A Class Divided and The Women of Summer

Films are often used for purposes other than entertainment - to educate, to inform, to motivate, and to persuade. "The Women of Summer," a documentary depicting an historic moment when feminists, unionists, and educators came together at Bryn Mawr's Summer School for Women Workers, is one such film. Another is Jane Elliott's "A Class Divided," a documentary that chronicles an exercise in which a class of third grade children in Riceville, Iowa were grouped into "them" and "us" while the camera observed the resulting biases and stereotypes which emerged (Frontline, 2005).

"The Women of Summer" was filmed by Suzanne Bauman and Rita Heller and focuses on the activities occurring at a summer program under the aegis of an exclusive women's college. These events in which working class women were introduced to the realm of humanistic and political thought is presented through the eyes of the alumni 50 years later at a reunion ("The Women of Summer," 2008). The actual summer school program was operated from 1921 to 1938, but the retrospective was f

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Category: Film - A