This article examines conversations, dialogues and statements about martial arts in films that can by no stretch of the imagination be regarded as martial arts films. It takes this unusual focus in order to glean unique insights into the status of martial arts in mainstream popular culture. The work is interested in the ways that martial arts are understood, positioned and given value within the wider flows, circuits, networks or discourses of culture. Films examined include Vision Quest/Crazy for You (1985), Lolita (1962), Roustabout (1964), Napoleon Dynamite (2004), An Officer and a Gentleman (1982), Full Metal Jacket (1987), Rollerball (1975), Trading Places (1983), The Wanderers (1979), Once Were Warriors (1994) and Meet the Fockers (2004); and some discussion is given to ‘limit cases’ – action films such as The Matrix (1999) and Lethal Weapon (1987). The analysis suggests that martial arts tend to be represented in non-martial arts films audiovisually, and that on the rare occasions martial arts are discussed, they tend to emerge as improper or culturally unusual activities or practices. Because of their familiar, yet non-normal (unhomely/unheimlich, uncanny) status, along with their entwinement in senses of lack and related fantasies and desires, martial arts in these contexts are frequently related to matters of sexuality, insecurity and the desire for plenitude. Accordingly, although occasionally associated with higher cultural values such as dignity, martial arts are more often treated as comic, uncanny or perverse aberrations from the norm.
{"title":"Fighting Talk: Martial Arts Discourse in Mainstream Films","authors":"P. Bowman","doi":"10.18573/JOMEC.186","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18573/JOMEC.186","url":null,"abstract":"This article examines conversations, dialogues and statements about martial arts in films that can by no stretch of the imagination be regarded as martial arts films. It takes this unusual focus in order to glean unique insights into the status of martial arts in mainstream popular culture. The work is interested in the ways that martial arts are understood, positioned and given value within the wider flows, circuits, networks or discourses of culture. Films examined include Vision Quest/Crazy for You (1985), Lolita (1962), Roustabout (1964), Napoleon Dynamite (2004), An Officer and a Gentleman (1982), Full Metal Jacket (1987), Rollerball (1975), Trading Places (1983), The Wanderers (1979), Once Were Warriors (1994) and Meet the Fockers (2004); and some discussion is given to ‘limit cases’ – action films such as The Matrix (1999) and Lethal Weapon (1987). The analysis suggests that martial arts tend to be represented in non-martial arts films audiovisually, and that on the rare occasions martial arts are discussed, they tend to emerge as improper or culturally unusual activities or practices. Because of their familiar, yet non-normal (unhomely/unheimlich, uncanny) status, along with their entwinement in senses of lack and related fantasies and desires, martial arts in these contexts are frequently related to matters of sexuality, insecurity and the desire for plenitude. Accordingly, although occasionally associated with higher cultural values such as dignity, martial arts are more often treated as comic, uncanny or perverse aberrations from the norm.","PeriodicalId":87289,"journal":{"name":"JOMEC journal : journalism, media and cultural studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-02-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45876712","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The aim of the article is to discuss the notion of subtext in cinematic dialogue and to sketch a map of the main types of subtext, drawing on the principles common to the narrative theories elaborated by Robert McKee (1998), John Truby (2007), Dara Marks (2006), and Chris Vogler (1992). A pivotal concept in my argument will be the one of theme, as it is explained in the main screenwriting textbooks: the theme of a story is intimately connected to the protagonist’s change in relation to the values at stake. A theme consists of the values that inspire the deep dramatic construction of the character – the moral need that defines him. Building on the importance of the moral flaw of the protagonist, I will identify four types of subtext, depending on whether it lies more in the flaws of the protagonist or in a hidden agenda he has, and on whether subtext is or is not shared by all the characters in the scene. In particular, I will discuss the emotional density of subtext when it stems from the moral flaw of the protagonist and when it is not shared with other characters. This happens when the writer uses dramatic irony and plays with the idea of fate.
{"title":"Mapping Subtext by Using Thematic Coordinates","authors":"Paolo Braga","doi":"10.18573/JOMEC.187","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18573/JOMEC.187","url":null,"abstract":"The aim of the article is to discuss the notion of subtext in cinematic dialogue and to sketch a map of the main types of subtext, drawing on the principles common to the narrative theories elaborated by Robert McKee (1998), John Truby (2007), Dara Marks (2006), and Chris Vogler (1992). A pivotal concept in my argument will be the one of theme, as it is explained in the main screenwriting textbooks: the theme of a story is intimately connected to the protagonist’s change in relation to the values at stake. A theme consists of the values that inspire the deep dramatic construction of the character – the moral need that defines him. Building on the importance of the moral flaw of the protagonist, I will identify four types of subtext, depending on whether it lies more in the flaws of the protagonist or in a hidden agenda he has, and on whether subtext is or is not shared by all the characters in the scene. In particular, I will discuss the emotional density of subtext when it stems from the moral flaw of the protagonist and when it is not shared with other characters. This happens when the writer uses dramatic irony and plays with the idea of fate.","PeriodicalId":87289,"journal":{"name":"JOMEC journal : journalism, media and cultural studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-02-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48933155","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This editorial for a special themed issue of JOMEC Journal gives an overview of the issue contents and introduces the articles, written by Kyle Barrowman, Paul Bowman, Paolo Braga, Evelina Kazakeviciute, Naz Onen and David Sorfa. The issue presents new research and developments relating to the relatively underrepresented areas of dialogue and communication in film. Half of the texts discussed here are language-centred readings of films focused on dialogue; the other half pay particular attention to the representation of different levels of communication, such as speech and writing or intra-communication on screen. It also touches upon broader topics, such as film as a means of communication between the director and the audience. The authors approach their objects of analysis from a variety of perspectives – from ordinary language philosophy to deconstruction. The findings of their studies have both theoretical and practical value: among other discoveries, the authors came up with new critical tools for the analysis of dialogue and communication in film and valuable ideas on how film dialogue can contribute to the movie dramaturgically. Therefore, the research published in this issue might be relevant and of use to dialogue and communication scholars, screenwriters, and filmmakers.
{"title":"Editorial: Dialogue and Communication in Film","authors":"Evelina Kazakevičiūtė","doi":"10.18573/JOMEC.182","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18573/JOMEC.182","url":null,"abstract":"This editorial for a special themed issue of JOMEC Journal gives an overview of the issue contents and introduces the articles, written by Kyle Barrowman, Paul Bowman, Paolo Braga, Evelina Kazakeviciute, Naz Onen and David Sorfa. The issue presents new research and developments relating to the relatively underrepresented areas of dialogue and communication in film. Half of the texts discussed here are language-centred readings of films focused on dialogue; the other half pay particular attention to the representation of different levels of communication, such as speech and writing or intra-communication on screen. It also touches upon broader topics, such as film as a means of communication between the director and the audience. The authors approach their objects of analysis from a variety of perspectives – from ordinary language philosophy to deconstruction. The findings of their studies have both theoretical and practical value: among other discoveries, the authors came up with new critical tools for the analysis of dialogue and communication in film and valuable ideas on how film dialogue can contribute to the movie dramaturgically. Therefore, the research published in this issue might be relevant and of use to dialogue and communication scholars, screenwriters, and filmmakers.","PeriodicalId":87289,"journal":{"name":"JOMEC journal : journalism, media and cultural studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-02-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49067177","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The essay film is one emerging genre in which the sonic elements and the editing characteristics are constructing the basis of its communication structure within and beyond the audiovisual material. This paper will enlighten the unique language and the means of communication of the essay form. In the essay film, the voice functions as a means of expression as opposed to a stack of sounds. With the support of the editing elements, the voice becomes a stylistic reflection towards the world, where the audience perceives the tone of the filmmaker. The voice is also not a rhetoric that oppresses the viewer but functions as a bridge to communicate with, and throughout, the audiovisual material as an artistic act that demands an intellectual response, like an open letter to be finalized in the viewers’ mind. The essay film does not seek to provide answers. Rather, it asks questions to the viewer, directly or indirectly, throughout the dialogue as the core of this filmmaking style. For the filmmaker to communicate with their viewer effectively, they position themselves as part of the audience. The essay film strives to go beyond formal, conceptual, and social constraint. Its structure undermines traditional boundaries, and is both structurally and conceptually transgressive, as well as self-reflective. It also questions the subject positions of the filmmaker and audience as well as the audiovisual medium itself – whether film, video, or digital electronic. This work highlights the dialogical characteristics of the essay film through a selection of essay film works with a focus on the voiceover usage and editing characteristics, to understand how a body of essayistic work addresses the viewer for a dialogical relationship.
{"title":"Essay Film as a Dialogical Form","authors":"Naz Önen","doi":"10.18573/JOMEC.188","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18573/JOMEC.188","url":null,"abstract":"The essay film is one emerging genre in which the sonic elements and the editing characteristics are constructing the basis of its communication structure within and beyond the audiovisual material. This paper will enlighten the unique language and the means of communication of the essay form. In the essay film, the voice functions as a means of expression as opposed to a stack of sounds. With the support of the editing elements, the voice becomes a stylistic reflection towards the world, where the audience perceives the tone of the filmmaker. The voice is also not a rhetoric that oppresses the viewer but functions as a bridge to communicate with, and throughout, the audiovisual material as an artistic act that demands an intellectual response, like an open letter to be finalized in the viewers’ mind. The essay film does not seek to provide answers. Rather, it asks questions to the viewer, directly or indirectly, throughout the dialogue as the core of this filmmaking style. For the filmmaker to communicate with their viewer effectively, they position themselves as part of the audience. The essay film strives to go beyond formal, conceptual, and social constraint. Its structure undermines traditional boundaries, and is both structurally and conceptually transgressive, as well as self-reflective. It also questions the subject positions of the filmmaker and audience as well as the audiovisual medium itself – whether film, video, or digital electronic. This work highlights the dialogical characteristics of the essay film through a selection of essay film works with a focus on the voiceover usage and editing characteristics, to understand how a body of essayistic work addresses the viewer for a dialogical relationship.","PeriodicalId":87289,"journal":{"name":"JOMEC journal : journalism, media and cultural studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-02-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47696946","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article takes note of the revival of interest in China in the ancient art of the bedchamber (fangzhongshu). We survey traditional Chinese sex culture, the textual sources of the bedchamber arts, the development of sexology as an academic discipline, and a synopsis of the theory and practice of the art of the bedchamber itself. We present the various views, pro and con, regarding these practices as they are being debated today in academic journals, advice columns, talk shows, and online forums. Finally, we review the roles of Western scholars in reviving the topic in China and Chinese masters in transmitting the art to the West. Formally an aspect of elite culture, like poetry and calligraphy, the art of the bedchamber has reemerged today in the context of cultural nationalism and an exploration of Chinese identity. Moreover, universal literacy and media penetration have democratized the discourse to include the voices of women and ordinary citizens.
{"title":"Debaters of the bedchamber: China reexamines ancient sexual practices","authors":"D. Wile","doi":"10.18573/JOMEC.169","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18573/JOMEC.169","url":null,"abstract":"This article takes note of the revival of interest in China in the ancient art of the bedchamber (fangzhongshu). We survey traditional Chinese sex culture, the textual sources of the bedchamber arts, the development of sexology as an academic discipline, and a synopsis of the theory and practice of the art of the bedchamber itself. We present the various views, pro and con, regarding these practices as they are being debated today in academic journals, advice columns, talk shows, and online forums. Finally, we review the roles of Western scholars in reviving the topic in China and Chinese masters in transmitting the art to the West. Formally an aspect of elite culture, like poetry and calligraphy, the art of the bedchamber has reemerged today in the context of cultural nationalism and an exploration of Chinese identity. Moreover, universal literacy and media penetration have democratized the discourse to include the voices of women and ordinary citizens.","PeriodicalId":87289,"journal":{"name":"JOMEC journal : journalism, media and cultural studies","volume":"1 1","pages":"5"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-02-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48927244","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
By using discourse analysis, this paper compares and contrasts the journalistic coverage of the story of a beauty blogger with facial disfigurement with her blog. On the one hand, we will show the extent to which a self-representational account may align with the journalistic coverage, reinforcing rather than contesting mainstream representations of disability. On the other, we will demonstrate how a person with a disfigurement can use blogging to reclaim her own identity and challenge the medical objectification of her body perpetuated by mainstream media. This research found that rather than being mutually exclusive, journalism and blogging can play a complementary role in shaping the society’s understanding of the complexities and contradictions surrounding disfigurement.
{"title":"Competing narratives in framing disability in the UK media: a comparative analysis of journalistic representations of facial disfigurement versus practices of self-representations online","authors":"D. Garrisi, J. Johanssen","doi":"10.18573/JOMEC.172","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18573/JOMEC.172","url":null,"abstract":"By using discourse analysis, this paper compares and contrasts the journalistic coverage of the story of a beauty blogger with facial disfigurement with her blog. On the one hand, we will show the extent to which a self-representational account may align with the journalistic coverage, reinforcing rather than contesting mainstream representations of disability. On the other, we will demonstrate how a person with a disfigurement can use blogging to reclaim her own identity and challenge the medical objectification of her body perpetuated by mainstream media. This research found that rather than being mutually exclusive, journalism and blogging can play a complementary role in shaping the society’s understanding of the complexities and contradictions surrounding disfigurement.","PeriodicalId":87289,"journal":{"name":"JOMEC journal : journalism, media and cultural studies","volume":"1 1","pages":"128"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-02-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47769715","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This essay examines the Snowden affair as a sort of Rorschach test that traces the contours of what I am calling the impasse of cynical reason. In particular, I contend that the emerging form of algorithmic dataveillance both elicits and actively thwarts theoretical and critical approaches predicated on an a normative, symbolic model of epistemology that this form aspires to supplant. As a result, what such approaches tend to discern in the emerging culture of surveillance are its own epistemological commitments—the very ones comprising the impasse of cynical reason. Breaking out of this impasse will thus require disrupting the deep, hidden complicity of such critique with its ostensible object. I contend that this will require taking seriously the often disingenuous or fallacious arguments on behalf of dataveillance in order to overcome the critical resistance to the quite genuine eventuality they connote—that of the decline of cynical reason as the prevailing form of social coordination.
{"title":"“Spying for the People”: surveillance, democracy and the impasse of cynical reason","authors":"Michael Kaplan","doi":"10.18573/JOMEC.165","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18573/JOMEC.165","url":null,"abstract":"This essay examines the Snowden affair as a sort of Rorschach test that traces the contours of what I am calling the impasse of cynical reason. In particular, I contend that the emerging form of algorithmic dataveillance both elicits and actively thwarts theoretical and critical approaches predicated on an a normative, symbolic model of epistemology that this form aspires to supplant. As a result, what such approaches tend to discern in the emerging culture of surveillance are its own epistemological commitments—the very ones comprising the impasse of cynical reason. Breaking out of this impasse will thus require disrupting the deep, hidden complicity of such critique with its ostensible object. I contend that this will require taking seriously the often disingenuous or fallacious arguments on behalf of dataveillance in order to overcome the critical resistance to the quite genuine eventuality they connote—that of the decline of cynical reason as the prevailing form of social coordination.","PeriodicalId":87289,"journal":{"name":"JOMEC journal : journalism, media and cultural studies","volume":"1 1","pages":"166"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-02-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44235617","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This study was triggered by a 2015 documentary film directed by Sophia Luvara, Inside the Chinese Closet , which depicts the plight of two homosexual individuals in present-day Mainland China. Upon further reading into the film text, the discourse of the protagonists’ sexual orientation is downplayed; rather, the issues of their singlehood seem to be more of a concern, and pervasive. The paper first discusses singlehood in relation to traditional Chinese culture. There is no doubt that Confucian philosophy and ‘face’ are correlated with the fact that the family-kinship in China has a pervasive influence on the public perception of singlehood. Yet, as the self-combed women have demonstrated, singlehood is not consistently problematized by the Chinese culture. Thereafter, the discussions move into the discourse of contemporary China, suggesting that state-backed media have been encouraging marriage and stigmatizing those who do not adhere. Unmarried women are not the only victims, though they seem to experience the stigmatization more often than men. Chinese bachelors, too, fall prey to stigmatization. In recent years, there also seems to be a continual normalization of homosexuality due to gay consumerism and the increase of the legalization of same-sex marriage. At the end of the day, be it for heterosexuals or homosexuals, marriage seems to be an important end point to singlehood. At last, the paper questions the need to look at singlehood as the binary opposition to marriage.
{"title":"Queering singlehood in mainland China","authors":"Benny Lim, Sum-Sheung Samson Tang","doi":"10.18573/JOMEC.176","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18573/JOMEC.176","url":null,"abstract":"This study was triggered by a 2015 documentary film directed by Sophia Luvara, Inside the Chinese Closet , which depicts the plight of two homosexual individuals in present-day Mainland China. Upon further reading into the film text, the discourse of the protagonists’ sexual orientation is downplayed; rather, the issues of their singlehood seem to be more of a concern, and pervasive. The paper first discusses singlehood in relation to traditional Chinese culture. There is no doubt that Confucian philosophy and ‘face’ are correlated with the fact that the family-kinship in China has a pervasive influence on the public perception of singlehood. Yet, as the self-combed women have demonstrated, singlehood is not consistently problematized by the Chinese culture. Thereafter, the discussions move into the discourse of contemporary China, suggesting that state-backed media have been encouraging marriage and stigmatizing those who do not adhere. Unmarried women are not the only victims, though they seem to experience the stigmatization more often than men. Chinese bachelors, too, fall prey to stigmatization. In recent years, there also seems to be a continual normalization of homosexuality due to gay consumerism and the increase of the legalization of same-sex marriage. At the end of the day, be it for heterosexuals or homosexuals, marriage seems to be an important end point to singlehood. At last, the paper questions the need to look at singlehood as the binary opposition to marriage.","PeriodicalId":87289,"journal":{"name":"JOMEC journal : journalism, media and cultural studies","volume":"1 1","pages":"70"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-02-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42520604","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article examines the distribution of sources in journalistic metadiscourse (media coverage of journalism) and the implication of the manner of distribution for democracy. In this study, the way sources were distributed in the media representation of the debate that arose from the News of the World phone hacking scandal and the Leveson Inquiry is taken as representative of how sources are distributed in journalistic metadiscourse. The main method for this study is content analysis. Content analysis was supplemented by critical discourse analysis in the study of 870 new articles on the media policy debate, from 6 British national newspapers. My findings show that journalistic metadiscourse is characterised by a doubly narrow spectrum of sources with access tilting heavily in favour of the press. I argue that this is dangerous to democracy and that it may be unrealistic to expect the press to function as a democratic public sphere during debates about themselves without some level of external coercion.
{"title":"Press coverage of the debate that followed the News of the World phone hacking scandal: the use of sources in journalistic metadiscourse","authors":"Binakuromo Ogbebor","doi":"10.18573/JOMEC.173","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18573/JOMEC.173","url":null,"abstract":"This article examines the distribution of sources in journalistic metadiscourse (media coverage of journalism) and the implication of the manner of distribution for democracy. In this study, the way sources were distributed in the media representation of the debate that arose from the News of the World phone hacking scandal and the Leveson Inquiry is taken as representative of how sources are distributed in journalistic metadiscourse. The main method for this study is content analysis. Content analysis was supplemented by critical discourse analysis in the study of 870 new articles on the media policy debate, from 6 British national newspapers. My findings show that journalistic metadiscourse is characterised by a doubly narrow spectrum of sources with access tilting heavily in favour of the press. I argue that this is dangerous to democracy and that it may be unrealistic to expect the press to function as a democratic public sphere during debates about themselves without some level of external coercion.","PeriodicalId":87289,"journal":{"name":"JOMEC journal : journalism, media and cultural studies","volume":"1 1","pages":"145"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-02-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45507421","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Although homosexuality was decriminalised in 1997 and partially depathologised in 2001, LGBTQ issues are still strictly censored in Chinese media. With the rapid growth of China’s LGBTQ community, an increasing number of independent films featuring LGBTQ issues have emerged in the past two decades. In this article, I trace a brief history of queer cinema in the People’s Republic of China in the postsocialist era (1978 to present). In particular, I chart the significant turn from ‘celluloid comrades’, i.e. queer people being represented by heterosexual identified filmmakers in an ambiguous way, to what leading Chinese queer filmmaker Cui Zi’en calls ‘digital video activism’, in which LGBTQ individuals and groups have picked up cameras and made films about their own lives. In doing so, I unravel the politics of representation, the dynamics of mediated queer politics and the political potential of queer filmmaking in China. I suggest that in a country where public expressions of sexualities and demands for sexual rights are not possible, queer filmmaking has become an important form of queer activism that constantly negotiates with government censorship and the market force of commercialisation. Rather than representing a pre-existing identity and community, queer films and filmmaking practices have brought Chinese gay identities and communities into existence.
{"title":"From 'celluloid comrades' to 'digital video activism': queer filmmaking in postsocialist China","authors":"Hongwei Bao","doi":"10.18573/JOMEC.171","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18573/JOMEC.171","url":null,"abstract":"Although homosexuality was decriminalised in 1997 and partially depathologised in 2001, LGBTQ issues are still strictly censored in Chinese media. With the rapid growth of China’s LGBTQ community, an increasing number of independent films featuring LGBTQ issues have emerged in the past two decades. In this article, I trace a brief history of queer cinema in the People’s Republic of China in the postsocialist era (1978 to present). In particular, I chart the significant turn from ‘celluloid comrades’, i.e. queer people being represented by heterosexual identified filmmakers in an ambiguous way, to what leading Chinese queer filmmaker Cui Zi’en calls ‘digital video activism’, in which LGBTQ individuals and groups have picked up cameras and made films about their own lives. In doing so, I unravel the politics of representation, the dynamics of mediated queer politics and the political potential of queer filmmaking in China. I suggest that in a country where public expressions of sexualities and demands for sexual rights are not possible, queer filmmaking has become an important form of queer activism that constantly negotiates with government censorship and the market force of commercialisation. Rather than representing a pre-existing identity and community, queer films and filmmaking practices have brought Chinese gay identities and communities into existence.","PeriodicalId":87289,"journal":{"name":"JOMEC journal : journalism, media and cultural studies","volume":"12 1","pages":"82"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-02-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48087775","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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