Institutional conditions

The development and the success of film and moving image studies has required the combined efforts of various institutions. The goal of this third research axis is to provide a critical history of those key institutions that, through various discourses and practices, have played a decisive role in the institutionalization and consolidation of film and moving image studies today. Research carried out in this axis is subdivided into three parts in order to study three separate institutions, examining their role in the development and rapid expansion of the discipline: the institutions of cinephilia, the institutions of social and community activism, and the institutions of learning.

Through a detailed history of cinephilia, its institutions and the sundry practices connected to it, ARTHEMIS researchers investigate the influence of cinephilia on film studies and the various traces it has left upon the discipline. For instance, this implies studying how cinephilia has given rise to various "taste cultures" in both film criticism and film theory and how it has sometimes hindered the development of more “scientific” approaches to film. Secondly, In looking at the role of social and community activism in the formation of film and moving image studies, ARTHEMIS researchers investigate the function of movements such as the documentary movement in the development of public and parapublic institutions concerned with the social and pedagogical function of cinema and its ability to shape public opinion. A whole network of institutions has developed since the late 20's that, to this day, influence the shape of film and moving image studies. The last subdivision in this research axis investigates the place cinema has had and continues to have in institutions of learning, with particular attention to the institutions of higher education.