As a film enthusiast, Honors American Literature (HAmLit) teacher Vennessa Nava has always incorporated films and different media into the HAmLit curriculum. She believes exploring different forms of media, or ‘text,’ not only strengthens understanding of themes but is also more applicable to students’ lives today.
“I say text with air quotes around it because I think that for a modern person living in society, we’re not just reading words on the page anymore,” Nava said. “We’re encountering all these different kinds of media, whether it’s just podcasts or film or just little clips. Instagram and TikTok and those kinds of media are very visual in nature, and I think it’s a more engaging way to go about accessing the same kinds of concepts.”
In order to give her students the skills they need to properly consume media in everyday lives, Nava explores a variety of films that reflect the critical lenses and themes explored in the class such Marxist and Post-Colonial. She says in past years, especially during the pandemic, the HAmLit teachers created a supplementary optional “film club” where students could watch different films such as “Parasite” and “Moonlight” to supplement the texts discussed in class.
Recently, HamLit has utilized the 2019 film “Us,” a psychological horror film where a family faces terrifying doppelgängers, revealing a deeper commentary on identity, privilege and societal division. The film is used to complement the social class critiques within The Great Gatsby, a core text in the HAmLit curriculum, as well as introduce more explicit aspects of race and class. Senior and former HAmLit student Ridwan Khan believes that watching “Us” was a way for students to recognize the importance of what they were learning.
“It showed a worst-case scenario if we don’t pay attention to critical race theory, and that really helped us understand the magnitude of why it was important,” Khan said. “By showing that through a world of fiction, it shows the potential ramifications in real life and it tells us to care more about that.”
Other literature classes such as American Literature also use media to supplement readings. American Literature student and junior Lauren Moore agrees that watching films emphasizes themes taught in class, adding that the visual elements of film and media make plotlines and symbols more hard-hitting. For example, the symbolism and depth of luxury in “The Great Gatsby” became more apparent to her while watching the movie version of the novel in class. Although there are sometimes inaccuracies in movie adaptations of classical literature, Moore believes they can still hold value in helping students understand themes through analyzing visual choices made by the filmmaker.
“It really helps to understand the media in multiple different senses, being able to see facial expressions and truly capture what the characters were feeling through visual means,” Moore said. “In ‘The Great Gatsby,’ symbolism is humongous, including stuff like colors and conditions — such as if something’s really pristine or something’s really worn down. It’s not shown as much in the book so I feel like the movie helped me to see the symbolism a lot more.”
Both Moore and Khan believe that watching films related to in-class texts adds an additional layer of understanding of the themes that sometimes the text could not offer. For example, Moore notes how watching movies can help clarify any confusion as a result of confusing dialogue due to characters’ accents in the book. According to Moore, watching a film often clarifies the text by adding a visual element, especially helping students who are not as fond of reading. Khan agrees with this sentiment, adding that being able to “view” the text creates a deeper level of understanding which he has seen in his current AP Literature class.
“I know this year, we’re watching an episode of ‘Black Mirror’ to try to explain the concept of social media and its effects,” Khan said. “It really exaggerates what’s actually going on in the text and makes it easier for us to understand and visualize. It’s really engaging and really helps to grasp the topic.”
Nava is a strong proponent of utilizing more media in curriculum, but notes that it does have its downsides if it is not effectively used to enhance the learning experience in class. She describes how using movies as supplementary material isn’t actually effective if the class simply just watches the movie. It is more about combining movies with the themes in the text and unpacking them to bring out the intellectual rigor. She described how some students were repulsed from watching “Us” solely because of its horror genre, but other than that, she had received overwhelmingly positive responses to the movies she played in class.
“After we started using film as literature and interpreting it, students would repeatedly tell me, ‘I can’t watch films in the same way anymore, because I’m starting to see a bunch of stuff that I didn’t see before,’” Nava said. “That’s my goal as a teacher. I want to give students a skillset that they can leave the classroom with and apply in the world around them. So hopefully they’re getting more and more out of the films they watch in class.”
