Spirituality and the Moving Image

This probably sounds pretty uninformed of me, but I didn’t know that the Media Arts Department had a mission statement. I just thought that the goals of the department were the same as the four aims of BYU. After reading the mission statement, I feel like I’ve really been put back into perspective of what my schooling is really about. I think that it would have been better for the writer to have included some quotes by both prophets and film scholars that apply to both our role as seekers of exaltation and filmmakers. Things like that are a form of testimony, and testimonies always speak with more power than someone just saying a bunch of words. This statement is very useful to me. I think that my growing experience in this department and at BYU has been sculpted by the mission statement, even though I was unaware of its existence. The most important part of the statement to me was when the question was asked: “How has film helped you find out who you are and what matters most to you in the world?”
Until recently I haven’t ever really taken a step back and looked at the lessons that I have learned from films. Looking at my favorite films help me to understand what I care about and the questions that seem to be ever present in my life. They help me to really figure out who I am. I recognize similarities in my life to the lives of those in the film and my reaction to those similarities says a lot about the person I am. These moments of reflection never would have happened if I wasn’t in a program whose main goal is to help me find out who I am and what matters most to me.
This website is definitely a writerly text. It doesn’t have any pictures or fancy things to look at. I think that that could be changed. For one thing, I think that it should be more advertised as existing, so people will be more desirous to look for it. Or at least have teachers draw attention to the fact that it exists. I have also seen short films made to demonstrate ideas like the one the above question poses. For example, the visual arts department made a short film that kind of motivates people to embrace life and love where they are at. This is the Media Arts department, why have we not done something like that?