| Dear Student:
As the coordinators of the 2005 Common Reading and Viewing Experience, we would like to welcome you to the Emerson community and take this opportunity to give you some information about the book and the film that we will be discussing in groups beginning September 12, and about which you will write your first college essay.
The purpose of the Common Reading and Viewing Experience is twofold. First, we would like to introduce you to the intellectual work of Emerson College, in which critical thinking, close-reading, and argument are central. Second, we would like to identify what makes that process particularly Emersonian: the pleasure of not only reading about or seeing great works, but also, making our own.
This year’s CRVE theme is Enacting Freedom and it centers on Gillo Pontecorvo’s award-winning feature film, The Battle of Algiers, and one of existentialism’s famed works, Camus’s novel The Stranger. Through these two works we ask students to engage with the question of the role of the individual in political change. When is an individual understood as a democratic freedom fighter? And when is she or he understood as a terrorist? Is inaction a political act? What are the limits of freedom fighting? Where are the ethical lines drawn? Although the film and the novel take place at a different time and place, Algeria in the 1940s and 1950s, they offer an eerily familiar history lesson to current world events.
Like the novelist and the director of the film, we are sure that most of you have your own interpretations of what freedom is and how one should enact it. To help you organize these thoughts, introduce you to the Emerson classroom, and give you an idea of what we will be doing in classroom discussions beginning September 12, we offer the following suggestions about the reading and the viewing process.
As you read The Stranger, underline the parts that you like the most. Think about why you like them—is it the portrayal of the characters? The themes? Find out what techniques Camus employs to get you interested in the story. Underline also the historical/philosophical/political references that you did you not understand and research them in order to get your answers
As you are viewing the film on the night of the 8th of September, think about your reactions and in which parts of the film you have them. Write down what you liked and what you did not understand in it. Is it the historical context? The themes? The political representations?
In general, reflect on what you think are the political and cultural lessons offered by these two quite different works and what informs your comprehension of them.
Together we will create a common reading and viewing experience. We look forward to meeting you in September.
Sincerely,
Dr Maria Koundoura, Writing, Literature, and Publishing
Dr Jane Shattuc, Visual and Media Arts
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