Free Associative Film Analysis

Abstract

Can people’s lives be enhanced through personal reflective contact with the arts? Results obtained from social intervention programs using the arts, including music (Tunstall 2012) and literature (Trounstine & Waxler 2008) indicate this is the case. In Meeting Movies (2006) Norman Holland demonstrates a reflective method of film analysis – free associative film analysis. In this essay, I will present my adaptation of this method, the results I obtained from individual free associative film analysis and its application in the classroom. I will examine the outcomes obtained in light of proposals made by philosopher Miranda Fricker on epistemic injustice (2007), and Byung-Chul Han on the social and neural roots of neurological illness such as depression, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), borderline personality disorder (BDO) and burnout syndrome today (2010). Based on these reflections, I will suggest that perhaps there has never been a greater need to study the arts.