Explorations in New Cinema History: Approaches and Case Studies

Explorations in New Cinema History brings together cutting-edge research by the leading scholars in the field to identify new approaches to writing and understanding the social and cultural history of cinema, focusing on cinema’s audiences, the experience of cinema, and the cinema as a site of social and cultural exchange. Includes contributions from Robert Allen, Annette Kuhn, John Sedwick, Mark Jancovich, Peter Sanfield, and Kathryn Fuller-Seeley among others Develops the original argument that the social history of cinema-going and of the experience of cinema should take precedence over production- and text-based analyses Explores the cinema as a site of social and cultural exchange, including patterns of popularity and taste, the role of individual movie theatres in creating and sustaining their audiences, and the commercial, political and legal aspects of film exhibition and distribution Prompts readers to reassess their understanding of key periods of cinema history, opening up cinema studies to long-overdue conversations with other disciplines in the humanities and social sciences Presents rigorous empirical research, drawing on digital technology and geospatial information systems to provide illuminating insights in to the uses of cinema

Table of Contents:
Notes on Contributors. Acknowledgements. Part 1 Mapping Cinema Experiences. 1 New Cinema Histories (Richard Maltby). 2 Reimagining the History of the Experience of Cinema in a Post-Moviegoing Age (Robert C. Allen). 3 Putting Cinema History on the Map: Using GIS to Explore the Spatiality of Cinema (Jeffrey Klenotic). 4 What to do with Cinema Memory? (Annette Kuhn). Part 2 Distribution, Programming and Audiences. 5 Social Class, Experiences of Distinction and Cinema in Postwar Ghent (Daniel Biltereyst, Philippe Meers and Lies Van de Vijver). 6 Distribution and Exhibition in The Netherlands, 1934–1936 (Clara Pafort-Overduin). 7 Patterns in First-Run and Suburban Filmgoing in Sydney in the mid-1930s (John Sedgwick). 8 From Hollywood to the Garden Suburb (and Back to Hollywood): Exhibition and Distribution in Australia (Mike Walsh). 9 Hollywood and its Global Audiences: A Comparative Study of the Biggest Box Office Hits in the United States and Outside the United States Since the 1970s (Peter Krämer). 10 Blindsiding: Theatre Owners, Political Action and Industrial Change in Hollywood, 1975–1985 (Deron Overpeck). Part 3 Venues and their Publics. 11 ‘No Hits, No Runs, Just Terrors’: Exhibition, Cultural Distinctions and Cult Audiences at the Rialto Cinema in the 1930s and 1940s (Tim Snelson and Mark Jancovich). 12 Going Underground with Manny Farber and Jonas Mekas: New York’s Subterranean Film Culture in the 1950s and 1960s (Peter Stanfield). 13 Searching for the Apollo: Black Moviegoing and its Contexts in the Small-Town US South (Arthur Knight). 14 Film Distribution in the Diaspora: Temporality, Community and National Cinema (Deb Verhoeven). Part 4 Cinema, Modernity and the Local. 15 The Social Biograph: Newspapers as Archives of the Regional Mass Market for Movies (Paul S. Moore). 16 Modernity for Small Town Tastes: Movies at the 1907 Cooperstown, New York, Centennial (Kathryn Fuller-Seeley). 17 Silent Film Genre, Exhibition and Audiences in South India (Stephen Putnam Hughes). 18 The Last Bemboka Picture Show: 16 mm Cinema as Rural Community Fundraiser in the 1950s (Kate Bowles). Index.

About the Author :
Richard Maltby is Professor of Screen Studies and Executive Dean of the Faculty of Education, Humanities and Law at Flinders University, South Australia. He has written and edited several books and articles on cinema history, including Hollywood Cinema (Blackwell, 2003). Daniel Biltereyst is Professor in Film and Media Studies at Ghent University, Belgium, and has written widely on the subject of film culture and controversy in the public sphere. Philippe Meers is Associate Professor in Film and Media Studies at the University of Antwerp, Belgium. He has published variedly on historical and contemporary cinema culture and audiences.

Review :
"Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty." (Choice, 1 November 2011)