Drawing on contemporary critical theories and academic debates, Women in Malayalam Cinema: Naturalising Gender Hierarchies analyses Malayalam cinema and the question of women from different perspectives. In its focus on woman-cinema interface, as depicted in a century of Malayalam cinema, this book addresses a wide range of themes crucial for a nuanced understanding of Malayalam film culture gender stereotyping, marriage and family, the aftermaths of matriliny, caste and gender relations, hegemonic patriarchy, female friendships and soft porn.
Cinema as an aesthetic construct exists in a specific historical and political context, reflecting the society and its aesthetic values. Visual representation of the Ugly, its politics and aestheticization, are deeply rooted in the screen space. Featuring unconventional characters, unembellished visuals, raw and gritty storytelling, the unaesthetic challenges conventional notions of beauty on screen. The physical, psychological, and social manifestations of the ugly are incorporated into the cinematic space through content, theme, physical representations, symbols, setting, dialogue, as well as the camera. Exploring the intricate connection between ugliness and the cinematic medium, the book focuses on identity, gender, and other manifestations of Ugly in contemporary Malayalam cinema. It meticulously analyses the portrayal of ugliness in characters, narratives, and visual aesthetics, thus highlighting societal norms and realities of life. The book is a must-read for film scholars, enthusiasts, and anyone interested in the intersection of aesthetics and storytelling.
Cinema in India is an entertainment medium that is interwoven into society and culture at large. It is clearly evident that continuous struggle and conflict at the personal as well as societal levels is depicted in cinema in India. It has become a reflection of society both in negative and positive ways. Hence, cinema has become an influential factor and one of the largest mass communication mediums in the nation. Social and Cultural Dynamics in Indian Cinema is an essential reference source that discusses cultural and societal issues including caste, gender, oppression, and social movements through cinema and particularly in specific language cinema and culture. Featuring research on topics such as Bollywood, film studies, and gender equality, this book is ideally designed for researchers, academicians, film studies students, and industry professionals seeking coverage on various aspects of regional cinema in India.
Oriental dancers, ballerinas, actresses and opera singers the figure of the female performer is ubiquitous in the cinema of pre-Revolutionary Russia. From the first feature film, Romashkov's Stenka Razin (1908), through the sophisticated melodramas of the 1910s, to Viskovsky's The Last Tango (1918), made shortly before the pre-Revolutionary film industry was dismantled by the new Soviet government, the female performer remains central. In this groundbreaking new study, Rachel Morley argues that early Russian film-makers used the character of the female performer to explore key contemporary concerns from changing conceptions of femininity and the emergence of the so-called New Woman, to broader questions concerning gender identity. Morley also reveals that the film-makers repeatedly used this archetype of femininity to experiment with cinematic technology and develop a specific cinematic language."
This book deepens the understanding of the work carried out by professional women in Spanish film and television since the arrival of democracy, a period of radical changes that saw an emergence of female talent. Although most of the literature on women and media deals with female film directors, this book also addresses television, a medium where the presence of women was significant throughout this period. This book makes an important contribution to the study of the history of women in Spanish media, focusing on the work of some well-known names, while also rescuing from oblivion others now forgotten. It brings together scholars from Spain, the United States and Ireland to analyze films and television programs written or directed by female professionals such as Pilar Miró, Josefina Molina, Cecilia Bartolomé, Rosa Montero, Carmen Martín Gaite, Cristina Andreu, Isabel Coixet and Paloma Chamorro. The book also includes four interviews with screenwriter Esmeralda Adam, television executive Carmen Caffarel, filmmaker Ana Díez and television director Matilde Fernández. Their reflections on personal and professional experiences shed light on the changes that took place in Spanish society during this period and the challenges they have faced in their careers.
The muscle-bound male body is a perennial feature of classically-inflected action cinema. This book reassesses these films as a cinematic form, focusing on the depiction of heroic masculinity. In particular, Hercules in his many incarnations has greatly influenced popular cultural interpretations of manliness and the exaggerated male form.
Feminism at the Movies: Understanding Gender in Contemporary Popular Cinema examines the way that contemporary film reflects today’s changing gender roles. The book offers a comprehensive overview of the central issues in feminist film criticism with analyses of over twenty popular contemporary films across a range of genres, such as chick flicks, teen pics, hommecoms, horror, action adventure, indie flicks, and women lawyer films. Contributors explore issues of femininity as well as masculinity, reflecting on the interface of popular cinema with gendered realities and feminist ideas. Topics include the gendered political economy of cinema, the female director as auteur, postfeminist fatherhood, consumer culture, depictions of professional women, transgender, sexuality, gendered violence, and the intersections of gender, race, and ethnic identities. The volume contains essays by following contributors: Taunya Lovell Banks, Heather Brook, Mridula Nath Chakraborty, Michael DeAngelis, Barry Keith Grant, Kelly Kessler, Hannah Hamad, Christina Lane (with Nicole Richter), JaneMaree Maher, David Hansen-Miller (with Rosalind Gill), Gary Needham, Sarah Projansky, Hilary Radner, Rob Schaap, Yael D Sherman, Michele Shreiber, Janet Staiger, Peter Stapleton, Rebecca Stringer, Yvonne Tasker, and Ewa Ziarek.
Research into and around women's participation in cinematic history has enjoyed dynamic growth over the past decade. A broadening of scope and interests encompasses not only different kinds of filmmaking--mainstream fiction, experimental, and documentary--but also practices--publicity, journalism, distribution and exhibition--seldom explored in the past. Cutting-edge and inclusive, Doing Women's Film History ventures into topics in the United States and Europe while also moving beyond to explore the influence of women on the cinemas of India, Chile, Turkey, Russia, and Australia. Contributors grapple with historiographic questions that cover film history from the pioneering era to the present day. Yet the writers also address the very mission of practicing scholarship. Essays explore essential issues like identifying women's participation in their cinema cultures, locating previously unconsidered sources of evidence, developing methodologies and analytical concepts to reveal the impact of gender on film production, distribution and reception, and reframing film history to accommodate new questions and approaches. Contributors include: Kay Armatage, Eylem Atakav, Karina Aveyard, Canan Balan, Cécile Chich, Monica Dall'Asta, Eliza Anna Delveroudi, Jane M. Gaines, Christine Gledhill, Julia Knight, Neepa Majumdar, Michele Leigh, Luke McKernan, Debashree Mukherjee, Giuliana Muscio, Katarzyna Paszkiewicz, Rashmi Sawhney, Elizabeth Ramirez Soto, Sarah Street, and Kimberly Tomadjoglou.
India Migration Report 2016 discusses migration to the Persian Gulf region. This volume: looks at contemporary labour recruitment and policy, both in India and in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries; explores gender issues in migration to Gulf countries; and brings together the latest field data on migrants across states in India. Part of the prestigious annual series, this volume will interest scholars and researchers of economics, development studies, migration and diaspora studies, labour studies, and sociology. It will also be useful to policymakers and government institutions working in the area.
The Allegory of the Cave, or Plato's Cave, was presented by the Greek philosopher Plato in his work Republic (514a–520a) to compare "the effect of education (παιδεία) and the lack of it on our nature". It is written as a dialogue between Plato's brother Glaucon and his mentor Socrates, narrated by the latter. The allegory is presented after the analogy of the sun (508b–509c) and the analogy of the divided line (509d–511e). All three are characterized in relation to dialectic at the end of Books VII and VIII (531d–534e). Plato has Socrates describe a group of people who have lived chained to the wall of a cave all of their lives, facing a blank wall. The people watch shadows projected on the wall from objects passing in front of a fire behind them, and give names to these shadows. The shadows are the prisoners' reality.
