Masterclass: “The invalids of the First World War on the screen – France, Germany and Russia”

As part of the teaching and research programme 2014–2016 at the Centre interdisciplinaire d’études et de recherches sur l’Allemagne (CIERA) the project “SantéFilm: Information, Persuasion, Propaganda. The medical and health film as a means of communication between science, medecine, public sphere and society in France, Germany and Russia/the USSR 1900–1980” organizes in collaboration with the projects RhinFilm and Medfilm a masterclass under the title: “The invalids of the First World War on the screen – France, Germany and Russia”.

Organisation: In the seminar students as well as international specialists are given the opportunity to examine the below questions on the basis of archival films of french, german and russian origin. These films made during the First World War should be watched before the Seminar (available on the teaching platform MEDFILM, medfilm.unistra.fr) and will serve as common ground for discussion and analysis. The seminar takes place between 10 and 17 ‘o clock at the MISHA in Strasbourg. It is open to students, that are not part of the university of Strasbourg upon application with the organising team. External applications can benefit from a refunding of travel costs. The application for this should be accompanied with a motivation letter (max. 1 page), also to be addressed to the organising team.

Questions: Among the victims of the First World War it was the invalids that most shaped the public opinion. In France, but also in Germany and Russia, the “gueules cassés”, the shell-shock victims and the soldiers mutilated in the war have mobilised civil society, inspired artists … – and often they also drove the association of veterans. Military medicine has achieved enormous progress in the years from 1914 to 1918. The bodies of the young men that went to the front in the best of health, have offered an immense field of experimentation to medical science.

In the already old tradition of the medical and health film physical just as mental injuries were captured by the camera, the inventions and discoveries of science were projected on the silver screens of all countries. The combat against the enemy on the field of medicine – disease and death – is subject to a film propaganda just as intense as the combat on the battlefields.

How is the trial that is put on bodies and minds by mechanised war filmed in France, Germany and Russia? How does promotion of the establishment of efficient sanitary systems, whose aim it is to send a maximum of injured back to the front work on the western and the eastern fronts? How does film allow to restore the social status of mutilated humans, that can only be helped by medicine in the most provisional ways?

To answer these questions Laurent Véray, Bregt Lameris (conditionally), Christian Bonah, Philipp Osten (conditionally), Philipp Stiasny (conditionally) and Alexandre Sumpf will present and analyse dailies, newsreels and documentaries from this epoch, that are kept in the French (ECPAD), German (BAFA) and Russian (RGAKFD) archives and are rarely screened.

Files:
• Appel_a_candidature_seminaire_Invalides_12_2014.pdf  (519 ko)