Beyond Representation: the Ethics and Aesthetics of Change in Turkish German Cinema After Reunification
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BEYOND REPRESENTATION: THE ETHICS AND AESTHETICS OF CHANGE IN TURKISH GERMAN CINEMA AFTER REUNIFICATION A thesis submitted to The University of Manchester for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Humanities 2014 GOZDE NAIBOGLU SCHOOL OF ARTS, LANGUAGES AND CULTURES CONTENTS List of Illustrations _______________________________________________ 4 Abstract_________________________________________________________5 Declaration ______________________________________________________6 Copyright Statement ______________________________________________7 Acknowledgments ________________________________________________8 Introduction_____________________________________________________10 Turkish German Cinema since the 1990s_______________________________13 The Spatial Turn__________________________________________________ 17 Deleuze’s Post-Representational Film Philosophy and the Ethics of Change_________________________________________________________ 22 Politics of Post-Representationalism in Migrant and Transnational Cinemas___28 Summary of Chapters______________________________________________33 Chapter One: The Berlin School Fiction Film_________________________ 36 1.1 An Ethics of Individuation: Geschwister (Thomas Arslan, 1997)__________40 1.2 Differential Subjectivities: Dealer (Thomas Arslan, 1999)_______________54 1.3 Beyond Movement: Der schöne Tag (Thomas Arslan, 2001)_____________69 1.4 Affective Maps of Post-Fordism’s Transit Zones: Jerichow (Christian Petzold, 2009)________________________________________________________ 80 Chapter Two: Aesthetics of the New Documentary Film and Beyond _____95 2.1 Introduction: Documentary Film and the Question of Representation _____ 95 2.2 Aysun Bademsoy’s Am Rand der Städte (2006) and Ehre (2011)________104 2.3 Diagrams in Harun Farocki’s Aufstellung (2005) ____________________ 135 2.4 Return to the Paternal Home: Thomas Arslan’s Aus der Ferne (2006) and Seyhan Derin’s Ich bin Tochter meiner Mutter (1996) ___________________150 2 Chapter Three: New Subjectivities in Social Realism _________________172 3.1. Feo Aladağ’s Die Fremde (2010) _______________________________ 173 3.2. Post-representational Queer Ethics in Yüksel Yavuz’s Kleine Freiheit (2003) _________________________________________________ 195 Conclusion _____________________________________________________213 Bibliography ___________________________________________________222 Appendix ______________________________________________________236 Word Count: 77,862 3 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Figure 1 - Erol running from his creditors in Geschwister_________________44 Figure 2 - Materiality of labour in Dealer_____________________________ 64 Figure 3 - Deniz walking in Kreuzberg in Der schöne Tag________________ 73 Figure 4 - Ali dancing on the beach in Jerichow________________________ 83 Figure 5 – Opening Scene in Am Rand der Städte______________________ 113 Figure 6 – High-rises robbing each other of sunlight in Am Rand der Städte_ 117 Figure 7 - Modern blocks folding inwards in Am Rand der Städte__________117 Figure 8 - The memorial site for Hatun Sürücü in Ehre__________________ 129 Figure 9 - 360-degree panning shot of the site of murder in Ehre___________130 Figure 10 – The state as patriarch in Ehre_____________________________133 Figure 11 – Aufstellung___________________________________________ 142 Figure 12 - 'Foreigners' in Aufstellung________________________________147 Figure 13 - The opening shot of Aus der Ferne – the static long take of the Bosphorus through a window_______________________________________154 Figure 14 - Children separating plastic bottles for recycling in Aus der Ferne 159 Figure 15 - Ben Annemin Kızıyım___________________________________ 167 Figure 16 - Umay at the women's hostel in Die Fremde__________________188 Figure 17 - Baran and Chernor in the Photo Booth in Kleine Freiheit_______209 4 ABSTRACT This thesis explores recent Turkish-German film through a radically post- representational vision of aesthetics and ethics. Post-representationalism as a methodology involves confronting conventional cognitive and hermeneutic approaches to film, and going beyond representational schemes and national paradigms for a closer engagement with the aesthetic. This thesis puts emphasis on tropes such as movement, gesture, process and becoming through an engagement with the writings of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari as an alternative to the theoretical models that dominate the scholarship on migrant and diasporic cinemas which place emphasis on dualisms and notions such as cultural and national identity. It attempts to broaden the discussions on post-Reunification Turkish German cinema by exploring a wide range of works including fiction, documentary and artist films dealing with labour migration from Turkey to Germany. The first chapter focuses on Thomas Arslan’s Berlin Trilogy and Christian Petzold’s Jerichow (2009) as ‘Berlin School’ films that convey a distinct aesthetic approach to labour migrants and their second generation offspring in Germany, which tends to focus on questions of work and the changing nature of labour under globalisation. The second chapter looks at documentary films by Thomas Arslan, Aysun Bademsoy, Harun Farocki and Seyhan Derin to re-evaluate the dominance of historical narratives and reassess the documentary form as an archival and creative practice through new political and ethico-aesthetic paradigms. The third chapter investigates social realist genre cinema through Feo Aladağ’s Die Fremde (2011) and Yüksel Yavuz’s Kleine Freiheit (2003) to explore whether new encounters with conventional aesthetics that zoom in on gestures and movements can call into question the limitation of linguistic and semiotic terms and categories of analysis. These chapters aim to move beyond representational and definitive frameworks in favour of a creative critical engagement with migrant film as a political vocation, which carries within itself the potential to invent new forms of thought, resistance, movement and people. 5 DECLARATION No portion of the work referred to in the thesis has been submitted in support of an application for another degree or qualification of this or any other university or other institute of learning. 6 COPYRIGHT STATEMENT i. The author of this thesis (including any appendices and/or schedules to this thesis) owns certain copyright or related rights in it (the “Copyright”) and s/he has given The University of Manchester certain rights to use such Copyright, including for administrative purposes. ii. Copies of this thesis, either in full or in extracts and whether in hard or electronic copy, may be made only in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (as amended) and regulations issued under it or, where appropriate, in accordance with licensing agreements which the University has from time to time. This page must form part of any such copies made. iii. The ownership of certain Copyright, patents, designs, trade marks and other intellectual property (the “Intellectual Property”) and any reproductions of copyright works in the thesis, for example graphs and tables (“Reproductions”), which may be described in this thesis, may not be owned by the author and may be owned by third parties. Such Intellectual Property and Reproductions cannot and must not be made available for use without the prior written permission of the owner(s) of the relevant Intellectual Property and/or Reproductions. iv. Further information on the conditions under which disclosure, publication and commercialisation of this thesis, the Copyright and any Intellectual Property and/or Reproductions described in it may take place is available in the University IP Policy (see http://documents.manchester.ac.uk/DocuInfo.aspx?DocID=487), in any relevant Thesis restriction declarations deposited in the University Library, The University Library’s regulations (see http://www.manchester.ac.uk/library/aboutus/regulations) and in The University’s policy on Presentation of Theses. 7 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank the following people for all their support, motivation and love, without which this thesis would not be possible. My most heartfelt thanks go to my main supervisor, Professor Margaret Littler for everything she has done for me in the past three years. I cannot appreciate your unfailing support, patience, encouragement and friendship enough. Your guidance has made such a wonderful impact on my life and work during this process. I am very grateful to my second supervisor Dr. Cathy Gelbin and my advisor Professor Christopher Perriam for their expert advice and helpful comments. Your support has been invaluable. I owe my sincerest gratitude to my former lecturers Dr. Tanya Horeck, Dr. Sarah Barrow, Dr. Tina Kendall, Dr. Milla Tiainen, Professor Jussi Parikka, Professor Patricia MacCormack and Professor Guido Rings for providing me with the inspiration and encouragement to start this project. I would also like to thank Davey Potts, Dr. Ana Katherine Miller, Dr. Michael Goddard, Dr. Jean Moritz Müller, Dr. Annie Ring and Dr. Felicity Colman for their insightful comments, stimulating discussions, sound advice and their friendship. I am grateful to the University of Manchester and DAAD for the funding they provided to conduct my research. I am also indebted to the staff at the Hochschule für Film und Fernsehen Konrad Wolf, and the Deutsche Kinemathek Berlin, for making it possible for me to watch many of the films that are under discussion in this thesis. Many thanks to