My experience is that that was everyday life in the 60s; we were also
suspicious of the word "adult" back then (and I'm still suspicious of it);
instead, at least at NSCAD, we were pretty much all students/artists/
learners/experiments/etc. and hopefully still are -
- Alan
On Sat, 2 Jan 2016, Gene Youngblood wrote:
This is a thoughtful and ?adult? response, Scott. May I remind us that students
and faculty at Calarts began swimming nude together the first day of class
(if not before, during registration) when the school opened in the fall of
1970 at the temporary campus, Villa Cabrini in Burbank, and that ?tradition?
continued for many years at the permanent campus in Valencia. Naked together
every day for years. l don?t trust anyone who thinks that?s outrageous.
In the interest of social control we?re supposed to think that the sixties
were ?about? war and protest and assassinations, with sex, drugs and
rock-and-roll as colorful background, nothing more. In my memoir-in-progress
I argue that the countercultural moment was also, and more importantly,
about cultural autonomy. Who is and is not ?adult,? what is and is not
?outrageous,?
are functions of cultural autonomy, or lack of it, in our socialization. It
begs the immemorial question, more relevant today than ever, who gets to
control the social construction of realities at politically relevant scale?
On Jan 2, 2016, at 6:19 AM, <sc...@financialcleansing.com>
<sc...@financialcleansing.com> wrote:
Dear Chuck et al,
The late-Sixties-early-Seventies were (of course) an unusual and
complex moment. From our perspective now, some of what went on back
then (at Binghamton and in other places--think of the legendary nude
faculty-student get-together at the San Francisco Art Institute!) can
seem outrageous--and perhaps to some extent was outrageous, as certain
"Voices" in the "Weave" of Binghamton Babylon make evident.
But it is also true that that generation of students certainly saw
themselves as adults and expected to be taken seriously as adults. As
various other "Voices" make clear, this included the expectation that
they were equals sexually as well as politically. Even Nixon
understood that if 18-and 19-year old young men were expected to put
their lives in jeopardy in Vietnam--or put their freedom in jeopardy
by refusing to serve in the military--then, 18-19-20-year olds should
be able to drink a beer, and by extension function as full and equal
adults in other ways as well.
The assumption that the men and women in the Cinema Department were
adults, equal to their teachers as human beings (if not yet as
accomplished intellectuals or artists), seems fully a part of the
energy of that department at that moment and part of what allowed the
Cinema Department to have powerful long-range effects.
Only one person refused to be interviewed for Binghamton Babylon. I
was unable to track down a number of other folks whose input I had
hoped for.
Scott
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [Frameworks] Noteworthy Publications This
Year?
From: Chuck Kleinhans <chuck...@northwestern.edu>
Date: Wed, December 30, 2015 12:41 pm
To: Experimental Film Discussion List
<frameworks@jonasmekasfilms.com>
On Dec 29, 2015, at 6:15 PM, David Baker
<dbak...@hvc.rr.com> wrote:
Scott MacDonald's revelatory, BINGHAMTON BABYLON:
VOICES FROM THE CINEMA DEPARTMENT 1967-1977
Among the ?revelations? are many references to (male) faculty having
sexual encounters with (usually female) students, and other
hanky-panky, in addition to drug and alcohol use/abuse. It
seems to me this is the first real discussion of these sorts of
events in the experimental film world. (well, historians have
sometimes touched on this for the distant past, but most of the
people here are still around).
I wonder how both people of that generation and the Millennial
generation take these details. A hidden history? More of the
same-old, same-old? Really dangerous under Title IX today (US
law giving women equal access to education)?
MacDonald mentions that a fair number of people did not want to
be interviewed, and there are very few women who are quoted.
Reluctant to drag up old baggage?
It?s interesting that for all the ?taboo breaking? poses of the avant
garde, sexual politics of personal relations within the
community are seldom discussed (with an exception for some gay
filmmakers).
Chuck Kleinhans
____________________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________
FrameWorks mailing list
FrameWorks@jonasmekasfilms.com
https://mailman-mail5.webfaction.com/listinfo/frameworks
_______________________________________________
FrameWorks mailing list
FrameWorks@jonasmekasfilms.com
https://mailman-mail5.webfaction.com/listinfo/frameworks
==
email archive http://sondheim.rupamsunyata.org/
web http://www.alansondheim.org / cell 718-813-3285
music: http://www.espdisk.com/alansondheim/
current text http://www.alansondheim.org/tp.txt
==
_______________________________________________
FrameWorks mailing list
FrameWorks@jonasmekasfilms.com
https://mailman-mail5.webfaction.com/listinfo/frameworks
