Beyond the screen: How Muskingum professors use films to spark deeper learning

Stock photo / Jeremy Yap Unsplash

By Katelyn Lindsey

NEW CONCORD, Ohio — Instead of relying solely on traditional lectures or lengthy textbook readings, some professors are turning to film as an engaging educational tool. By incorporating movies into their curriculum, they’re offering students a more immersive and interactive way to connect with course material.

During the spring semester, associate professor of religion, Melissa Conroy, hosted a screening of Ramayana: The Legend of Prince Rama. The event featured Indian cuisine catered by Ammar India Restaurant located in Zanesville, Ohio.

This event was open to the campus community, as well as an extra credit opportunity for Conroy’s world religions course. She explained that the film is part of a broader effort to use cinema as a bridge to religious and cultural understanding.

 “I really wanted to do every single religion we’ve covered through a film. For Hinduism, we watched the two great epics: The Mahabharata, which is like a five-hour film, and the Ramayana, which I was able to get a copy of from a Japanese company,” Conroy said.

Despite minor challenges like navigating the yen-to-dollar exchange rate and international correspondence, Conroy found the process worthwhile.

“It was kind of an international effort just to watch a movie for two hours in New Concord and eat Indian food,” she said.

Conroy said she is experimenting using film in her classes to help students grasp lengthy materials such as the Ramayana, which is a Hindu epic poem with 1700 pages. In its 135 minutes, Conroy said the film was fairly accurate to the original text.

Using films like Ramayana or even contemporary titles such as Everything Everywhere All at Once, Conroy encourages students to think critically about how media interprets and adapts religious ideas.

“It’s about asking students to take what they know and think, ‘Okay, how does this director view these ideas? " Conroy said.

Outside of her teaching role, Conroy also serves on the editorial board for the Journal of Religion and Film, which is based at the University of Nebraska Omaha. Although the journal is affiliated with another institution, Muskingum students are still welcome to submit their work for potential publication.

Former assistant professor of film, Michael Carvaines, has also implemented the use of film in his courses, such as in MEDIA-210 Media Literacy. Carvaines said that films are more than entertainment, they are a way to explore cultural, political, and journalistic issues.

Unlike documentaries, which often present facts directly, he said fictional films give students an emotional connection to the content.

“Students often tell me that it feels more engaging [to learn through films],” Carvaines said. “It also feels a little deeper when you see characters and actors playing it. They [students] get to know the people better and become a little more 3-dimensional.”

One film he often uses is Dark Waters, which follows an Ohio-based lawyer exposing environmental pollution.

“By watching it as a movie, students get a lot more detail,” he said. “They get more emotionally invested.”

He also points to films like Zodiac and Spotlight to show journalism in action, emphasizing how storytelling can highlight real-world consequences.

“A movie can use all these elements like music and sound effects and editing to kind of get an emotional response,” Carvaines said.

While these films may not be entirely accurate or dramatized, films such as Spotlight can offer an insight to the real pressures investigative journalists face.

In the future, we may see more professors choose to diversify their classes by implementing film in their curriculum. Conroy hopes to host more screenings like Ramayana to get the campus involved in both film and the learning experience.