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

Year 2025, Issue: 19, 41 - 54, 30.06.2025
https://doi.org/10.38060/kare.1712561

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.

Supporting Institution

Research co-funded by the European Union

Project Number

2023-1-DE01-KA220-HED-000154375

References

  • Bayrakdar, Deniz, and Robert Burgoyne eds. Refugees and Migrants in Contemporary Film, Art and Media. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2022.
  • Berghahn, Daniela, and Claudia Sternberg eds. European Cinema in Motion: Migrant and Diasporic Film in Contemporary Europe. New York and London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.
  • Cottingham, Laura. Fear Eats the Soul (Angst essen Seele auf), 2nd ed. London: British Film Institute, 2020.
  • Elsaesser, Thomas. Fassbinder’s Germany: History, Identity, Subject. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 1996.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • Heide, Markus. “Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974).” Hospitality and European Film, 2019. https://hostfilm.usal.es/index.php/fear-eats-the-soul-2/.
  • Heide, Markus. “Aki Kaurismäki’s The Other Side of Hope (2017).” Hospitality and European Film, 2019. https://hostfilm.usal.es/index.php/aki-kaurismaki-the-other-side-of-hope/
  • Lippmann, Malve, Can Sungu, and Martin Ganguly. Rainer Werner Fassbinder Angst essen Seele, Lehrmaterial, CinEd, https://cined.eu/back-office/uploads/DE_Cin_ED_Pedagogical_File_ANGST_ESSEN_SEELE_AUF_8e0571f037.pdf.
  • Mayne, Judith. “Fassbinder and Spectatorship.” New German Critique, no. 12 (Autumn 1977): 61-74.
  • MigraMedia, “Teaching and Research Project on Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s film Angst essen Seele auf (1974, engl. Ali: Fear Eats the Soul) — student essays by Elissavet Leonidaki, Maria Markaki, Ioannis Theodorou (University of Crete),” 10pp. https://www.uni-hildesheim.de/migramedia/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Students-papers-on-Fear-Eats.-English.pdf and https://www.uni- hildesheim.de/migramedia/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Students-papers-on-Fear-Eats.-Greek-version.pdf.
  • Mooney, William H. “Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Douglas Sirk: Recreation of All That Heaven Allows as Angst essen Seele auf (1974).” In Adaptation and the New Art Film: Remaking the Classics in the Twilight of Cinema, 27-67. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021.
  • Reimer, Robert C. “Comparison of Douglas Sirk’s All That Heaven Allows and R. W. Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul; Or, How Hollywood’s New England Dropouts Became Germany’s Marginalized Other.” Literature/Film Quarterly 24, no. 3 (1996): 281-287.
  • Rhodes, John David. “Fassbinder’s Work: Style, Sirk, and Queer Labor.” In A Companion to Rainer Werner Fassbinder, edited by Brigitte Peucker, 181-203. Chichester, West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012.
  • Salazkina, Masha, and Yumna Siddiqi eds. Teaching Migration in Literature, Film, and Media. New York: Modern Language Association of America, 2025.
  • Skvirsky, Salomé Aguilera. “The Price of Heaven: Remaking Politics in All That Heaven Allows, Ali: Fear Eats the Soul, and Far from Heaven.” Cinema Journal 47, no. 3 (2008): 90-121.
  • Spicka, Mark E. “Guest Workers, Social Order, and West German Municipalities, 1960-7.” Journal of Contemporary History 54, no. 3 (July 2019): 619-639.

Yüksek Öğrenimde Göç Sineması: Rainer Werner Fassbinder'in Ali: Korku Ruhu Yer (1974) ve Çağdaş Öğrenci Perspektifleri

Year 2025, Issue: 19, 41 - 54, 30.06.2025
https://doi.org/10.38060/kare.1712561

Abstract

Erasmus+ KA220 projesi MigraMedia kapsamında, "Avrupa Medyasında Göç Anlatıları: Bu makalenin yazarları, bir göç filminin yüksek öğrenim öğrencileri üzerindeki etkisini değerlendirmek için işbirliği yaptılar. Rainer Werner Fassbinder'in Angst essen Seele auf (Ali: Korku Ruhu Yiyor, 1974) filmini, sanatsal önemi ve modernist estetik ile melodramatik anlatı unsurlarını birleştirerek göçmen deneyimini benzersiz bir şekilde ele alması nedeniyle seçmişlerdir. Filmin günümüz öğrencileri üzerindeki etkisini değerlendirmek için, çeşitli beşeri bilimler bölümlerinden gelen bir sinema dersindeki Yunan lisans öğrencilerinden film hakkında kısa yazılar yazmalarını ve bir anket göndermelerini istediler. Öğrencilerin yanıtları, Ali gibi farklı bir döneme ait güçlü bir göç filminin Fear Eats the Soul gibi farklı bir döneme ait güçlü bir göç filminin günümüz sınıflarında faydalı olabileceği ve öğrencilerin sosyal ve eleştirel farkındalıklarını genişletmek için bir araç görevi görebileceği yönündeydi. Bu makale öncelikle filmi ve tarihsel bağlamını tartışmakta, ardından öğrencilerin bakış açılarını sunmakta ve yorumlamaktadır.

Project Number

2023-1-DE01-KA220-HED-000154375

References

  • Bayrakdar, Deniz, and Robert Burgoyne eds. Refugees and Migrants in Contemporary Film, Art and Media. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2022.
  • Berghahn, Daniela, and Claudia Sternberg eds. European Cinema in Motion: Migrant and Diasporic Film in Contemporary Europe. New York and London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.
  • Cottingham, Laura. Fear Eats the Soul (Angst essen Seele auf), 2nd ed. London: British Film Institute, 2020.
  • Elsaesser, Thomas. Fassbinder’s Germany: History, Identity, Subject. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 1996.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • Heide, Markus. “Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974).” Hospitality and European Film, 2019. https://hostfilm.usal.es/index.php/fear-eats-the-soul-2/.
  • Heide, Markus. “Aki Kaurismäki’s The Other Side of Hope (2017).” Hospitality and European Film, 2019. https://hostfilm.usal.es/index.php/aki-kaurismaki-the-other-side-of-hope/
  • Lippmann, Malve, Can Sungu, and Martin Ganguly. Rainer Werner Fassbinder Angst essen Seele, Lehrmaterial, CinEd, https://cined.eu/back-office/uploads/DE_Cin_ED_Pedagogical_File_ANGST_ESSEN_SEELE_AUF_8e0571f037.pdf.
  • Mayne, Judith. “Fassbinder and Spectatorship.” New German Critique, no. 12 (Autumn 1977): 61-74.
  • MigraMedia, “Teaching and Research Project on Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s film Angst essen Seele auf (1974, engl. Ali: Fear Eats the Soul) — student essays by Elissavet Leonidaki, Maria Markaki, Ioannis Theodorou (University of Crete),” 10pp. https://www.uni-hildesheim.de/migramedia/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Students-papers-on-Fear-Eats.-English.pdf and https://www.uni- hildesheim.de/migramedia/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Students-papers-on-Fear-Eats.-Greek-version.pdf.
  • Mooney, William H. “Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Douglas Sirk: Recreation of All That Heaven Allows as Angst essen Seele auf (1974).” In Adaptation and the New Art Film: Remaking the Classics in the Twilight of Cinema, 27-67. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021.
  • Reimer, Robert C. “Comparison of Douglas Sirk’s All That Heaven Allows and R. W. Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul; Or, How Hollywood’s New England Dropouts Became Germany’s Marginalized Other.” Literature/Film Quarterly 24, no. 3 (1996): 281-287.
  • Rhodes, John David. “Fassbinder’s Work: Style, Sirk, and Queer Labor.” In A Companion to Rainer Werner Fassbinder, edited by Brigitte Peucker, 181-203. Chichester, West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012.
  • Salazkina, Masha, and Yumna Siddiqi eds. Teaching Migration in Literature, Film, and Media. New York: Modern Language Association of America, 2025.
  • Skvirsky, Salomé Aguilera. “The Price of Heaven: Remaking Politics in All That Heaven Allows, Ali: Fear Eats the Soul, and Far from Heaven.” Cinema Journal 47, no. 3 (2008): 90-121.
  • Spicka, Mark E. “Guest Workers, Social Order, and West German Municipalities, 1960-7.” Journal of Contemporary History 54, no. 3 (July 2019): 619-639.
There are 19 citations in total.

Details

Primary Language English
Subjects Multicultural, Intercultural and Cross-Cultural Studies, Cinema Studies (Other)
Journal Section Research Article
Authors

Markus Heide 0000-0002-2359-4484

Panayiota Mini 0009-0005-4284-7730

Project Number 2023-1-DE01-KA220-HED-000154375
Publication Date June 30, 2025
Submission Date June 2, 2025
Acceptance Date June 26, 2025
Published in Issue Year 2025 Issue: 19

Cite

Chicago 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, no. 19 (June 2025): 41-54. https://doi.org/10.38060/kare.1712561.

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