BFFS and the Charter for Media Literacy

BFFS is a signatory of the Charter for Media Literacy, launched in 2005 (more details here), and an active participant in the Associate Parliamentary Media Literacy Group (APMLG). We do however take issue with some perceptions about how what we do on your behalf is reflected in the Charter, and this page analyses the issue in some detail.

Introduction

The Charter for Media Literacy, launched in 2005, forms the basis for current media policy thinking and will determine public policy that affects the film society movement for the next few years. Central to the Charter is the proposition that ‘every UK citizen of any age should have opportunities, in both formal and informal education, to develop the skills and knowledge necessary to increase their enjoyment, understanding and exploration of the media’. It asserts that media literate people should be able to

  • gain access to, and make informed choice about, a wide range of media forms and content from different cultural and institutional sources – cultural access
  • analyse critically the techniques, languages and conventions used by the media and the messages they convey – critical understanding
  • use media creatively to express and communicate ideas information and opinions – creative activity.
These are the ‘3 Cs’.

This framework has been adopted by a number of public bodies. The Associate Parliamentary Media Literacy Group bases its approach on Ofcom’s derivation of the framework, and bfi has based its current and ongoing film education audit on it.It is necessary therefore to review the contribution of the film society movement to the 3 Cs, to establish whether they accurately reflect what we do.

Film societies and the 3 Cs – the argument

Cultural access to film
  • It is generally agreed that film societies enable cultural access, but then, so do cineplexes. BFFS asserts that they enable a qualitatively superior cultural access in the following ways:
    • commercial cinema restricts the distribution of cultural films to the population, but film societies extend that distribution
    • film societies do not need to satisfy commercial criteria to operate and can function in small and remote communities
    • film societies actively enable cultural access by placing informed choice as a collective process at the heart of their operation
    • the film society movement actively promulgates diversity of taste and adventurous programming, and this is supported by a lower risk factor
  • The film society movement offers contextual advantages to this cultural access, as
    • it enables inclusion of communities disadvantaged by size, location or ethnicity which are not provided for commercially
    • it supports and develops voluntary activists which ensures continuity of provision
    • it recognises and subscribes to the values of a cultural tradition
    • it offers safe, local, community-based access to film in which lone women, for example, can feel comfortable.
  • The film society movement explicitly sets out to integrate educational opportunities into cultural access
    • most film societies issue programme notes
    • many film societies feature introductions to films, or dedicated educational events
    • BFFS offers educational events within BFFS regions (e.g. Screen Yorkshire Film Weekends) open to all film society members
    • all film society members are able to make programming suggestions, which require self-education.
Critical understanding

  • This is a fundamentally problematic concept, as it can be (and often is) taken to signify subscription to a critically accepted reading. The essentially technical rubric for the process of critical understanding conveyed in the Charter for Media Literacy evades this issue, but for film societies it touches on an underlying principle, namely, that there are as many correct readings of a film as there are people in the audience.
  • Equally problematic is the reliance within the film society movement on informal self-education as a fundamental dynamic, as
    • the process is difficult to measure, making it harder to mount an evidence-based case for funding in the current climate
    • there is no requirement for institutional involvement, and therefore no opportunity for standard-setting and measurement
    • all learning trajectories are individual and internal, and are of value for that reason
    • the process is entirely learner-controlled.
  • However, there is considerable anecdotal evidence for
    • the development of critical skills among film society audiences
    • an evident willingness to exercise those skills, but not in formal contexts
    • an evident desire to extend the skills
    • a general process by which participants develop in confidence, awareness and capability in the exercise of these skills within the nurturing environment of the film society
  • There is a body of theoretical work which can explain why film societies offer a channel of media literacy development for people who would otherwise be excluded from this process. Examples would include:
    • Bourdieu, in Distinction (1979), discusses the ‘particularities of a heretical mode of aquisition’ in relation to autodidacts (328), whom he regards as victims ‘by default of the effects of educational entitlement’. These ‘victims by default’ are in fact victims of an education system which has for far too many years excluded consideration of film: they are the people who have decided to do something about it.
    • De Certeau, in The Practice of Everyday Life (1984), identifies tactics by which the economically weak bypass power and authority structures in order to describe their own ‘trajectories’ through the cultural maze. Film societies can be seen as a collaborative means of achieving this.
    • There is a broad consensus in audience and film reception studies (e.g. Staiger, Interpreting Films, 1992) that most assumptions about audiences and their behaviour are questionable (this would include those made by academics and policy developers), and that there is a need for considerable research into the operation of film and television culture, at the group and individual level.
  • BFFS therefore asserts the need for research into the learning processes enabled by film societies, to establish whether they do in fact produce ‘critical understanding’, and if so, of what kind. It is preparing a prima facie case that it is a key enabling body for the development of these qualities among the dispersed adult population outside cities, and is seeking funding to test the hypothesis, in order to identify which processes are enabled and supported in the film society environment, and to develop good practice at the local, regional and national level to recognise, nurture and enhance those processes.
Creative activity

Again the charter rubric establishes technical criteria for what constitutes ‘creative activity’ – as in ‘using the media’.

  • There is some evidence of enablement by digital technology resulting directly in film-making by film society members. In general however the influencing process is less directly demonstrable, with individuals undertaking film-watching and film-making in different segments or at different times in their lives. Nevertheless, many film makers tell of inspiration drawn from film society viewings. And in many localities, film societies are the only agency of access to films likely to provide such inspiration.
  • However it is narrow and misleading to restrict the creative processes associated with film to the technical processes of film production. Staiger (1992, see above) discusses reading theory at length, and all possible models posit (i) creative engagement of the reader in the reading process and (ii) prior experience of the reader as a formative element in that process. Thus film culture (like television culture) is a rich and widespread source of creative engagement with narrative in UK culture.
Further considerations
  • Film offers access to a diverse range of cultural values and experiences. Much of the creative engagement with narrative offered by film societies is in the context of ‘world cinema’, which characteristically presents viewers with at the same time a revelation of cultural diversity and an insight into common humanity. Thus the ‘creative activity’ of interpretation is modulated by an enlightening liberal impulse, within the context of a process that consists in part of a progression from cultural access to critical awareness, and in part a subscription to a value-system which fuels the progression process.
  • It must be recognised that film society audiences have chosen that mode of reception: they are not there, present in the room, by chance. Technical and commercial support for watching, alone at home, virtually any film, anywhere in the country, is now in place. Yet many people seek out the social context of film societies for their significant viewing experiences. This needs explaining. BFFS proposes as a working hypothesis that two key conditions are provided by film societies: (i) a disciplined, neutral watching environment, in which a film is watched uninterruptedly in the dark, allowing the development of a creative ‘flow state’ in relation to the narrative and an impeded critical formulation, and (ii), a social context, in which analysis and the creative flow state are legitimated and liberated by the presence of like-minded others.
  • At the operational level, film societies can in fact be said to provide ideal conditions of study, supplying a question-posing introduction, an uninterrupted viewing and opportunities for post-viewing discussion. Few other environments offer this kind of package.
Conclusion

BFFS would argue that alongside the three Cs there should be a fourth – continuity of cultural development. While there is no evidence that attendance at commercial cinema exhibition leads to engagement in a process that can take subjects through cultural access to critical understanding, and ultimately to creative engagement in film, there is ample evidence that film society attendance can have that effect. Many (perhaps most) film practitioners list film society membership as a formative experience, and at the 2006 Film Society of the Year Awards, Anthony Minghella testified eloquently to its impact on his own career. BFFS would further argue that, while once this argument related chiefly to a process in which early-life exposure to good film led to consequent film-making careers, more recently rapid adoption of digital technology for capturing, editing and distributing film had made this a whole-life argument. Many examples exist.