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Asian Unit 3

Exploring the Indonesian Mass Killings via Documentary

 

Name: Helen Ditouras

College: Schoolcraft College

Discipline: English

Module Title: Exploring the Indonesian Mass Killings via Documentary

Narrative Description of the Module: This module focuses on samples of documentary film and the subsequent narratives and testimonies from those impacted by the Indonesian Mass Killings of 1965-66. The point of interest will be the way in which the genre of documentary shapes the narrative process AND problematizes the transmission/representation of the experiences and suffering of those affected by the killings.

Educational Objectives of the Module
  1. Explain the importance of popular culture in engaging with the global community.
  2. Validate the potency of popular culture as an aid in discovering, transforming, and instilling values in individuals and society.
  3. Demonstrate how popular culture can promote and undermine global social justice.
  4. Examine efforts to represent victims of genocide via narrative.
Detailed outline of main themes (with accompanying content notes) to be included in the Lectures/Discussions Used to Implement the Module
This module will include mostly film media in the form of documentaries and the mass killings themed readings. Several power points will be included that cover the Indonesian mass killings, documentary as a genre, and rhetorical form in documentary film.
Listing of Audio-Visuals Used to Implement the Module (provide electronic links to sites where they can be accessed)
  1. Screenings: The Act of Killing (2012), The Look of Silence (2014)
  2. 40 Years of Silence (2009), Shadow Play: Indonesia’s Year of Living Dangerously (2003); Worse Than War (2009)
  3. PowerPoints
    1. Rhetorical Form in Documentary PPT
    2. Indonesia and the Mass Killings of 1965-1966 PPT
    3. Teaching the Indonesian Mass Killings via Documentary PPT
Student Readings (links to sites where readings can be accessed electronically or by purchase)
  1. Worse than War (Daniel Goldhagen)
  2. Regarding the Pain of Others (Susan Sontag)
  3. Robert Cribb 'The Indonesian Massacres', in Samuel Totten & William S Parsons (ed.), Century of Genocide (3rd ed), Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, New York, pp. 235-262.
  4. Reflective journal writing
Student Evaluation/Testing Regarding the Module
  1. Multiple Choice quiz on the genre of documentary
  2. Summary and analysis of film criticism
Resources (Bibliography) Used to Develop-Implement the Module
  1. Anderson, Benedict, and Ruth T. McVey. A Preliminary Analysis of the October 1st, 1965 Coup in Indonesia. Equinox Publishing, 2009 (Reprint).
  2. Cribb, Robert 2014, 'Film review: The Act of Killing', Critical Asian Studies, vol. 46, no. 1, pp. 147-149.
  3. Cribb, R 2010, 'Political Genocides in Postcolonial Asia', in Donald Bloxham & A. Dirk Moses (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Genocide Studies, Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, pp. 445-65.
  4. Cribb, R 2010, Gangsters and revolutionaries of Jakarta 1945-1949 (Para jago dan kaum revolusioner Jakarta 1945-1949), Mapus Jakarta, Indonesia.
  5. Cribb, R & Coppel, C 2009, 'A genocide that never was: explaining the myth of anti-Chinese massacres in Indonesia, 1965-66', Journal of Genocide Research, vol. 11, no. 4, pp. 447-465.
  6. Cribb, R 2008, 'The Indonesian Massacres', in Samuel Totten & William S Parsons (ed.), Century of Genocide (3rd ed), Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, New York, pp. 235-262.
  7. Crouch, Harold. Political Reform in Indonesia after Soeharto. Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2010.
  8. Hefner, Robert W. The Political Economy of Mountain Java. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990.
  9. Kammen, Douglas, and Katharine McGregor, eds. The Contours of Mass Violence in Indonesia, 1965-68. Nias Press, 2012.
  10. Kollantai, Pauline. "Emotional intelligence in higher education: using art in a philosophical discussion on God, evil and suffering." Research in Education 93 (2015): 66-76. Print.
  11. Perera, Suvendrini. "'They Give Evidence': Bodies, Borders and the Disappeared." Social Identities 12.6 (2006): 637-56. Print.
  12. Rabinowitz, Paula. "Wreckage upon Wreckage: History, Documentary and the Ruins of Memory."History and Theory 32.2 (1993): 119-37. Print.
  13. Robinson, Geoffrey. The Dark Side of Paradise: Political Violence in Bali. Cornell University Press, 1998 (Reprint).
  14. Strange, Carolyn, & Cribb, Robert, 2014, 'Historical perspectives on honour, violence and emotion', in (ed.), Honour, Violence and Emotions in History, Bloomsbury, London, pp. 1-22.
  15. Tyson, Adam. "Genocide documentary as intervention." Journal of Genocide Research 17.2 (2015): 177-99. Print.
  16. Waterson, Roxana. "Trajectories of Memory: Documentary Film and the Transmission of Testimony."History and Anthropology 18.1 (2007): 51-73. Print.
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