President Kathleen Waldron

"At William Paterson University, we are committed to providing an education that is outstanding and affordable.  We continue to be proud of our many accomplishments with regard to academic excellence and student success." 

Bruce Williams, Ph.D.

Department: Languages and Cultures Position: Professor Area Specialization: Cinema history and theory, sociolinguistics of the cinema, cultural studies, multiculturalism and discourse. 

BRIEF BIOGRAPHY

Holding a Ph.D. from the University of California at Los Angeles, Dr. Bruce Williams is Professor and Graduate Director in the Department of Languages and Cultures and Co-coordinator of the program in International Cinema at the William Paterson University of New Jersey.  He has published extensively in the areas of cinema history; film theory; Latin American and European cinemas, and language and cinema.  His current research interests include Albanian cinema; film criticism as a tool for nation-building in North Korea and Albania; cinematic ties between Brazil and the Soviet Union; radical cinema and reception; celebrity studies, and the sociolinguistics of the cinema..

EDUCATION

ACADEMIC HISTORY

Ph.D., 1986, The University of California at Los Angeles.  Hispanic Languages and Literatures. 

Major field – Brazilian cinema.  Studies in Latin American (Spanish American and Brazilian) literature, Spanish and Portuguese Peninsular literature, and generative linguistics).  Research on literary and cultural ties between Brazil and Eastern Europe. 

M.A. (with distinction), 1980, The University of California at Los Angeles.  Luso-Brazilian Studies. 

Field of research concentration – Brazilian cinema.  Course work in Brazilian and Portuguese literature, Spanish American and Spanish Peninsular literature, and generative linguistics. 

M.A., 1977, The University of Pennsylvania.  Germanic Languages and Literatures. 

Major area of research concentration – German cinema and theatre. 

B.A. (summa cum laude), 1977, The University of Pennsylvania.  German and French. 

“What Ever Happened to West Side Story?:  Gene Kelly, Jazz Dance and Not So Real Men in Jacques Demy’s The Young Girls of Rochefort” (with Svea Becker).  New Review of Film and Television Studies 6.3 (December, 2008): 303-321

“Playgrounds of Desire: Almodóvar, Fetishism, and the Male Ideal Ego.  Journal of Film and Video 52.2 (Summer 2000): 28-40. 

“I Lost It at the Movies: Parodic Spectatorship in Héctor Babenco’s Kiss of the Spider Woman.”  Cinémas 10.1 (Fall 1999): 79-94. 

“Dwarfing Difference: Deformity at the Threshold of the Visible in Bemberg’s I Don’t Want to Talk About It.”  Canadian Journal of Film Studies/Revue canadienne d’études cinématographiques 8.2 (Fall 1999): 44-55. 

“Albanian Cinema: From Isolation to Transnationalism.”  Book manuscript under contract with Intellect Press, United Kingdom. 

“In the Heat of the Factory: The Global Fires of The Hour of the Furnaces.”  In Mazierska.  Eva and Lars Kristensen, eds. “ Marxism and Political Activism in Film.” ( Book proposal accepted by Berghahn, London.) 

“No Spy Left Behind: Espionage, Pedagogy, and Albania’s Xhanfise Keko.” ( Article in preparation for submission to major refereed journal.) 

“Towards a Transnational Albania.” ( Article in preparation for submission n to major refereed journal.) 

“Inventive Orthodoxy: A Comparative Analysis of Albanian and North Korean Nation Building through Film Review.” ( Article in preparation for submission to major refereed journal.) 

“Order and Progress, Sickle and Hammer: The Reception of Brazilian Cinema in the Soviet Union.” ( Article in preparation for submission to major refereed journal.) 

REFEREED CONFERENCE PAPERS DELIVERED

“The Culural Revolution Revisited: Chinees Nostalgia for Albanian Cinema” (with Ming Jian).  Paper to be presented at the British Association for Slavonic and East European Studies, Cambridge, UK, April 2014. 

“Albania’s Outside Insiders: Ethnographic Dramas and Language Choice.”  Paper to be presented at the Popular Culture Associaton, Chicago, March, 2014. 

“Home from Transnational: Code-Switching and Cinematic Pragmatics in the New Korean Cinema” (with Keumsil Kim Yoon).  Paper to be presented at the Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Seattle, March 2014. 

“Adopted Goddesses: Cult Celebrity in the New German Cinema and Its Alternative.”  Paper presented at the Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Chicago, March, 2013. 

“Why Johnny Can Stream and the Aesthetics of the Glance.”  Paper presented at The Virtual World: Global Media Perceptions Conference at the Marubi Film and Multimedia Academy, Tirana, Albania, January, 2009. 

“We Can All See It All: Choreographer Vince Paterson and the Democratization of Dance in Lars von Trier’s Dancer in the Dark” (with Svea Becker.)  Paper presented at the Popular Culture Association, Boston, April, 2007. 

“The Rich Also Babble: The Short-Circuiting of Meaning in the International Space of the Telenovela.”  Paper presented at the Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Chicago, March, 2007. 

“Americans on the French Atlantic: US Jazz Dance and Celebrity Intertext in Les Demoiselles de Rochefort” (with Svea Becker).  Paper presented at the Popular Culture Association, Atlanta, April, 2006. 

“Brazil’s Open Cities: Mimicry in the Urban Landscape of Cinema Nôvo.”  Paper presented at the Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Vancouver, BC, March, 2006. 

“The Madison for Outcasts: Dance and Movement from American Pop Culture in Jean-Luc-Godard’s Band of Outsiders” (with Svea Becker).  Paper at the Popular Culture Association, San Diego, March, 2005. 

“No Such a Dead Ringer or Paratextuality in David Greene’s What Ever Happened to....” Paper presented at La répétition/Repetition Colloquium, Université de Reims, March, 2002. 

“A Southern Mirror: Borderland Discourse in the Chicano Cinema of Gregory Nava.”  Paper presented at Points of Convergence: The Tartu Conference on North American Studies.  University of Tartu, Tartu, Estonia, April, 2001. 

“The Imaginary Screen: Exile Cinema as Reconfiguration in the Pedagogy of Peace.”  Paper presented at the Seoul International Conference of Non-governmental Organizations: The Role of NGOs in the 21st Century.  Kyung Hee University, Seoul, Republic of Korea, October, 1999. 

“Frysky Business: Micro-regionalism in the Era of Post-Nationalism.”  Paper presented at the Society for Cinema Studies, West Palm Beach, April, 1999. 

“Cinema of Panic and the Panic of Exile: Fernando Arrabal and the Reconfiguration of Nation.”  Paper presented at the Florida State University Conference on Literature and Film, January, 1999. 

"Fluid Frontiers: Narrative Cinemas and Linguistic Borderlands."  Paper presented at the Florida State University Conference on Film and Literature, Tallahassee, January, 1998. 

"You Never Write But You Call (to Mind)!  The 'Hidden' Film as Cross-Cultural Intertext."  Paper presented at the Society for Cinema Studies, Ottawa, May 1997. 

“Corporal Revolt in the Work of Emma Sepúlveda."  Paper presented at the Conference on Popular Culture, San Antonio, March, 1997. 

“Camping at the Margins: Naked Myth and Its Intertext in the Films of Pedro Almodóvar."  Paper presented at the Spanish Semiotics Association, Zaragoza, Spain, November, 1996. 

“Madrid au Naturel or the Reassessment of Genre in Post-Franco Cinema."  Paper presented at the 5th AIZEN Conference on Emile Zola and Naturalism.  Hunter College, New York City, September, 1996. 

“Female beneath the Line: Authorship and Voice in the Human Rights Documentary."  Paper presented at Console-ing Passions Conference, University of Wisconsin at Madison, April, 1996. 

“Voices from the Fissures: Female Authorship and Film As Testimony."  Paper presented at the Fifth Annual Conference on Ibero-American Culture and Society: Latin American Women Writers, Discourse of/on the Feminine.  University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, February, 1996. 

“Having Your (European) Cake and Eating It Too: Brazilian Cinema and the Threat of National Difference."  Society for Cinema Studies, New York City, March, 1995. 

“Look at Me!:  Autobiography and Gaze in the Films of María Luisa Bemberg."  Pacific Council on Latin American Studies, Las Vegas, Nevada, March, 1995. 

“Freeing a Perversion: Fetishism and Transgression in the Films of Pedro Almodóvar."  Florida State University Annual Conference on Literature and Film, Tallahassee, March, 1995. 

“Directing Panic: The Early Films of Fernando Arrabal.”  Invited lecture presented at the Marubi Film and Multimedia Academy, Tirana, Albania, May, 2012. 

“Circassian by the Circular Method: Media and Language Planning in Homeland and Diaspora. ”Invited lecture presented to the Jordanian Association of Caucasus Circassia, Aman, Jordan, May, 2010. 

“The Eagle Spreads Its Wings: International Reception of the New Albanian Cinema.”  Address presented at the :”Balkan Cinema through Cross-Cultural Perspectives” Symposium held at the Tirana International Film Festival, Tirana, Albania, December, 2009. 

“A Four-Dimensional Tight Rope: Studio and Independent Production in the National and International Work of Guillermo del Toro.”  Invited lecture presented at the Marubi Film and Multimedia Academy, Tirana, Albania, December 2009. 

“The Stakes of Chinese Roulette: Fassbinder and Intertextuality.”  Lecture presented jointly with Professor Elvis Hoxha at the Marubi Film and Multimedia Academy, Tirana, Albania, January 2008. 

“Film and Minority Language in the United States.”  Invited lecture presented at the University of Inner Mongolia, Hohhot, China, June, 2002. 

“The Bridges of Los Angeles County: Borderland Discourse in the Chicano Films of Gregory Nava.”  Lecture presented at the Anglo-American Studies Division of the University of Tirana, Albania, March 2002. 

“Getting Frysked at the Movies: European Cultural Minorities and Narrative Cinema.”  The William Paterson University College of Humanities and Social Science Colloquium on Identity, September, 2000. 

“Screen and Memory: Latin American Film as Testimony."  The William Paterson College Issues and Ideas Series, February, 1996. 

“Scraps of Life: Engendered Subjectivity and the Recoupment of History in the Works of Marjorie Agosín."  Essex College, April, 1994. 

“Whoopie Does Reno: An Almodóvar Remake As Cultural Translation."  University of Nevada, Reno, February, 1993. 

“History As Memory: Tomás Gutiérrez Alea."  Lecture delivered as part of a retrospective of Latin American Cinema.  Served as discussant for screenings of several films.  Event organized by the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, The Ohio State University, April, 1990. 

“National Cinemas.”  Panel chaired at the Society for Cinema Studies, Chicago, March 2000. 

“Projecting Harmony: Film Studies and Peace Education.”  Panel chaired at the Seoul International Conference of Non-governmental Organizations: The Role of NGOs in the 21st Century.  Kyung Hee University, Seoul, Republic of Korea, October, 1999. 

“Building Blocks of Language: Addressing the Needs of English Language Learners with Communication Disorders.”  The 29th Annual Bilingual/ESL Conference, William Paterson University, December 4, 2009. 

“Language Diversity: Special Gifts and Challenges.”  The 28th Annual William Paterson University Bilingual./ESL Conference.,  December, 2008. 

“Multiple Literacies”: The 27th Annual William Paterson University Bilingual/ESL Conference.”  December 7, 2007. 

“Fostering a Multilingual New Jersey”: The 26th William Paterson University Bilingual/ESL Conference.”  December 8, 2006. 

COLLOQUIA AND INFORMAL TALKS

“Peter Weir’s The Truman Show and New Paradigms of Identification.”  Talk given and discussion moderated at the Marubi Film and Multimedia Academy, Tirana, Albania, January, 2009. 

“Fassbinder Reconsidered.”  Talk given and discussion moderated at the Marubi Film and Multimedia Academy, Tirana, Albania, January, 2008. 

“Playing with Babel: Language, Technology, and Interactivity.”  Paper presented at the Department of Languages and Cultures Colloquium on Teaching and Research, The William Paterson University, Spring, 2006. 

“‘I’senstein: Subjectivity and Counterpoint in Mário Peixoto’s Limite.”  Paper presented at the Department of Languages and Cultures Colloquium on Teaching and Research, The William Paterson University, Spring, 2002. 

“I Could Go on Lip Synching: Absence as Intertext in the Films of Werner Schroeter.”  Talk presented as part of the Colloquium on Teaching and Research of the Department of Languages and Cultures, The William Paterson University, September, 1998. 

“Knowing Just Who the Natives Are: The Tourist Gaze in María Luisa Bemberg's Miss Mary."  Presented brief introduction and served as discussant for a screening of Bemberg's film as a part of the William Paterson College's International Film Festival, November, 1996. 

“Margarethe von Trotta: Feminist Filmmaker."  Presented brief introduction and served as co-discussant for a screening of Rosa Luxemburg.  Program sponsored by the Women's Center and the History Club of the William Paterson College, March, 1994. 

“Chilean Arpilleras."  Presented introduction to display of political folk art and served as discussant for Recapturing Community: Latin America and the Oral Tradition symposium, the William Paterson College, March, 1994. 

“Brecht, Artaud and the Theatre of Spain."  Talk and discussion presented to graduate students at the University of Nevada, November, 1992. ( Event coordinated by Emma Sepúlveda-Pulvirenti). 

“Private Collections: Betraying the Voyeuse."  Delivered brief introductory talk and served as discussant for screening at the American Film Institute Festival, Los Angeles, May, 1990. 

“El cine latinoamericano: Mujeres-cineastas."  Talk with open discussion at the Modern Language House, the College of William and Mary, March 1989. 

“Las buenas intenciones de Rosita Murphy: El mito panamericano de Springtime in the Rockies."  Lecture and round table discussion at the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, the University of New Hampshire, February, 1989. 

“Reflexivity in the Latin American Cinema."  Lecture and round table discussion for students in Latin American Studies, University of Southern California, January, 1988. ( Event coordinated by Beth Miller). 

“Screen and Gaze in Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands.  Talk and open discussion with undergraduate students at UCLA, Spring, 1985. 

Refereed reader, Scope: An Online Journal of Film Studies (University of Nottingham). 

Refereed reader, Journal of Languages and Culture

Consultant for the Chinese Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press/Beijing Foreign Languages Audiovisual Press on the development and evaluation of print and media resources in English and Spanish, Beijing, China, December 2012-January 2013.