Hindu. The Kerala State Chalachitra Academy, for one in India, has taken significant steps to make cinema an integral part of the school curriculum. N.J. Nair reported that the academy has “proposed teaching the aesthetics of cinema, the technical aspects of filmmaking, including cinematography, editing and sound recording, in the vocational higher secondary education.”
“Students should have a serious approach to cinema and they should learn it like literature itself. While appreciating the intrinsic artistic worth of cinema, they should be able to make use of its employment potential too. Hence, we have mooted a serious study of the technical aspects at the higher secondary level,” the academy vice-chairman V.K. Joseph told the newspaper [http://tinyurl.com/m5pa78].
“Why is film history not taught to schoolchildren?” The question must have occurred to many in the later half of the last century. A majority in the country might consider it a ridiculous idea. Some might call it too dangerous a proposition, and rightly so. We are yet to be aware of the scope and impact cinema could have on the impressive minds. What is really stopping us from pursuing this exciting idea is, perhaps then, fear. We are yet to have a real understanding of the power and the perils of the cinematic medium.
Ronald Bergan raised the same question recently on The Guardian blog [http://tinyurl.com/nhnrkv] recently. “Schoolchildren should be taught how to “read” films just as they are taught to read literature,” Bergan said, “They should learn how films systemise time and space and communicate ideas and emotions; how the patterns and structures of film genres allow us to engage specific historical and social rituals; how different conceptions of film history can direct and shape our responses; how film theory is a pragmatic extension and intensification of our interactions with a film, formal, technical and empirical. They should learn how to explore films from different angles and cultural perspectives.”
“The man is only half himself, the other half is his expression.” We are living in an age when the world cinema could be the better half.
[Note: An earlier version of this article was first published in print. As the issue was important, I decided to post it here on PFC as well.]
Anurag Kashyap
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Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
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Salik,
I have thought of this many times, that why in India are children starved of learning about the history of our cinema? Sometimes I dream of initiating a course in film studies by myself, together with some like minded folk who are well versed in different aspects of film making.
Anyways, glad that you wrote about it.
Schoolchildren should be taught how to “read” films just as they are taught to read literature. Very well said and your article is well written. Not only children, we adult should also learn how to explore films from different angles and cultural perspectives. But in a country where film appreciation course are not still part of university academics as a minor part of large syllabus, this is a much long distance dream.
http://passionforcinema.com/understanding-cinema/
And cinema made for children is completely in mess, children’s Film Society, India (CFSI) is in sleping mode. DD national channels have done more than fair share of their job , but all private channels are just feeding us disney products having different aesthetics values. Regarding teaching it as a part of school, most of educationist consider it as silly idea. They either enjoy themselves Ray and Ghatak for intellectual broadmindening but consider it as a dangerous a proposition. Film education is necessary as cinema is just more than a tool enjoyment. It is a experience; a treat for all ages.
Right!
There must be an optional from class-9 onwards.We could allow children to learn either literature or Cinema…
For example, English paper could be in two parts, one, a compulsary grammar and english awareness. The second one an elective between English literature / Study of Cinema…
Wow.. I just imagined sitting in the school chapel, watching a film, while a teacher explains the camera angles, lighting and the editing concepts.. Lip-smacking prospect..
While the concept is just and valid, it would take a lot of time and effort to get something like this brought in.there are lots of hindrances like-
1. Mindset of the people- radical change needed
2. Requirement of teaching staff- how many people would be qualified to actually “teach cinema”?going by the no.of schools- the number is mindboggling.
3. Resources- not all schools would be willing to invest in what is required for the same.
But all said and done an awareness or a movement must start for the same.Hopefully posts like these will make more & more people think on these lines.
salik
yes. we don’t have tradition to teach film history in school.
In some schools there are subjects like journalism and mass communicaiton. But focus is on journalism. They might be some information on history of film and cinema. But they don’t tell how to read cinema. That means they are not for making students critical towards cinema or any texts. thanks for writing.
Its hard that small children can comprehend anything related to arts at such a tender age.
We as a human beings mature with age and its our maturity and experience with some artistic bent inside our mind makes it possible to value all the artistic things in this universe under which cinema comes. It would be good to start some institutions to teach this form of art but those would be hardly beneficial to teach cinema to small children as suggested by you.
I agree and I do.Yes I do teach cinema in school for kids as young as 3 year olds to as old as 13. And the medium has given us the opportunity to be part of the Hyderabad film festival by Children Film Society as part of the delegates and jury!
But the problem faced is…WHERE are the movies we want to show our kids? We have dearth in the availability of these movies.
How about all those interested in keeping this idea alive help me by sending names of the movies we can show to the kids and what would they pick up from that movie?
Hoping to get responses soon
Some useful links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_children%27s_films
http://www.filmsite.org/100kidsfilms.html
http://www.filmsite.org/100kidsfilms2.html