UDTH281: Screwball Comedy: Home

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Critics are considered experts in their field. Here are a few guidelines that qualifies someone as an expert:

• A person that has a degree in their field (in most cases this will be a Ph.D.)
• A person that continually studies and publishes about aspects in their field
• Opinions and ideas expressed in publications are supported by research or evidence
• Publications by this person are published scholarly articles and are peer-reviewed (checked for accuracy by other members in their field)

So then, what is criticism?

• Who: Articles written by critics or experts in the field
• What: Articles examine a topic very closely. They often attempt to interpret or find meaning in a text, work of art, piece of music, etc.
• How: Critics use examples from primary sources to prove their argument. They often use secondary sources (articles by other critics) to further support their argument or thesis.
• Why: Stories, art, music, etc. rarely has one concrete meaning. There can be several ways to consider a topic. Criticism then, is articles that are proposing new ways to interpret a topic. This interpretation could use historical events, specific ideas in their discipline, biographical information about the creator, new evidence uncovered about a topic (a painting for example), etc. Because there are so many outside events that influence a creation of art, there can be lots of articles on one particular topic.

• Use the exact title of a film.
• Put film titles and genre searches in "quotes." This will ensure that the database is finding the entire phrase and not just individual words mentioned in the title. For example, "It Happened One Night" or "Screwball Comedy."
• Generic name? Try searching for title and director. A well-known actor might work too.
• Not able to find anything by searching for title? Try expanding your search and looking for the specific actors or the genre they are associated with. You may be able to find information about your particular work within a source that talks about the actors and or the genre in general.
• Often artistic works are influenced by some outside event (politics, war, economy, etc.). After doing a little background research, try searching for your film and factors that may have influenced it. Don't forget you may need to try various keywords and the more you put in the search box, the less results you'll get.