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Conference Notes: Content in Motion | Curating Europe’s Audiovisual Heritage: Session 4

Copyright: National Library of Sweden

Opening & Session 1 | Session 2 | Session 3 | Session 4 | Session 5 & Closing Keynote

The fourth session of our #EUscreen15 conference, “Curating (Hi)stories”, discussed the role of AV material in scholarly research and education, including the design of interactive teaching materials and online platforms. The session included talks from Peter B. Kaufman on visual education; Elsa Coupard & Claude Mussou on curating history with French audiovisual archives; and Steven Stegers on moving images in history education, and was opened and moderated by Dana Mustata, University of Groningen.

The fourth session of our #EUscreen15 conference, “Curating (Hi)stories”, discussed the role of AV material in scholarly research and education, including the design of interactive teaching materials and online platforms. The session included talks from Peter B. Kaufman on visual education; Elsa Coupard & Claude Mussou on curating history with French audiovisual archives; and Steven Stegers on moving images in history education, and was opened and moderated by Dana Mustata, University of Groningen.

Visual Education and the University of the Air | Peter B. Kaufman
 

Peter B. Kaufman (@pbkauf) is a documentary filmmaker and writer; Associate Director of Columbia University’s Center for Teaching and Learning; and founder and Executive Producer of Intelligent Television in New York. Educated at Cornell and Columbia, he produces online courses and video initiatives with Columbia faculty on such topics as the American Civil War and art in Harlem. He is, most recently, co-author of The Problem of the Yellow Milkmaid for Europeana, author of Assessing the Audiovisual Archive Market for PrestoCentre and The Columbia Manual of Video Style, and executive producer of RUSSIA’S OPEN BOOK: RUSSIAN WRITING UNDER PUTIN for PBS. Photo by Sebastiaan Ter Burg / CC BY-SA.

 
Session four began with Peter B. Kaufman discussing the importance of visual education. His evocative and enlightening talk focused around the need for intersection between the differing cultures of education, technology, media and the screen.

He traced the ways in which these intersections had taken place over the years, but identified the need for increased collaboration in an increasingly mediatized age. Drawing an arguments put forward by Roy Rosenzweig who wondered ‘Can history be open source?’ Kaufman wondered if education and television could also be open source.

Curating History with French Audiovisual Archives | Elsa Coupard & Claude Mussou
 

Elsa Coupard has been editorial coordinator at Ina Hypermedia Studio since 2006. Former teacher of history and geography, she is now responsible for the educational website Jalons/Milestones. She previously graduated in History and Cinema from the University of Provence.
Claude Mussou is in charge of a newly created web archiving activity at the French Audiovisual Institute (Ina), she is the head of InaTHEQUE (@inadlweb), the department which fosters and promotes academic usage of Ina’s collections. Photos by Sebastiaan Ter Burg / CC BY-SA.

 
The importance of education and media literacy was a theme which ran through all of the presentations of this session. Elsa Coupard and Claude Mussou from French Audiovisual institute (Ina) demonstrated the practical uses and applications of archive material within school age teaching of history. In their specifically designed site Jalons which sits adjacent to the main webpage, material has been specifically chosen and curated by archival experts and teachers in close collaboration with the minster of education.

Jalons features videos chosen by teachers, archivists and historians and is organised around years and by themes and topics. The site was launched in 2003 and is updated every 2 years. As well as the videos on the site, the material is also accompanied by carefully curated contextual information. All of this ensures that the material can be easily transferred into the classroom – there are even learning pathways into the site which are designed to be easily delivered lesson plans.

Moving Images in History Education | Steven Stegers
 

Steven Stegers (@StevenStegers) is the Programme Director of EUROCLIO – European Association of History Educators. He has contributed to the implementation of cross-border history education projects in many countries. He has been directly involved with large numbers of implementers of new educational material, providers of initial and in-service teacher training, and promoters of innovation in education in general. He has been consultant to the International Baccalaureate for the History Curriculum Review in 2012, to KAICIID Dialogue Center, and is an author of the Handbook for Intercultural Citizenship Education developed by the Anna Lindh Foundation. Photo by Sebastiaan Ter Burg / CC BY-SA.

 
The final panelist, Steven Stegers continued the focus on moving image and its uses within education, but focused on the importance of moving beyond national boundaries and offering broader and more accessible narratives which can help the teaching of history. Transnational AV archives such as EUscreen and transnational educational platforms such as our collaborative partner Historiana provide an important range of perspectives.

Stegers also spoke of the importance of transnational cooperation and collaboration and the usefulness of showing film and audiovisual content within European schools. He also identified a range of barriers which frequently stand in the way of using moving image in the classroom. These included issues of copyright and technology, problems with access, difficulties of language and translation and the time constraints which many teachers and educators face in trying to source such material.

Echoing the arguments put forward by Peter Kaufman, Steger also called for more attention to be given to the teaching of media literacy. He suggested that as a subject, this is frequently taught as part of other disciplines, but that in a modern digital age, it really deserved more attention in its own right. Following on from many of the ideas demonstrated by Elsa Coupard and Claude Mussou, Stegers also indicated how audiovisual content could be curated online and that context for events and material was vital.

The panel concluded with a lively discussion with contributions from the audience which focused on the key ideas put forward in the panel, particularly ideas of open source, open access, the need for context, audio visual curation, and moving image as a key teaching tool.

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