This is a midterm paper which will discuss the movie “Desk Set”. “Beginning in the mid-1940s, C. Wright Mills was a professor of at Columbia University, where he initially did research at Columbia’s Bureau of Applied Social Research. He went on to write during the 1950s a number of well known, if controversial, books critical of American society, including, for example, The Power Elite (1959). He also wrote White Collar: The American Middle Class, https://archive.org/stream/whitecollarameri00mill#page/n0/mode/2up, which was published in 1951.
Your paper should analyze the movie Desk Set, focusing upon how the researchers and the computer are portrayed in the context of Mills’ study White Collar: The American Middle Class, in particular, Chapter 10 entitled “Work”. You may approach the subject in any manner you believe is appropriate. For example, you may wish to discuss how the movie reinforces or contradicts Mills’ portrayal of “work”, to what extent the interaction between the characters reflects what Mills titles “The Morale of the Cheerful Robots,” whether the work environment in the film, including its hierarchy, conforms to “The Conditions of Modern Work,” and whether we are intended to believe (or not) the movie’s resolution of the conflicts presented by the computer. While your paper must be limited to an analysis of Desk Set and should focus upon Chapter 10, you need not limit your paper to this particular chapter but may consider others, such as Chapter 7 (“Brains, Inc.”). You may also consider discussing other, then-contemporary critiques in addition to Mills’ White Collar if, for example, you wish to contrast his view with that of other contemporary writers.”
I will also upload the syllabus for better understanding.