A question may be either a linguistic expression used to make a request for information, or else the request itself made by such an expression. This information may be provided with an answer.

Questions are normally ''put forward'' or ''asked'' using interrogative sentences. However they can also be formed by imperative sentences, which normally express commands: "Tell me what two plus two is"; conversely, some expressions, such as "Would you pass the salt?", have the grammatical form of questions but actually function as requests for action, not for answers, making them allofunctional. (A phrase such as this could, theoretically, also be viewed not merely as a request but as an observation of the other person's desire to comply with the request given.)

Varieties of questions

Questions have a number of uses. 'Raising a question' may guide the questioner along an avenue of research (''see'' Socratic method). A rhetorical question is asked to make a point, and does not expect an answer (often the answer is implied or obvious). Pre-suppositional questions, such as "Have you stopped beating your wife?" may be used as a joke or to embarrass an audience, because any answer a person could give would imply more information than he was willing to affirm. Questions can also be titles of works of art and literature (e.g. Leo Tolstoy's short story ''How Much Land Does a Man Need?'' and the movie ''What About Bob?''), or a scholarly monograph (e.g. ''Who Asked the First Question?''). McKenzie lists 17 types of questions in his "Questioning Toolkit" and suggests that thinkers must orchestrate and combine these types in his article "Punchy Question Combinations". Examples of his question types include the ''irreverent question'', the ''apparently irrelevant question'', the ''hypothetical question'' and the ''unanswerable question''. Questions can be infelicitous as well, based on incorrect and illogical premises (e.g. "Why do cats have green wings?").

In research projects

#Descriptive question, used primarily to describe the existence of some thing or process. #Relational question, designed to look at the relationships between two or more variables. #Causal question, designed to determine whether one or more variables causes or affects one or more outcome variables.

In surveys

#Dichotomous questions, usually these questions require yes/no answers or require a person to answer by choosing an option(s) from a multiple choice of possible answers. #Nominal questions, these types of questions are designed to inquire about a level of quantitative measure. Usually these questions form correlations between a number and a concept. For example:

Occupational Class: 1= Moderate 2= Severe 3= etc.

#Qualifying questions (also called ''filter questions'', or ''contingency questions'') These types of questions are designed to determine if the individual answering the question needs to continue on to answer subsequent questions.

Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives (Categories of questions)

Knowledge: who, what, when, where, why, how..? Describe...?

Comprehension: retell...

Application: How is...an example of...?; how is...related to...?; why is...significant?

Analysis: What are the parts or features of...? Classify...according to...;

Synthesis: What would you infer from...? What ideas can you add to...? How would you design a new..? What would happen if you combined...? What solutions would you suggest for...?

Evaluation: Do you agree that...? What do you think about...? What is the most important..? Place the following in order of priority...? How would you decide about...? What criteria would you use to assess...?

Grammar

Languages may use both syntax and prosody to distinguish interrogative sentences (which pose questions) from declarative sentences (which state propositions). Syntax refers to grammatical changes, such as moving words around or adding questions words; prosody refers to changes in tone of voice while speaking. Some syntactic devices used by languages for marking questions include:

A marked word order different from the usual word order in statements (see wh-movement). For example, French speakers may ask questions using inversion, and English speakers may do so in sentences with auxiliary verbs (as in "Do you want...?" as opposed to "You do want....").

An interrogative mood or some other verb inflection such as the subjunctive mood

A grammatical particle (cf. Japanese ''ka'', Mandarin ''ma'') Replacing a word in a declarative sentence with an interrogative word (also known as a ''wh''-word) such as "what". For example, in English the declarative "you want something" can be changed into a question by replacing 'something' with 'what' and moving it, as well as adding the auxiliary "do" ("What do you want?"); in Mandarin, however, only the first step is necessary ( ''nǐ yào shénme'', lit. "you want what?")

Non-syntactic devices include:

A different intonation pattern (often a raised pitch near the end of the sentence) - see Intonation (linguistics)

(In written language) distinctive punctuation, such as the question mark

Combinations of any of the above are possible, as well as alternative patterns for different types of questions. For example, English employs the syntactic approach (word order change) and the tonal pattern for common questions, but resorts to just raising the tone while leaving the word order as it is for focused (emphatic) questions such as "You did ''what''?". Spanish changes the word order only when interrogative pronouns are involved (not in yes-no questions). In Chinese, the word order remains the same for questions as for statements, with the particle added to create a wh-interrogative in situ.

In languages written in Latin or Cyrillic, a question mark at the end of the sentence identifies questions orthographically. In Spanish, an additional mark is placed at the beginning (e.g. ''¿Cómo está usted?'').

"Negative questions" are interrogative sentences which contain negation in their phrasing, such as "Shouldn't you be working?". These can have different ways of expressing affirmation and denial from the standard form of question, and they can be confusing, since it is sometimes unclear whether the answer should be the opposite of the answer to the non-negated question. For example, if one does not have a passport, both "Do you have a passport?" and "Don't you have a passport?" are properly answered with "No", despite apparently asking opposite questions. The Japanese language avoids this ambiguity. Answering "No" to the second of these in Japanese would mean, "I ''do'' have a passport".

A similar ambiguous question in English is "Do you mind if...?" The responder may not reply unambiguously "Yes, I do mind," if they do, or "No, I don't mind," if they don't, a simple "No" or "Yes" answer can lead to confusion, as a single "No" can seem like a "Yes, I do mind," as in "No, please don't do that," and a "Yes" can seem like a "No, I don't mind," as in "Yes, go ahead." An easy way to bypass this confusion would be to ask a non-negative question, such as "Is it all right with you if...?"

Some languages have different particles (for example the French "''si''", the German "''doch''" or the Danish "''jo''") to answer negative questions (or negative statements) in an affirmative way; they provide a means to express contradiction.

There are three types of sentences in the English language where the predicate can come before the subject. An interrogative sentence is one such one; for example, in "what did you buy?", the predicate "what" comes before the subject "you".

Types

Yes–no questions

* Yes–no questions can be answered with a "yes" or "no", hence the name.

Alternative questions

* Alternative questions (choice questions) present two or more alternatives, as in "Do you want fish or lamb?". They cannot be answered with a yes or no.

Wh-questions

* Wh-questions use interrogative words to request information. In some languages, wh-movement may be involved. They too cannot be answered with a yes or no.

Tag questions

* Tag questions are a grammatical structure in which a declarative statement or an imperative is turned into a question by adding an interrogative fragment (the "tag"), such as "right"—for example, "You remembered the eggs, right?" Tag questions can be answered with a yes or no.

Questions and answers

The simplest questions implicitly or explicitly request information from a range (finite or infinite) of alternatives. When information purporting to be that requested is presented back to the questioner, the question is said to be ''answered''. The information thus presented is called an ''answer''. Answers may be ''correct'' or ''incorrect''. They are incorrect if they present false information. If they present information from outside the proffered alternatives, they may be called wrong or simply inappropriate or irrelevant. This depends on the context, as do several other possibilities: Sometimes "I don't know" is an acceptable answer, sometimes even a correct answer. The same is true of "None of the above" and "There is no answer." An answer is the, or a, correct answer, if it presents true information which falls within the determined range of alternatives. Questions of this simplest sort usually begin with ''Who'', ''what'', ''which'', ''where'', ''when'', ''does''/''do'', ''is''/''are''.

Other questions do not so easily fit this mould. For example, questions beginning "Why" and "How" often request any information at all that will alleviate certain confusion in a person who wants to ask that question. Here the manner in which the information is presented might be more important than which information is presented; the questioner may even already know all of the information contained in the right answer, and merely needs it to be expressed in a more useful form.

Ultimately, the interrogative pronouns (those beginning with ''wh'' in addition to the word ''how''), derive from the Proto-Indo-European root ''k^wo-'' or ''k^wi'', the former of which was reflected in Proto-Germanic as ''χ^wa-'' or ''kh^wa-''.. In ''how'' (Old English ''hū'', from Proto-Germanic ''χ^wō''), the ''w'' merged into the lave of the word, as it did in Old Frisian ''hū, hō'' (Dutch ''hoe'' "how"), but it can still be seen in Old Saxon ''hwō'', Old High German ''hwuo'' (German ''wie'' "how"). The Proto-Indo-European root directly originated the Latin and Romance form ''qu-'' in words such as Latin ''quī'' ("which") and ''quando'' ("when"). In English, the gradual change of voiceless stops into voiceless fricatives (phase 1 of Grimm's law) during the development of Germanic languages is responsible for "wh-" of interrogatives. Although some varieties of American English and various Scottish dialects still preserve the original sound (i.e. [hw] rather than [w]), the majority only preserve the [w]. The words ''who'', ''whom'', ''whose'', ''what'' and ''why'', can all be considered to come from a single Old English word ''hwā'', reflecting its masculine and feminine nominative (''hwā''), dative (''hwām''), genitive (''hwæs''), neuter nominative and accusative (''hwæt''), and instrumental (masculine and neuter singular) (''hwȳ'', later ''hwī'') respectively. Other interrogative words, such as ''which'', ''how'', ''where'', ''whence'' as well as the now archaic ''whither'' derive either from compounds (''which'' coming from a compound of ''hwā'' [what, who] and ''līc'' [like]), or other words from the same root (''how'' deriving from ''hū'').

Learning

Questions are used from the most elementary stage of learning to original research. In the scientific method, a question often forms the basis of the investigation and can be considered a transition between the observation and hypothesis stages. Students of all ages use questions in their learning of topics, and the skill of having learners creating "investigatable" questions is a central part of inquiry education. The Socratic method of questioning student responses may be used by a teacher to lead the student towards the truth without direct instruction, and also helps students to form logical conclusions.

A widespread and accepted use of questions in an educational context is the assessment of students' knowledge through exams.

Philosophical questions

The philosophical questions are conceptual, not factual questions. There are questions that are not fully answered by any other. Philosophy deals with questions that arise when people reflect on their lives and their world. Some philosophical questions are practical: for example, "Is euthanasia justifiable?", "Does the state have the right to censor pornography or restrict tobacco advertising?", "To what extent are Mäori and Päkehä today responsible for decisions made by their ancestors?".

Other philosophical questions are more theoretical, although they often arise through thinking about practical issues. The questions just listed, for example, may prompt more general philosophical questions about the circumstances under which it may be morally justifiable to take a life, or about the extent to which the state may restrict the liberty of the individual. Some fascinating, 'classic', questions of philosophy are speculative and theoretical and concern the nature of knowledge, reality and human existence: for example, "What, if anything, can be known with certainty?", "Is the mind essentially non-physical?", "Are values absolute or relative?", "Does the universe need explanation in terms of a Supreme Intelligence?", "What, if anything, is the meaning or purpose of human existence?". Finally, the philosophical questions are typically about conceptual issues; they are often questions about our concepts and the relation between our concepts and the world they represent.

Origins of questioning behavior

Joseph Jordania suggested that the ability to ask questions is the central cognitive element that distinguishes human and animal cognitive abilities. Enculturated apes Kanzi, Washoe, Sarah and a few others who underwent extensive language training programs (with the use of gestures and other visual forms of communications) successfully learned to ''answer'' quite complex questions and requests (including question words "who" what", "where"), although so far they failed to learn how to ''ask questions themselves''. For example, David and Anne Premack wrote: "Though she [Sarah] understood the question, she did not herself ask any questions — unlike the child who asks interminable questions, such as What that? Who making noise? When Daddy come home? Me go Granny's house? Where puppy? Sarah never delayed the departure of her trainer after her lessons by asking where the trainer was going, when she was returning, or anything else". The ability to ask questions is often assessed in relation to comprehension of syntactic structures. Jordania suggested that this approach is not justified, as (1) questioning is primarily a cognitive ability, and (2) questions can be asked without the use of syntactic structures (with the use of specific intonation only). It is widely accepted, that the first questions are asked by humans during their early infancy, at the pre-syntactic, one word stage of language development, with the use of question intonation.

See also

Debate

Doubt

Exclamation

Inquiry

Interrogation

Interrobang

Interrogative word

Interrogatory

Logic

Problem

Proposition

Question mark

Rhetorical question

Sentence (linguistics)

Sentence function

Truth

Who Asked the First Question?

References

C. L. Hamblin, "Questions", in: Paul Edwards (ed.), Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

Georg Stahl, "Un développement de la logique des questions", in: Revue Philosophique de la France et de l'Etranger 88 (1963), 293-301.

Fieser, James, Lillegard, Norman (eds), Philosophical questions: readings and interactive guides, 2005.

McKenzie, Jamie, Leading questions: ''From Now On'': The Educational Technology Journal, 2007.

McKenzie, Jamie, Learning to question to wonder to learn, ''From Now On'': The Educational Technology Journal, 2005.

McKenzie, Jamie, "The Question Mark"

Muratta Bunsen, Eduardo, "Lo erotico en la pregunta", in: Aletheia 5 (1999), 65-74.

Smith, Joseph Wayne, Essays on ultimate questions: critical discussions of the limits of contemporary philosophical inquiry, Aldershot: Avebury, 1988.

Berti, Enrico, Soggetti di responsabilita: questioni di filosofia pratica, Reggio Emilia, 1993.

Category:Grammar Category:Human communication Category:Data collection Category:Interrogative words and phrases Category:Sentences by type

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name	Jim Jarmusch
birth date	January 22, 1953
birth name	James R. Jarmusch
birth place	Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, United States
occupation	Film director, screenwriter, actor, producer, editor and composer
alma mater	Columbia University (1975)
years active	1979–present
partner	Sara Driver }}

James R. "Jim" Jarmusch (; born January 22, 1953) is an American independent film director, screenwriter, actor, producer, editor and composer. Jarmusch has been a major proponent of independent cinema, particularly during the 1980s and 1990s.

Early life

Jarmusch was born to a family of middle-class suburbanites in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio in 1953. His mother, of Irish and German descent, had been a reviewer of film and theatre for the ''Akron Beacon Journal'' before marrying his father, a businessman of Czech and German descent who worked for the B.F. Goodrich Company. She introduced the future director, the middle of three children, to the world of cinema by leaving him at a local cinema to watch matinee double features such as ''Attack of the Crab Monsters'' and ''Creature From the Black Lagoon'' while she ran errands. The first adult film he recalls having seen was the 1958 cult classic ''Thunder Road'' (starring Robert Mitchum) the violence and darkness of which left an impression on the seven-year-old Jarmusch. Another B-movie influence from his childhood was ''Ghoulardi'', an eccentric Cleveland television show which featured horror films.

Despite his enthusiasm for film, Jarmusch, an avid reader in his youth, had a greater interest in literature, a pursuit in which he was encouraged by his grandmother. Though he refused to attend church with his Episcopalian parents (not being enthused by "the idea of sitting in a stuffy room wearing a little tie"), Jarmusch credits literature with shaping his metaphysical beliefs and leading him to reconsider theology in his mid-teens. From his peers he developed a taste for counterculture: he and his friends would steal the records and books of their older siblings – William Burroughs, Jack Kerouac, Mothers of Invention. They made fake identity documents which allowed them to visit bars at the weekend but also the local art house cinema – which though it typically showed pornographic films would on occasion feature underground films such as Robert Downey, Sr.'s ''Putney Swope'' and Andy Warhol's ''Chelsea Girls''. At one point, he took an apprenticeship with a commercial photographer. "Growing up in Ohio", he would later remark, "was just planning to get out".

New York

After graduating from high school in 1971, Jarmusch moved to Chicago and enrolled in the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. After being asked to leave due to neglecting to take any journalism courses–Jarmusch favored literature and art history–he transferred to Columbia University the following year, with the intention of becoming a poet. At Columbia, he studied English and American literature under professors including New York School avant garde poets Kenneth Koch and David Shapiro. At Columbia he began to write short "semi-narrative abstract pieces", and edited the undergraduate literary journal ''The Columbia Review''.

During his final year at Columbia, Jarmusch moved to Paris, for what was initially a summer semester on an exchange program but turned into ten months. There, he worked as a delivery driver for an art gallery, and spent most of his time at the Cinémathèque Française.

Jarmusch graduated from Columbia University in 1975.

Broke and working as a musician in New York City after returning from Paris in 1976, Jarmusch applied on a whim to the prestigious Graduate Film School of New York University's Tisch School of the Arts (then under the direction of Hollywood director László Benedek). Despite his complete lack of experience in filmmaking, his submission of a collection of still photographs and an essay about film secured his acceptance into the program. He studied there for four years, meeting fellow students and future collaborators Sara Driver, Tom DiCillo and Spike Lee in the process. During the late 1970s in New York City, Jarmusch and his contemporaries were part of an alternative culture scene centered on the CBGB music club.

In his final year at New York University, Jarmusch worked as an assistant to the renowned ''film noir'' director Nicholas Ray, who was at that time teaching in the department. In an anecdote Jarmusch has recounted of the formative experience of showing his mentor his first script, Ray disapproved of its lack of action, to which Jarmusch responded after meditating on the critique by reworking the script to be even less eventful. On Jarmusch's return with the revised script, Ray reacted favourably to his student's dissent, citing approvingly the young student's obstinate independence. Jarmusch was the only person Ray brought to work – as his personal assistant – on ''Lightning Over Water'', a documentary about his dying years on which he was collaborating with Wim Wenders. Nicholas Ray died in the summer of 1979 after a long fight with cancer. A few days afterwards, having been encouraged by Ray and New York underground filmmaker Amos Poe and using scholarship funds given by the Louis B. Mayer Foundation to pay for his school tuition, Jarmusch started work on a film for his final project. The university, unimpressed with Jarmusch's use of his funding as well as the project itself, promptly refused to award him a degree.

Feature films

First features and rise to fame: ''Vacation'' and ''Paradise''

Jarmusch's final year university project was completed in 1980 as ''Permanent Vacation'', his first feature film. It was made on a shoestring budget of around $12,000 in misdirected scholarship funds and shot by cinematographer Tom DiCillo on 16 mm film. The 75 minute quasi-autobiographical feature follows an adolescent drifter (Chris Parker) as he wanders around downtown Manhattan. The film was not released theatrically, and did not attract the sort of adulation from critics that greeted his later work. ''The Washington Post'' staff writer Hal Hinson would disparagingly comment in an aside during a review of Jarmusch's ''Mystery Train'' (1989) that in the director's debut, "the only talent he demonstrated was for collecting egregiously untalented actors". The bleak and unrefined ''Permanent Vacation'' is nevertheless one of the director's most personal films, and established many of the hallmarks he would exhibit in his later work, including derelict urban settings, chance encounters, and a wry sensibility.

Jarmusch's first major film, ''Stranger Than Paradise'', was produced on a budget of approximately $125,000 and released in 1984 to much critical acclaim. A deadpan comedy recounting a strange journey of three disillusioned youths from New York through Cleveland to Florida, the film broke many conventions of traditional Hollywood filmmaking. It was awarded the Camera d'Or at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival as well as the 1985 National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Film, and became a landmark work in modern independent film.

''Down by Law'', ''Mystery Train'', and ''Night on Earth''

In 1986, Jarmusch wrote and directed ''Down by Law'', starring musicians John Lurie and Tom Waits, and Italian comic actor Roberto Benigni (his introduction to American audiences) as three convicts who escape from a New Orleans jailhouse. Shot like the director's previous efforts in black and white, this constructivist neo-noir was Jarmusch's first collaboration with renowned Dutch cinematographer Robby Müller, who had been known for his work with Wenders.

His next two films each experimented with parallel narratives: ''Mystery Train'' (1989) told three successive stories set on the same night in and around a small Memphis hotel, and ''Night on Earth'' (1991) involved five cab drivers and their passengers on rides in five different world cities, beginning at sundown in Los Angeles and ending at sunrise in Helsinki. Less bleak and somber than Jarmusch's earlier work, ''Mystery Train'' nevertheless retained the director's askance conception of America. He wrote ''Night on Earth'' in about a week, out of frustration at the collapse of the production of another film he had written and the desire to visit and collaborate with friends such as Benigni, Gena Rowlands, and Isaach de Bankolé.

As a result of his early work, Jarmusch became an influential representative of the trend of the American road movie. Not intended to appeal to mainstream filmgoers, these early Jarmusch films were embraced by art house audiences, gaining a small but dedicated American following and cult status in Europe and Japan. Each of the four films had their premiere at the eminent and discerning New York Film Festival, while ''Mystery Train'' was in competition at the 1989 Cannes Film Festival. Jarmusch's distinctive aesthetic and ''auteur'' status fomented a critical backlash at the close of this early period, however; though reviewers praised the charm and adroitness of ''Mystery Train'' and ''Night On Earth'', the director was increasingly charged with repetitiveness and risk-aversion.

In 1991 Jim Jarmusch appeared as himself in Episode One of John Lurie's cult television series ''Fishing With John''.

Late nineties, experiments in genre: ''Dead Man'' and ''Ghost Dog''

In 1995, Jarmusch released ''Dead Man'', a period film set in the 19th century American West starring Johnny Depp and Gary Farmer. Produced at a cost of almost $9 million with a high-profile cast including John Hurt, Gabriel Byrne and, in his final role, Robert Mitchum, the film marked a significant departure for the director from his previous features. Earnest in tone in comparison to its self-consciously hip and ironic predecessors, ''Dead Man'' was thematically expansive and of an often violent and progressively more surreal character. The film was shot in black and white by Robby Müller, and features a score composed and performed by Neil Young, for whom Jarmusch subsequently filmed the tour documentary ''Year of the Horse'', released to tepid reviews in 1997. Though ill-received by mainstream American reviewers, ''Dead Man'' found much favor internationally and among critics, many of whom lauded it as a visionary masterpiece. It has been hailed as one of the few films made by a Caucasian that presents an authentic Native American culture and character, and Jarmusch stands by it as such, though it has attracted both praise and castigation for its portrayal of the American West, violence, and especially Native Americans.

Following artistic success and critical acclaim in the American independent film community, he achieved mainstream renown with his far-East philosophical crime film ''Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai'', shot in Jersey City and starring Forest Whitaker as a young inner-city man who has found purpose for his life by unyieldingly conforming it to the ''Hagakure'', an 18th-century philosophy text and training manual for samurai, becoming, as directed, a terrifyingly deadly hit-man for a local mob boss to whom he may owe a debt, and who then betrays him. The soundtrack was supplied by RZA of the Wu-Tang Clan. The film was unique among other things for the number of books important to and discussed by its characters, most of them listed bibliographically as part of the end credits. The film is also considered to be an homage to ''Le Samourai'', a 1967 French New Wave film by auteur Jean-Pierre Melville, which starred renowned French actor Alain Delon in a strikingly similar role and narrative.

Late period: ''Cigarettes'', ''Flowers'', and ''Control''

A five-year gap followed the release of ''Ghost Dog'', which the director has attributed to a creative crisis he experienced in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks in New York City. 2004 saw the eventual release of ''Coffee and Cigarettes'', a collection of eleven short films of characters sitting around drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes that had been filmed by Jarmusch over the course of the previous two decades. The first vignette, "Strange to Meet You", had been shot for and aired on ''Saturday Night Live'' in 1986, and paired Roberto Benigni with comedian Steven Wright. This had been followed three years later by "Twins", a segment featuring actors Steve Buscemi and Joie and Cinqué Lee, and then in 1993 with the Short Film Palme d'Or-winning "Somewhere in California", starring musicians Tom Waits and Iggy Pop.

He followed ''Coffee and Cigarettes'' in 2005 with ''Broken Flowers'', which starred Bill Murray as an early retiree who goes in search of the mother of his unknown son in attempt to overcome a midlife crisis. Following the release of ''Broken Flowers'', Jarmusch signed a deal with Fortissimo Films, whereby the distributor would fund and have "first-look" rights to the director's future films, and cover some of the overhead costs of his production company, Exoskeleton.

Jarmusch's latest film, ''The Limits of Control'', opened in the United States on May 22, 2009. A sparse, meditative crime film set in Spain, it starred Isaach de Bankolé as a lone assassin with a secretive mission. A behind-the-scenes documentary, ''Behind Jim Jarmusch'', was filmed over three days on the set of the film in Seville by director Léa Rinaldi.

In October 2009, Jarmusch appeared as himself in an episode of the HBO series ''Bored to Death''. In September 2010, Jarmusch helped to curate the All Tomorrow's Parties music festival in Monticello, New York. He is also working on a documentary about the rock band The Stooges and co-writing a non-traditional opera about the inventor Nikola Tesla. In 2012, Jarmusch will shoot a new film, ''Only Lovers Left Alive'', with Tilda Swinton, Tom Hiddleston, Mia Wasikowska, and John Hurt.

As a filmmaker

Style and characters

Jarmusch has been characterized as a minimalist filmmaker, and his idiosyncratic films unhurried. His films often eschew traditional narrative structure, lacking clear plot progression and focusing more on mood and character development. In an interview early in his career, he stated that his goal was "to approximate real time for the audience." Jarmusch's early work is marked by a brooding, contemplative tone, featuring extended silent scenes and prolonged still shots. He has experimented with a vignette format in three films either released or begun around the early nineties: ''Mystery Train,'' ''Night on Earth,'' and ''Coffee and Cigarettes''. Jarmusch's approach to filmmaking—in the words of ''The Salt Lake Tribune'' critic Sean P. Means—involves "blending film styles and genres with sharp wit and dark humor", and is pervaded by a signature deadpan comedic tone.

The protagonists of Jarmusch's films are usually lone adventurers. The director's male characters have been described by critic Jennie Yabroff as "three time losers, petty thiefs and inept con men, all [...] eminently likeable, if not down right charming", and by novelist Paul Auster as "laconic, withdrawn, sorrowful mumblers".

Themes

Though his films are predominantly set in the United States, Jarmusch has advanced the notion that he looks at America "through a foreigner's eyes", with the intention of creating a form of world cinema that synthesizes European and Japanese film with that of Hollywood. His films have often included foreign actors and characters, and (at times substantial) non-English dialogue. In his two later-nineties films, he dwelt on different cultures' experiences of violence, and on textual appropriations between cultures: a wandering Native American's love of William Blake, a black hit-man's passionate devotion to the ''Hagakure''. The interaction and syntheses between different cultures, the arbitrariness of national identity, and irreverence towards ethnocentric, patriotic or nationalistic sentiment are recurring themes in Jarmusch's work.

Jarmusch's fascination for music is another characteristic that is readily apparent in his work. Musicians appear frequently in key roles – John Lurie, Tom Waits, Gary Farmer, Youki Kudoh, RZA and Iggy Pop have featured in multiple Jarmusch films, while Joe Strummer and Screamin' Jay Hawkins appear in ''Mystery Train'' and GZA, Jack and Meg White feature in ''Coffee and Cigarettes''. Hawkins' song "I Put a Spell on You" was central to the plot of ''Stranger than Paradise'', while ''Mystery Train'' is inspired by and named after a song popularized by Elvis Presley, who is also the subject of a vignette in ''Coffee and Cigarettes''. In the words of critic Vincent Canby, "Jarmusch's movies have the tempo and rhythm of blues and jazz, even in their use – or omission – of language. His films work on the senses much the way that some music does, unheard until it's too late to get it out of one's head."

On his narrative focus, Jarmusch remarked in a 1989 interview, "I'd rather make a movie about a guy walking his dog than about the emperor of China."

Impact and legacy

Jarmusch is ascribed as having instigated the American independent film movement with ''Stranger Than Paradise''. Critic Lynn Hirschberg declared ''Stranger than Paradise'' in a 2005 profile of the director for ''The New York Times'' to have "permanently upended the idea of independent film as an intrinsically inaccessible avant-garde form". The success of the film accorded the director a certain iconic status within arthouse cinema, as an idiosyncratic and uncompromising ''auteur'' exuding the aura of urban cool embodied by downtown Manhattan. Such perceptions were compounded with the release of his subsequent features in the late 1980s, establishing him as one of the generation's most prominent and influential independent filmmakers. In a 1989 review of his work, Vincent Canby of ''The New York Times'' called Jarmusch "the most adventurous and arresting film maker to surface in the American cinema in this decade".

Jarmusch was recognized with the Filmmaker on the Edge award at the 2004 Provincetown International Film Festival. A retrospective of the director's films was hosted at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, during February 1994, and another, "The Sad and Beautiful World of Jim Jarmusch", by the American Film Institute in August 2005.

Personal life

Jarmusch rarely discusses his personal life in public. His longtime girlfriend, filmmaker Sara Driver, worked closely with him on his early films, but the stress this put on their relationship caused them to break up and resolve thereafter not to work together and have since lived together for many years. He divides his time between New York City and the Catskill Mountains of Upstate New York. Jarmusch stopped drinking coffee in 1986, the year of the first installment of ''Coffee and Cigarettes'', though he remained a smoker.

In the early 1980s, Jarmusch was part of a revolving lineup of musicians in Robin Crutchfield's Dark Day project, and later became the keyboardist and one of two vocalists for The Del-Byzanteens, a No Wave band whose sole LP ''Lies to Live By'' was a minor underground hit in the United States and Britain in 1982. Jarmusch is also featured on the album ''Wu-Tang Meets the Indie Culture'' (2005) in two interludes described by Sean Fennessy in a Pitchfork Media review of the album as both "bizarrely pretentious" and "reason alone to give it a listen". Jarmusch and Michel Gondry each contributed a remix to a limited edition release of the track "Blue Orchid" by The White Stripes in 2005.

The author of a series of essays on influential bands, Jarmusch has also had at least two poems published. He is a founding member of The Sons of Lee Marvin, a humorous "semi-secret society" of artists resembling the iconic actor, which issues communiqués and meets on occasion for the ostensible purpose of watching Marvin's films.

Selected filmography

''Permanent Vacation'' (1980)

''Stranger Than Paradise'' (1984)

''Down by Law'' (1986)

''Mystery Train'' (1989)

''Night on Earth'' (1991)

''Dead Man'' (1995)

''Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai'' (1999)

''Coffee and Cigarettes'' (2003)

''Broken Flowers'' (2005)

''The Limits of Control'' (2009)

''Only Loves Left Alive'' (2012-??)

See also

No Wave Cinema

Footnotes

References

Ródenas, Gabri (2009), ''Guía para ver y analizar'' Noche en la Tierra ''de Jim Jarmusch'', Barcelona / Valencia: Octaedro / Nau Llibres. ISBN 978-84-8063-931-6 / 978-84-7642-776-7

Ródenas, Gabri (2009), “Jarmusch y Carver: Se ha roto el frigorífico” in Fernández, P. (Ed.), ''Rompiendo moldes: Discursos, género e hibridación en el siglo XXI''. Zamora/Sevilla: Editorial Comunicación Social. ISBN 978-84-96082-88-5. Available at Google Books.

Ródenas, Gabri (2009), “Jarmusch Vs Reagan” in ''Revista Odisea''. Almería: University of Almería. December 2009. ISSN 1578-3820.

Ródenas, Gabri (2010), “Jim Jarmusch: Del insomnio americano al insomnio universal”, in ''Comunicación y sociedad'', Navarra: University of Navarra, June 2010. ISSN 0214-0039.

Ródenas, Gabri (2011), ''Jim Jarmusch: Lecturas sobre el insomnio americano (1980-1991)'', Spain/Germany: - Editorial Académica Española - LAP Lambert Academic Publishing GmbH & Co. KG. ISBN 978-3-8443-3503-3.

Further reading

External links

Jim Jarmusch at the ''Senses of Cinema'' Great Directors critical database

The Jim Jarmusch Resource Page, curated by Jarmusch scholar Ludvig Hertzberg

* Limited Control, Hertzberg's companion blog

It's a sad and beautiful world

Category:1953 births Category:American film directors Category:American people of Czech descent Category:American people of German descent Category:American people of Irish descent Category:American screenwriters Category:Chevaliers of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres Category:Columbia University alumni Category:Living people Category:New York University alumni Category:Medill School of Journalism alumni Category:People from Akron, Ohio Category:People from Manhattan Category:American experimental filmmakers

bg:Джим Джармуш bs:Jim Jarmusch ca:Jim Jarmusch cs:Jim Jarmusch da:Jim Jarmusch de:Jim Jarmusch et:Jim Jarmusch es:Jim Jarmusch eo:Jim Jarmusch fa:جیم جارموش fr:Jim Jarmusch ga:Jim Jarmusch gl:Jim Jarmusch ko:짐 자무시 hr:Jim Jarmusch it:Jim Jarmusch he:ג'ים ג'ארמוש lv:Džims Džārmušs hu:Jim Jarmusch mk:Џим Џармуш nl:Jim Jarmusch ja:ジム・ジャームッシュ no:Jim Jarmusch pl:Jim Jarmusch pt:Jim Jarmusch ro:Jim Jarmusch ru:Джармуш, Джим sk:Jim Jarmusch sr:Џим Џармуш fi:Jim Jarmusch sv:Jim Jarmusch tg:Ҷим Ҷармуш tr:Jim Jarmusch uk:Джим Джармуш zh:吉姆·賈木許

name	Shekhar Suman
alt	Shekhar Suman at Jhalak Dikhla Jaa Bash
birth place	Patna, Bihar, India
spouse	Alka Suman
yearsactive	1985 - present
occupation	Actor }}

Shekhar Suman is an Indian film actor and a television personality. He has also been featured as a singer on a music album. Suman married Alka Kapur on May 4, 1984, and has a son, Adhyayan Suman a Bollywood film actor.

Career

He started his Bollywood career with the film ''Utsav'' opposite Rekha in September 1985.

On television, he was featured in the shows ''Dekh Bhai Dekh'', ''Reporter'', ''Wah janab'','chote babu' ''Andaz'',''Amar Prem'' 'aaha', 'main' 'vilayati babu'''Movers n Shakers'', ''Simply Shekhar'' and ''Carry On shekhar''. The last three were primarily modelled on and adapted from ''The Tonight Show'' with Jay Leno. He hosted ''Film Deewane'' ''The Great Indian Comedy Show'' on Star One until February 2006 and appeared in some episodes of ''Dial One aur Jeeto'' on Sahara TV. He also did quiz shows including ''Nilaam Ghar'' on Zee Television and ''He-Man'' on Star One. He also hosted a show on Star News, ''Poll Khol'' for five years, which was a satire on the Indian politics, ''Comedy Circus I'', ''Comedy ka maha muqabala'', and ''Perfect Bride''.

He was one of the judges of ''The Great Indian Laughter Challenge'' along with Navjot Singh Sidhu. This programme, a stand-up comedy contest, was the first of its kind on Indian television. However, Shekhar quit after the end of the third season due to differences with Sidhu. He became the judge of a rival comedy program ''Comedy Circus''. He also hosted the show ''Jab Khelo SAB Khelo'' on SAB TV. He can be seen on Sony TV as a participant in Jhalak Dikhlaja.

He made his singing debut with a music album named ''Kuch Khwaab Aise'', a collection of eight love ballads whose music was composed by Aadesh Srivastava and lyrics written by Shyam Raj. In December 2009, he appeared as a participant on a reality TV series, ''Raaz Pichhle Janam Ka'' based on past life regression.

He has also appeared as a judge in the reality TV show ''Lux Perfect Bride''.

Filmography

Television

! Title	! Role	! Channel
	Judge
	Judge
''Comedy Circus 2''	Judge
''Comedy Circus 20 – 20''	Judge
''Comedy Circus Ka Jadoo''	Judge
''Dam Dama Dam''	Sarju/Chichi/Sonu/Karan	Zee TV
''Dekh Bhai Dekh''	Sameer Diwan
''Dekh India Dekh''	Judge
''Ek Raja Ek Rani''	Ajay Kapoor	DD National / Zee TV
	Ajay Premi	STAR Plus
	Contestant
''Simply Shekhar''	Host	Zee TV
''Tedhi Baat Shekhar Ke Saath''		SAB TV
''The Great Indian Comedy Show''	Judge	STAR One
''The Great Indian Laughter Challenge''	Judge	STAR One

Film

	bgcolor=#DDEEFF

References

External links

Category:Living people Category:Indian film actors Category:Indian comedians Category:Indian actors Category:Hindi film actors Category:Indian Hindus Category:Indian television presenters