Back when I taught intro to Environmental Science I had the class watch the Grapes of Wrath to demonstrate the socioeconomic impacts of environmental mis-management combined with climate change. I also had them watch Soylent Green.
It went over suprisingly well and my approach was pretty simple. I told them what kinds of things to look for in the movie and to make a list of the socioeconomic impacts. I did a similar thing with SG. The interesting thing about SOylent Green is that it came out back in the 60s and was lambasted for suggesting that we would have to do things like "Buy Water." I point out to them that the movie was highly criticized, and then asked them to list off the things in the movie that are now true. Its actually kind of eerie (sp?). I don't know that these were very good "content based" assignments, but the students did gain appreciation for the problems and what could result. My students were Freshman at a community college, so I would expect you could use a much more challenging and effective approach in your situation. Often, I was just trying to get the students to write in paragraphs and complete sentences. On Wed, September 26, 2007 8:16 am, Dr. Gary Grossman wrote: > Dear Colleagues, > At some point in my career I'd like to teach a moderately, large > non-majors > oriented course, delineating basic concepts in ecology and resource > management, via film, art and literature. One idea would be to have the > film, etc. illustrate the point which could then be reinforced via a book > chapter or edited journal article so that they would be understandable by > non-majors. Does anyone teach a course like this? If you do, would you > mind sharing your materials? If you don't but have ideas about specific > films, short stories, paintings, sculptures, etc. please let me know and > please also tell us why you would chose that work (i.e. what concept it > illustrates). I have a pretty good background in the visual arts, so help > with literature and film would be appreciated. As an example of what I'm > looking for, I would use the film Dersu Uzala by Kurasawa to illustrate > the > role of humans relationship to nature. Thanks for your help. g2 > > -- > Gary D. Grossman > > Distinguished Research Professor - Animal Ecology > Warnell School of Forestry & Natural Resources > University of Georgia > Athens, GA, USA 30602 > > http://www.arches.uga.edu/~grossman > > Board of Editors - Animal Biodiversity and Conservation > Editorial Board - Freshwater Biology > Editorial Board - Ecology Freshwater Fish > Malcolm L. McCallum Assistant Professor of Biology Editor Herpetological Conservation and Biology http://www.herpconbio.org [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
