Making Meaning: Inference and Rhetoric in the Interpretation of Cinema by David

Description: Making Meaning by David Bordwell With this book, the author provides a history of film criticism and an analysis of how critics interpret film as well as a proposal for an alternative programme of film studies. FORMAT Paperback LANGUAGE English CONDITION Brand New Publisher Description David Bordwells new book is at once a history of film criticism, an analysis of how critics interpret film, and a proposal for an alternative program for film studies. It is an anatomy of film criticism meant to reset the agenda for film scholarship. As such Making Meaning should be a landmark book, a focus for debate from which future film study will evolve.Bordwell systematically maps different strategies for interpreting films and making meaning, illustrating his points with a vast array of examples from Western film criticism. Following an introductory chapter that sets out the terms and scope of the argument, Bordwell goes on to show how critical institutions constrain and contain the very practices they promote, and how the interpretation of texts has become a central preoccupation of the humanities. He gives lucid accounts of the development of film criticism in France, Britain, and the United States since World War II; analyzes this development through two important types of criticism, thematic-explicatory and symptomatic; and shows that both types, usually seen as antithetical, in fact have much in common. These diverse and even warring schools of criticism share conventional, rhetorical, and problem-solving techniques-a point that has broad-ranging implications for the way critics practice their art. The book concludes with a survey of the alternatives to criticism based on interpretation and, finally, with the proposal that a historical poetics of cinema offers the most fruitful framework for film analysis. Notes A new book by David Bordwell is always an event. The wealth of examples, the sharp prose and vividness of his presentation give his writing force and persuasiveness. -- Thomas Elsaesser Author Biography David Bordwell is Jacques Ledoux Professor of Film Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Table of Contents Part 1 Making films mean: interpretation as construction; meaning made; interpretive doctrines. Part 2 Routines and practices: Interpretation, Inc; the logic of discovery, or, problem-solving; the logic of justification, or, rhetoric; an anatomy of interpretation. Part 3 Interpretation as explication: the French connection; explication academicized; picture planes; meaning and unity. Part 4 Symptomatic interpretation: culture, dream, and Lauren Bacall; myth as antinomy; systeme a la mode; the contradictory text; symptoms and explications. Part 5 Semantic fields: meanings in structures; structures of meaning; the role of semantic fields. Part 6 Schemata and heuristics: mapping as making; knowledge structures and routines; mapping as modeling. Part 7 Two basic schemata: is there a class for this text?; making films personal. Part 8 Text schemata: a bulls-eye schema; meaning, inside out and outside in; textual trajectories; doctrines into diachronies. Part 9 Interpretation as rhetoric: sample strategies; theory talk. Part 10 Rhetoric in action - seven models of "Psycho": "Hitch and his public" (1960), Jean Duochet; "Psycho", Hitchcocks films (1965), Robin Wood; "inside Norman Bates", films and feelings (1967), Raymond Durgnat; "the world and its image", film as film (1972), V.F. Perkins; "psychosis, neurosis, perversion" (1979), Raymond Bellour; "Psycho - the instiutionalization of female sexuality" (1982), Barbara Klinger; "links in a chain - Psycho and film classicism" (1986), Leland Poague. Part 11 Why not read a film: the ends of interpretation; the end of interpretation?; prospects for a poetics. Review Its hard to avoid superlatives when talking about David Bordwells work. Let me simply say that here is a book which, for lucidity, breadth, erudition, and rigor, only he could have written. It addresses and analyzes interpretive practice in a way that only the most self-absorbed critic can ignore, and then only at his or her own risk. -- Seymour Chatman * Film Quarterly *Making Meaning is a startling and important book. -- Barry Salt * Sight & Sound *[Bordwell] approaches the issue with his characteristically refreshing candor, clarity, and wit, proceeding from the direct question, How do film interpreters actually come up with the meanings at which they arrive? …The controversies sure to be ignited by Making Meaning, in the short run, will be anything but dull; in the long run, its contributions to the development of film poetics will be of even greater import. -- Herb Eagle * Wide Angle *An A-list historian and theorist himself, Bordwell is the unchallenged capo di tutti capi of academic film studies… His industrial-strength overview is a streamlined and steady Eurail pass through the Continental modes of thought that have dominated the American university since the late 60s. -- Thomas Doherty * Boston Phoenix Literary Supplement *A new book by David Bordwell is always an event. The wealth of examples, the sharp prose and vividness of his presentation give his writing force and persuasiveness. -- Thomas Elsaesser Promotional A new book by David Bordwell is always an event. The wealth of examples, the sharp prose and vividness of his presentation give his writing force and persuasiveness. -- Thomas Elsaesser Review Quote Making Meaning is a startling and important book. Details ISBN067454336X Author David Bordwell Publisher Harvard University Press Series Harvard Film Studies Language English ISBN-10 067454336X ISBN-13 9780674543362 Media Book Format Paperback Series Number 0000 Year 1991 Imprint Harvard University Press Place of Publication Cambridge, Mass Country of Publication United States DEWEY 791.43015 Illustrations 13 line illustrations Subtitle Inference and Rhetoric in the Interpretation of Cinema Short Title MAKING MEANING REV/E Edition Description Revised Pages 352 DOI 10.1604/9780674543362 UK Release Date 1991-10-01 AU Release Date 1991-10-01 NZ Release Date 1991-10-01 US Release Date 1991-10-01 Publication Date 1991-10-01 Audience Professional & Vocational We've got this At The Nile, if you're looking for it, we've got it. With fast shipping, low prices, friendly service and well over a million items - you're bound to find what you want, at a price you'll love! TheNile_Item_ID:161738945;

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