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In the late 1990s and 2000s, a number of calls were made by scholars to “internationalize” or “dewesternize” the field of media and communication studies. I argue that these approaches have indirectly silenced a much longer disciplinary history outside “the West” that has not only produced empirical knowledge but has also actively challenged Western epistemologies. This article seeks to reinscribe the epistemological and historical foundations of media and communication studies in Africa. By framing the research of African media and communication scholars within the changing nature of knowledge production, shifting power relations between African nations, and the evolving role of African universities, I demonstrate how academic knowledge production is frequently driven and constrained by particular dominant social, political, and economic interests.

Betancourt reviews The Desiring-Image: Gilles Deleuze and Contemporary Queer Cinema by Nick Davis and Ethereal Queer Television, Historicity, Desire by Amy Villarejo.

This book introduces the term "otherism" and looks at the discourse of otherism and the issue of otherness in South Asian religion, literature and film. It examines cultural questions related to the human condition of being the "other," of the process of "othering" and of the representation of "otherness" and its religious, cultural and ideological implications. The book applies the perspectives of ideological criticism, theories of hybridity, orientalism, nationalism, and gender and queer studies to gain new insights into the literature, film and culture of South Asia. It looks at the different ways of interpreting "otherness" today. The book goes on to analyze the ideological implications of the creation of "otherness" with regard to religious and cultural identity and the legitimation of power, as well as how the representation of "otherness" reflects the power structures of contemporary societies in South Asia. Offering a well-thought-out reflection on important cultural questions as well as a deep insight into the study of religion and "otherness" in South Asian literature and film, this book is a pioneering project that is of interest to scholars of South Asian Studies and South Asian religions, literatures and cultures.

Transgender representations generally distance the transgender characters from the audience as objects of ridicule, fear, and sympathy. This distancing is accomplished through the use of specific narrative conventions and visual codes. In this dissertation, I analyze representations of transgender individuals in popular film comedies, thrillers, and independent dramas. Through a textual analysis of 24 films, I argue that the narrative conventions and visual codes of the films work to prevent identification or connection between the transgender characters and the audience. The purpose of this distancing is to privilege the heteronormative identities of the characters over their transgender identities. This dissertation is grounded in a cultural studies approach to representation as constitutive and constraining and a positional approach to gender that views gender identity as a position taken in a specific social context. Contributions are made to the fields of communication, film studies, and gender studies through the methodological approach to textual analysis of categories of films over individual case studies and the idea that individuals can be positioned in identities they do not actively claim for themselves. This dissertation also makes a significant contribution to conceptions of the gaze through the development of three transgender gazes that focus on the ways the characters are visually constructed rather than the viewpoints taken by audience members. In the end, transgender representations work to support heteronormativity by constructing the transgender characters in specific ways to prevent audience members from developing deeper connections with them.

De-Westernizing Film Studies aims to consider what form a challenge to the enduring vision of film as a medium - and film studies as a discipline - modelled on ‘Western’ ideologies, theoretical and historical frameworks, critical perspectives as well as institutional and artistic practices, might take today. The book combines a range of scholarly writing with critical reflection from filmmakers, artists & industry professionals, comprising experience and knowledge from a wide range of geographical areas, film cultures and (trans-)national perspectives. In their own ways, the contributors to this volume problematize a binary mode of thinking that continues to promote an idea of ‘the West and the rest’ in relation to questions of production, distribution, reception and representation within an artistic medium (cinema) that, as part of contemporary moving image culture, is more globalized and diversified than at any time in its history. In so doing, De-Westernizing Film Studies complicates and/or re-thinks how local, national and regional film cultures ‘connect’ globally, seeking polycentric, multi-directional, non-essentialized alternatives to Eurocentric theoretical and historical perspectives found in film as both an artistic medium and an academic field of study. The book combines a series of chapters considering a range of responses to the idea of 'de-westernizing' film studies with a series of in-depth interviews with filmmakers, scholars and critics. Contributors: Nathan Abrams, John Akomfrah, Saër Maty Bâ, Mohammed Bakrim, Olivier Barlet, Yifen Beus, Farida Benlyazid, Kuljit Bhamra, William Brown, Campbell, Jonnie Clementi-Smith, Shahab Esfandiary, Coco Fusco, Patti Gaal-Holmes, Edward George, Will Higbee, Katharina Lindner, Daniel Lindvall, Teddy E. Mattera, Sheila Petty, Anna Piva, Deborah Shaw, Rod Stoneman, Kate E. Taylor-Jones

The writer frames his analysis of Kan Lume and Loo Zihan's feature length film Solos (2007) with a historical overview of the representation of queer sexualities in new Singaporean cinema. This approach also takes in the Penal Code Section 377A, arguing that not only do these repressive laws force queer sexualities to the margins of culture and society, but also that the State's censorship laws are a means by which it can reify ‘the Asian value system's supposed rejection of queerness’.

The writer examines Singapore's Media Development Authority's censorship of representations of lesbianism in film, music video, television and theatre. She highlights the government surveillance and repression of portrayals of LGBT cultures and communities in Singapore by unpacking the ambiguities and contradictions underlying the censorship of these popular media forms. This reflects an institutional ‘inability to read lesbians’.

The notion of “self” and “other” and its representation in artwork and literature is an important theme in current cultural sciences as well as in our everyday life in contemporary Western societies. Moreover, the concept of “self” and “other” and its imaginary dichotomy is gaining more and more political impact in a world of resurfacing ideology-ridden conflicts. The essays deal with Jewish reality in contemporary Germany and its reflection in movies from the special point of view of cultural sciences, political sciences, and religious studies. This anthology presents challengingly new insights into topics rarely covered, such as youth culture or humor, and finally discusses the images of Jewish life as realities still to be constructed.

Introduction and seven articles looking at the range of present-day queer cinema to be found.

While expanding critiques of pinkwashing have drawn increasing attention to how queer issues in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories are perniciously mobilized by a network of lobby groups, Brand Israel initiatives, and international gay and lesbian organizations, these critiques often fail to consider how queer Palestinians mobilize and understand themselves. This article reports on an October 2011 panel and film screening at Yale University and the Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies at New York University. “Queer/Palestinian: Critical Strategies in Palestinian Queer and Women's Filmmaking” uniquely focused on questions of queerness and Palestine through a program of eight new Palestinian visual productions. The program brought together Palestinian film scholars, filmmakers, visual artists, and curators for a discussion of queer and feminist artistic practice in relation to Palestinian strategies for resistance. Together, the “Queer/Palestinian” films suggest the urgency for Palestinian visual artists to persistently generate new means of expressing, embodying, and critiquing visions for Palestinian society. Films such as Victoria Moufawad-Paul's Nus Enssas/ صيصنصن (Canada, 2011) and Raafat Hattab's Hourieh (Palestine, 2011) explore issues ranging from queer diasporic solidarity politics and challenges to out/closeted binaries and to the creative reinscription of nakba narratives. Nadia Awad's Two Adaptations of the Same Novel (US, 2011), Suzy Salamy's 1982/2006 (US, 2006), and Moufawad-Paul's Rejoice, O My Heart / يبلق اي حرفا (Canada, 2011) suggest an irreverent queer strategy by undermining the narrative conventions and visual codes of mainstream news media and popular US and Egyptian cinema. Salamy's video, previously projected through mobile exhibition on city buildings, and Eli Rezik's online “web-movies” Living Alone without Me (Palestine, 2011) and Between Us Two (Palestine, 2011) compelled a panel discussion of alternative means of distribution and exhibition. Finally, Alaa AbuAsad's Masturbate bil beit (Palestine, 2011) rounded out the program with an explicitly erotic and unapologetically political version of the meeting of “queer” and “Palestinian.”

This article discusses key findings from a survey of the professional patterns, scholarly productivity, and educational characteristics of Chilean Journalism and Mass Communication (JMC) educators, as well as documentary information about the schools where they work. The results reveal a weak academic culture that contrasts with a strong professional culture among the members of this community, but also the influence that both organizational and individual variables have on Chilean JMC educators' orientations. Specifically, the analyses indicated that the level of education, part-time/full-time commitment, and the type of university are the most influential factors in defining both the prevalence of a professional culture and the lack of research productivity. These findings support other international studies, indicating a global tendency across key variables that influence academic development in the field. Likewise, it shows how distant Chilean JCM educators are from the university-scholarly tradition.

Marlon Rachquel Moore interviews emerging independent filmmaker Tina Mabry about her southern upbringing, racial and sexual consciousness, and the joys and turbulence of bringing her first feature-length film, Mississippi Damned, to the silver screen. Mississippi Damned is based on Mabry's family and set in her hometown of Tupelo, Mississippi.

Thérèse Lamartine est bien connue des milieux féministes. Détentrice d’une maîtrise en études cinématographiques, elle a publié Elles, cinéastes... ad lib, en 1985, aux Éditions Remue-ménage, dans lequel elle présentait des réalisatrices de diverses origines, actives entre 1895 et 1981. En 2009, elle publiait Soudoyer Dieu, un roman scrutant la longue et inconsolable douleur d’un groupe de femmes après la tuerie de Polytechnique. Avec Le Féminin au cinéma, une petite plaquette consacrée aux films «de femmes» ou, comme elle le précise, aux films qui «sculptent un art du mieux-vivre la mixité dans nos sociétés ou [qui] débrident les stéréotypes et nous dérident à la fois», Lamartine ouvre les portes d’un monde cinématographique souvent méconnu et rend hommage à des femmes de cinéma, autant derrière que devant la caméra. En sortant ces femmes de l’ombre, elle met au jour un cinéma riche et original, mais méconnu.

Cheryl Dunye's 1996 film The Watermelon Woman earned a place in cinematic history as the first feature-length narrative film written and directed by an out black lesbian about black lesbians. This article examines how the film provides an important opportunity to mark the burgeoning genre of black queer documentary as a historiographical medium. The documentary film is a tool that highlights underexplored issues in black experience and provides a cultural site for imagining new possibilities for black lesbian subjectivity and creating innovative approaches to representing sexuality in black filmmaking.

The silence around queerness is decisively broken. Much has happened in the last two decades. Today, there are queer groups, writers, activists, academics, filmmakers, and an increasing number of spaces where friendship, solidarity, and political engagement can be nurtured. Queer activism has been responsible for bringing a legal challenge to Section 377 (IPC) that criminalizes “sexual acts against the order of nature”.

Discussions of established women filmmakers whose careers have produced major bodies of work, as well as newer filmmakers and new media artists.

Cette vidéaste regarde - et nous fait regarder - la frontière comme un espace mental et matériel : les interviews, la voix over dont le texte apparaît à l'écran, les citations de textes, les images, les sons et le found footage sont combinés de façon à donner un aperçu saisissant et intime à la fois des conditions de vie des femmes (division du travail, prostitution, violence à l'égard des femmes dans les rues, etc.) propres aux régions frontalières, c'est-à-dire se définissant en fonction des contraintes liées à leur position limitrophe, mais offrant une certaine liberté aux gens qui y vivent du fait, justement, de cette position. Il est intéressant de voir comment le road movie permet de réaffirmer la place de l'automobile comme pur moyen de mobilité, mais en même temps comment il nous oblige à nous concentrer sur un autre type de mobilité, que Walter Moser (2008, p. 9) appelle la « médiamotion », soit : une forme de mobilité que nous procurent les médias mais qui, dans un certain sens, remplace ou redouble le déplacement physique en offrant aux êtres humains une expérience presque paradoxale : le contact à distance. On peut également voir dans le road movie contemporain un « road movie interculturel6», parce que la route y trace «un espace imaginaire particulièrement apte à figurer la complexité et les asymétries de l'interculturel » (Gin 2008, p. 41), mais également parce que : l'intetculturalité [...] du road movie résiderait en ce sens dans le mouvement que subit un principe ou une pulsion d'identification culturelle ne pouvant ni se réaliser ou s'assouvir - narrativement, visuellement - dans l'univocité d'un arrêt sur image, ni pour autant s'épuiser on the road Xp. 44). En fait, la mobilité transnationale se situant au centre de cette production filmique «accentuée» donne lieu à un ensemble de tentatives en constante évolution, où les identités culturelles en devenir peuvent être «constamment reformulées dans une perspective future, bien que conditionnées par des liens historiques et des devoirs avec le passé» (Grillo, Riccio et Salih 2000, p. 16), aussi bien que par les liens qu'entretiennent les migrants et les exilés avec leur identité et leur culture d'origine.

In 1971, I made a film entitled Self Portrait of a Nude Model Turned Cinematographer in which I explore the objectifying ‘male’ gaze on my body in contrast to the subjective lived experience of my body. The film was a radical challenge to the gaze that objectifies woman – and thus imprisons her – which had hitherto dominated narrative cinema. Since the objectification of women has largely excluded us from the privileged phallogocentric discourses, in this paper I hope to bring into the psychoanalytic dialogue a woman's lived experience. I will approach this by exploring how remembering this film has become a personally transformative experience as I look back on it through the lens of postmodern and feminist discourses that have emerged since it was made. In addition, I will explore how this process of imaginatively looking back on an artistic creation to generate new discourses in the present is similar to the transformative process of analysis. Lastly, I will present a clinical example, where my embodied countertransference response to a patient's subjection to the objectifying male gaze opens space for a new discourse about her body to emerge.

How should one think about popular media in the African context? Should we attempt to understand and analyse the increasing proliferation of tabloids, reality television shows, pop music, websites and mobile communications through the analytical frameworks constructed by scholars in the Global North, or does Africa pose unique research questions? Is there a danger of either essentializing Africa by treating her as ‘different’, or by ignoring her specificity by approaching her media via Western theoretical constructs? The scholar wishing to understand the interface between popular media, development and democracy in contemporary African societies is faced with a complex double bind. Elsewhere (Nyamnjoh 2005: 2-3) I have argued that African worldviews and cultural values are doubly excluded from global media discourses, first by the ideology of hierarchies and boundedness of cultures, and second by cultural industries more interested in profits than the promotion of creative diversity and cultural plurality. Little attention is accorded to how Africans negotiate and navigate the various identity margins and cultural influences in their lives, in ways that are not easily reducible to simple options or straightforward choices. The consequence of rigid dichotomies or stubborn prescriptiveness based on externally induced expectations of social transformation is an idea of democracy hardly informed by popular articulations of personhood and agency in Africa, and media whose professional values and content are not in tune with the expectations of those they purport to serve. The predicament of media practitioners in such a situation, as well as those wishing to understand African media practice through media theory, is obvious: to be of real service to liberal democracy and its expectations of modernity, they must ignore alternative ideas of personhood and agency in the cultural communities within which such practices take place and of which such practitioners and, often, scholars form part. Attending to the interests of particular cultural groups as strategically essential entities risks contradicting the principles of liberal democracy and its emphasis on civic citizenship and the autonomous individual, which media practitioners in African societies are being held accountable to.

Undercurrents engages the critical rubric of "queer" to examine Hong Kong's screen and media culture during the transitional and immediate postcolonial period. Helen Hok-Sze Leung draws on theoretical insights from a range of disciplines to reveal parallels between the crisis and uncertainty of the territory's postcolonial transition and the queer aspects of its cultural productions. Leung explores Hong Kong cultural productions -- cinema, fiction, popular music and subcultural projects -- and argues that while there is no overt consolidation of gay and lesbian identities in Hong Kong culture, undercurrents of diverse and complex expressions of gender and sexual variance are widely in evidence. Undercurrents uncovers a queer media culture that has been largely overloo... Source: Publisher