Research Article

Migration Cinema in Higher Education: Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) and Contemporary Student Perspectives

Number: 19 June 30, 2025
EN TR

Migration Cinema in Higher Education: Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) and Contemporary Student Perspectives

Abstract

Within the context of the Erasmus+ KA220 project MigraMedia, “Migration Narratives in European Media: Teaching, Learning, and Reflecting,” the authors of this essay collaborated to assess the impact of a migration film on higher education students. They chose Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Angst essen Seele auf (Ali: Fear Eats the Soul, 1974) due to its artistic significance and unique treatment of the migrant experience, combining modernist aesthetics and melodramatic narrative elements. To assess the film’s impact on contemporary students, they asked Greek undergraduate students in a film course, coming from various humanities departments, to write short papers about the film and submit a survey. The students’ responses indicated that a powerful migration film from a different period, such as Ali: Fear Eats the Soul, can be beneficial in today’s classrooms and can serve as a tool for broadening students’ social and critical awareness. The essay first discusses the film and its historical context and then presents and comments on the students’ perspectives.

Keywords

Supporting Institution

Research co-funded by the European Union

Project Number

2023-1-DE01-KA220-HED-000154375

References

  1. Bayrakdar, Deniz, and Robert Burgoyne eds. Refugees and Migrants in Contemporary Film, Art and Media. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2022.
  2. Berghahn, Daniela, and Claudia Sternberg eds. European Cinema in Motion: Migrant and Diasporic Film in Contemporary Europe. New York and London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.
  3. Cottingham, Laura. Fear Eats the Soul (Angst essen Seele auf), 2nd ed. London: British Film Institute, 2020.
  4. Elsaesser, Thomas. Fassbinder’s Germany: History, Identity, Subject. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 1996.
  5. Fassbinder, Rainer Werner. “‘At some point films have to top being films’: A Conversation with Hans Günther Pflaum about Fear Eats the Soul” (February 1974). In The Anarchy of the Imagination: Interviews, Essays, Notes, edited by Michael Töteberg and Leo A. Lensing, translated by Krishna Winston, 11-15, Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992.
  6. Gorfinkel, Elena. “Impossible, Impolitic: Ali: Fear Eats the Soul and Fassbinder’s Asynchronous Bodies.” In A Companion to Rainer Werner Fassbinder, edited by Brigitte Peucker, 502-515, Chichester, West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012.
  7. Graf, Rüdiger. “‘das hinterhältigste und wirksamste Instrument gesellschaftlicher Unterdrückung’: Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft in Rainer Werner Fassbinders Angst essen Seele auf.” In Die Kunst der Geschichte: Historiographie, Ästhetik, Erzählung, edited by Martin Baumeister, Moritz Föllmer, and Philipp Müller, 373-392, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 2009.
  8. Hagener, Malte. “Migration and refugees in German cinema: transnational entanglements.” Studies in European Cinema 15, no. 2-3 (2018): 110-124, https://doi.org/10.1080/17411548.2018.1453772.

Details

Primary Language

English

Subjects

Multicultural, Intercultural and Cross-Cultural Studies, Cinema Studies (Other)

Journal Section

Research Article

Publication Date

June 30, 2025

Submission Date

June 2, 2025

Acceptance Date

June 26, 2025

Published in Issue

Year 2025 Number: 19

APA
Heide, M., & Mini, P. (2025). Migration Cinema in Higher Education: Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) and Contemporary Student Perspectives. KARE Uluslararası Karşılaştırmalı Edebiyat Dergisi, 19, 41-54. https://doi.org/10.38060/kare.1712561
AMA
1.Heide M, Mini P. Migration Cinema in Higher Education: Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) and Contemporary Student Perspectives. KARE Uluslararası Karşılaştırmalı Edebiyat Dergisi. 2025;(19):41-54. doi:10.38060/kare.1712561
Chicago
Heide, Markus, and Panayiota Mini. 2025. “Migration Cinema in Higher Education: Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) and Contemporary Student Perspectives”. KARE Uluslararası Karşılaştırmalı Edebiyat Dergisi, nos. 19: 41-54. https://doi.org/10.38060/kare.1712561.
EndNote
Heide M, Mini P (June 1, 2025) Migration Cinema in Higher Education: Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) and Contemporary Student Perspectives. KARE Uluslararası Karşılaştırmalı Edebiyat Dergisi 19 41–54.
IEEE
[1]M. Heide and P. Mini, “Migration Cinema in Higher Education: Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) and Contemporary Student Perspectives”, KARE Uluslararası Karşılaştırmalı Edebiyat Dergisi, no. 19, pp. 41–54, June 2025, doi: 10.38060/kare.1712561.
ISNAD
Heide, Markus - Mini, Panayiota. “Migration Cinema in Higher Education: Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) and Contemporary Student Perspectives”. KARE Uluslararası Karşılaştırmalı Edebiyat Dergisi. 19 (June 1, 2025): 41-54. https://doi.org/10.38060/kare.1712561.
JAMA
1.Heide M, Mini P. Migration Cinema in Higher Education: Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) and Contemporary Student Perspectives. KARE Uluslararası Karşılaştırmalı Edebiyat Dergisi. 2025;:41–54.
MLA
Heide, Markus, and Panayiota Mini. “Migration Cinema in Higher Education: Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) and Contemporary Student Perspectives”. KARE Uluslararası Karşılaştırmalı Edebiyat Dergisi, no. 19, June 2025, pp. 41-54, doi:10.38060/kare.1712561.
Vancouver
1.Markus Heide, Panayiota Mini. Migration Cinema in Higher Education: Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974) and Contemporary Student Perspectives. KARE Uluslararası Karşılaştırmalı Edebiyat Dergisi. 2025 Jun. 1;(19):41-54. doi:10.38060/kare.1712561

 

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