Hollywood and Africa: Case Studies in Filmic Representation

This course on Hollywood films about Africa—from classics such as 'African Queen' (East Africa), 'Tarzan' (Equatorial Africa) and 'Out of Africa' (Kenya) to recent productions such as 'Blood Diamond' (Sierra Leone), 'The Last King of Scotland' (Uganda), 'Lord of War' (arms trade), 'The Constant Gardner' (Kenya) and 'Black Hawk Down' (Somalia)—will tack back and forth between filmic representation and case study, using the latter to critique the former. As contrastive material, the class will also draw on non-Hollywood films about Africa, for example 'Hotel Rwanda' (Rwanda) or 'Lumumba' (DRC).