McLaughlin / WR 13300 / Spr 2015

NOTE-TAKING/DISCUSSION WORKSHEET: SELMA

Part I: As you watch and reflect on Selma, pay attention to the following
characters/topics and their rhetorical significance in the film. How are they
portrayed? How are we, as viewers, supposed to perceive each character or idea?
What choices do the filmmakers make to invite that response?
MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR

CORETTA SCOTT KING

ANNIE LEE COOPER

PRESIDENT LYNDON B. JOHNSON

J EDGAR HOOVER

GOVERNER GEORGE WALLACE

JAMES BEVEL

McLaughlin / WR 13300 / Spr 2015

JOHN LEWIS

MALCOLM X

MEDIA

LAW ENFORCEMENT

SURVEILLANCE

RELIGION

1960s AMERICAN SOUTH

GENDER

SOCIAL PROTEST

McLaughlin / WR 13300 / Spr 2015

Part II: As you watch and reflect on the film, pay attention to the deliberate choices
of the filmmakers and the impact of those choices on viewers. It may be helpful to
organize your thinking around four key elements of film, listed below.
CINEMATOGRAPHY (Camera Angle, Camera Distance, Camera Movement, etc)

EDITING (linking/cutting together of different shots, added effects, arrangement)

SOUND (emerging from within the scene AND sound that was added later, like
musical score)

MISE-EN-SCENE (means literally put into the scene and can include: props,
costuming, makeup, staged body language, lightingany element that makes the
scene)

McLaughlin / WR 13300 / Spr 2015

Part III. Analyze the rhetorical situation and intended purpose of the film. You may
wish to refer back to Bitzer and Herrick as you reflect on the films context and
purpose.
EXIGENCE (what is the problem that can be solved through discourse? To what
extent can this film be read as a fitting response to that problem? You may wish to
do some outside research here):

AUDIENCE (who is the intended audience of the film? How can you tell? What moves
does the film make that signal awareness of that audience, their values, their
anxieties, their desires, etc?):

CONSTRAINTS (what constraints shape the message? Remember that these can be
constraints imposed by the medium or genre, as well as ideological or social
constraints)

INTENDED PURPOSE/SOCIAL FUNCTION (be specific hereif, for example, you feel
the film tests ideas as Herrick describes, then what ideas are being tested within
the film, and why? You may discuss more than one intended purpose/function)

McLaughlin / WR 13300 / Spr 2015

CENTRAL ARGUMENT/CLAIM(S) (given the rhetorical situation and your impressions

of the films purpose, what seems to be the central argument of the film? What
claims are embedded within that argument?)