'Accented' Cinema: the Construction of Indian Women in the Films of Mira Nair and Deepa Mehta Author(S): Subeshini Moodley Reviewed Work(S): Source: Agenda, No

Postcolonial Feminisms Speaking through an 'Accented' Cinema: The Construction of Indian Women in the Films of Mira Nair and Deepa Mehta Author(s): Subeshini Moodley Reviewed work(s): Source: Agenda, No. 58, African Feminisms Three (2003), pp. 66-75 Published by: Agenda Feminist Media Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4548098 . Accessed: 27/03/2012 17:29

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http://www.jstor.org Postcolonial feminisms speaking through an 'accented' cinema: the construction of

Indian women in the films of Mira Nair and Deepa Mehta

in between the home and host societies the Diasporicfilms can be described as engaging dialogue of filmmak-

ers writes SUBESHINI MOODLEY. Through an examination of the films of Mira Nair and Deepa Mehta, she proposes a theoreticalframeworkfor the support ofa potential postcolontalfeministfilm practice

Hamid Naficy1 argues that even though the is based on the belief that diasporic and exilic - experiences of diaspora and exile differ from one filmmakers seem to exhibit specific similarities person to the next, films produced by diasporic at levels of technique, style, aesthetics and filmmakers exhibit similarities at various levels. ideology - in the production of their films. Naficy He calls this an 'accented' cinema. Mira Nair and (2001) says that if the dominant cinema (read: Deepa Mehta are women filmmakers of the Indian Hollywood) is considered to be universal (and - diaspora whose films depict Indian women in thereby lacking accent), diasporic and exilic films - comparison to their popular construction in are accented. This notion of accent does not unconventional and controversial ways. The simplistically emerge from 'the accented speech similarity of the construction of Nair and Mehta's of the diegetic characters' within these films, but female protagonists, as a result, seems to from the 'displacement of the filmmakers' facilitate a filtering of postcolonial feminisms (Naficy, 2001:4). throughout the narrative of their films. This focus therefore proposes that the merging of Nancy's The term 'displacement' is used in relation to its theory of diasporic filmmaking, and Chandra opposite, namely, placement. Naficy argues that Talpade Mohanty and Gayatri Chakravorty the notion of place is expressed through spatial Spivak's notions of postcolonial feminism, in the and temporal configurations. On the one hand, a analysis of Nair and Mehta's construction of their place is a certain section of space to which a female characters, will establish a theoretical person or many people may attach special framework for the support of a potential significance or value. Place is therefore not postcolonial feminist film practice. something singularly physical. It is rather a concept characterised by the social relations An accented cinema attached to it. On the other hand, place is also characterised by history, giving it a 'Accented cinema' is a label given by Naficy temporal dimension (Naficy, 2001). Therefore, (2001) to films directed/produced by exilic and the 'displacement of filmmakers' refers not only diasporic people around the world. His argument to the physical movement of filmmakers from

66 Agenda 58 2003 Focus their own 'place' to another, but also to the timing 1999) were severely criticised, and the last of and reasons for that move, and the social, (Water, date unknown) was not completed emotional and psychological experience/expense because the Indian government had stopped that the move incurs. shooting. In addition, Nair and Mehta's female characters are constructed as Indian women with

As a consequence of diasporic films being agency and not simply as ideological constructs of produced in the transition between cultures nationalism. and societies, 'accented' cinema is interstitial2 and can be described as engaging in dialogue To understand, however, what constitutes between the home and host societies of the the notion of agency in their films, it is first filmmakers (Naficy, 2001:6). necessary to understand the symbolic nationalist representation that these filmmakers challenge. Diasporic people, says Naficy, tend to cling to notions of their ethnic consciousness and A persistent theme of Indian distinctiveness. These concepts are achieved Nationalism has been the re- through an awareness and perpetuation of processing of the image of the elements specifically characteristic of, or Indian woman and her role Nair and associated with, the homeland. This is often not based in the family, based on Mehta's favourably received by either the home or host models of Indian womanhood female characters societies. The reason is that on the one hand the from the distant glorious past. are Indian host country, in some instances, interprets a The woman becomes a metaphor women maintenance of tradition, culture or ethnicity as for the purity, the chastity, and with an assertion or imposition on their society. On the the sanctity of the Ancient Spirit agency other hand, the home country may sometimes that is India. As Chatterjee5 view a diasporic move out of their country as a puts it, the national construct of betrayal or rejection of their tradition, culture and the Indian woman attributes ethnicity - whether or not the diasporic 'the spiritual qualities of self- community attempts to maintain, or is critical of, sacrifice, benevolence, devotion, religiosity, these elements. This is where the controversy in and so on' to femininity, which then stands (as Mira Nair and Deepa Mehta's3 films arise. Both a sign for nation' (1989a:630). filmmakers have received negative responses in India for the content of their films. Nair's4 film, Consequently, anything that threatens to Kama Sutra (1996) was heavily criticised for the dilute this model of Indian womanhood nudity it contained and its open references to sex. constitutes a betrayal of all that it stands for: Even though she wove a fictional storyline around nation, religion, God, the Spirit of India, the ancient Hindu book on the art of lovemaking, culture, tradition, family (Bhattacharjee in her film was still considered unacceptable and a Dasgupta, 1998:172). desecration of Indian values and principles. Each of the films in Mehta's trilogy was disrupted during Bhattacharjee suggests that the symbolic status their making. The first two (Fire, 1995 mdEarth, of the Indian woman has led to her oppression

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and colonisation, such that her body and its their own identities to become the subjects of representation become subject to the dominant their own lives. hegemony of patriarchal nationalism. Popular - Indian cinema, Bollywood the dominant This process is characterised by what Naficy - cinematic practice in India has tended to refers to as 'journeys of identity'. Borders, in capitalise on this and has perpetuated this this regard, are a significant aspect: they can control through the establishment of female either be a connection or a division between dichotomies - the virtuous, dutiful, sexually the 'home' and 'elsewhere', or the familiar and pure woman versus the 'loose' or 'common' unfamiliar. Borders are interesting locations woman. It is thus the rejection or transgression (physical or imagined) where a variety of of this inscription of the Indian woman and her factors (race, class, gender, history and body, in the films of Nair and Mehta, that this national identity) diverge and intersect. Border focus offers as the notion of agency. consciousness arises out of being situated at a border location and can be described as The female characters in Nair 'multiperspectival and tolerant of ambiguity, and Mehta's films rebel against ambivalence and chaos' (Naficy, 2001:31). These their oppression through the Relating to this, Nair and Mehta's characters protago- exploration of their sexualities and often seem to be in a state of tension regarding nists don't the reclaiming of their bodies. By who they are expected to be, and always stretching the boundaries of their who they would like to be. These characters begin as sexual identities, these women often transform through a crossing over of women speak out in resistance through borders within themselves. These are evident with the language of their bodies. in choices made against the grain, succumbing agency Their bodies being the marginal to desire or engagement in rebellious activity. spaces that they occupy, these protagonists don't always begin as Before borders are crossed, however, journeys women with agency, but grow and are embarked upon. While border-crossing develop to that point. Their marginal spaces are relates to the change-over or refashioning of first defined and highlighted in order to show identity, journeys relate to the content of the how they later redefine and transcend its transition that occurs during the processes boundaries. The growth and development of changing over and refashioning. These toward agency is riddled with difficulties, and journeys are motivated and, like borders, can these women often have to struggle with their be either actual or imaginary. Indian identities and revisit the unfair expectations placed on their roles as daughters, Not all journeys involve physical wives and mothers. The process involves much travel. There are also metaphoric and introspection and, at some point, these philosophical journeys of identity and protagonists take an active step in rejecting the transformation that involve the films' current inscription of their identities and characters and sometimes the filmmakers participate in the creation and construction of themselves... (Naficy, 2001:33).

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Focusing on the latter type of journey, many inevitably, in the political process, producing elements of physical journeys can be applied. unmanned sites of political antagonism For instance, psychological/metaphorical and unpredictable forces for political journeys can be heterogeneous and evolutionary. representation. The address to nation as They can also be exploratory, involving personal narration stresses the insistence of political quests, wandering and searching, thereby power and cultural authority.... What emerges altering individual targets, purposes and as an effect of such 'incomplete signification' is objectives (Naficy, 2001). This type of journey is a turning of boundaries and limits into the in- deeply philosophical venturing into the between spaces through which the meanings of individual psyche and establishing subjectivity. cultural and political authority are negotiated The journey thus becomes one of identity. As a (Bhabha, 1990:4). consequence of uprooting or being uprooted from one country and attempting to transplant Nair and Mehta's women characters undergo the physical self into the new environment, journeys of identity. They travel necessary mental and emotional changes are from being obedient, dutiful, made in order to exist comfortably in the new virtuous women who honour the environment. Amidst all of these changes, family (and by implication, the people in exile and diaspora begin to question country) to women who step outside People in who they are and who they have to become. of tradition to become empowered, exile begin to They begin to analyse and measure the decision-making beings. The change appropriateness of the influencing factors of comes through a reclaiming of body question who both their homeland and their host country. and sexuality, as these are the they are These internal transformational shifts in identity aspects of the Indian woman that often surface in the personal struggles of these were governed by norms and rules filmmakers' characters whether or not the film that would supposedly make her an depicts a story about living in exile or the acceptable, worthy being. The diaspora (Naficy, 2001). actions of the women in the films disrupt mainstream convention, and re-define Homi Bhabha's thoughts, regarding the narration the nature of the margin on two levels: it of nation, shed an interesting light on Naficy's becomes both a site of resistance for the ideas of journeying, border-crossing and identity: characters in the films, and a site for the expression of that resistance for the filmmakers. The 'locality' of national culture is neither Whereas the characters find themselves in the unified nor unitary in relation to itself, nor margins of the narrow confines of tradition and must it be seen simply as 'other' in relation to nationalism and react in rebellion, the directors what is outside or beyond it. The boundary... find themselves in the interstitial margins of the and the problem of outside/inside must always homeland and the host country and respond itself be a process of hybridity, incorporating politically, bell hooks supports the concept of the new 'people' in relation to the body politic, margin as a platform for resistance (hooks, generating other sites of meaning and 1990:149-150):

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For me [the] space of radical openness is a often universalist approach of these feminisms margin - a profound edge. Locating oneself tend to assume that the Third World woman/ there is difficult yet necessary. It is not a 'safe' woman of colour is a singular monolithic place. One is always at risk. One needs a subject. A consequence of employing western community of resistance. [...] fljt [the feminist methodological and analytical modes margin] is also the site of radical possibility, a to the Third World experience is that a space of resistance. It was this marginality homogeneous notion of the oppression of that I was naming as a central location for the women as a group is assumed, which, in turn, production of a counter-hegemonic discourse produces the image of an average Third World that is not just found in words but in habits of woman (Williams and Chrisman, 1992). being and the way one lives. As such, I was not - speaking of a marginality one wishes to lose This average third world woman leads to give up or surrender as part of moving into an essentially truncated life based on - the center but rather of a site one her feminine gender (read: sexually stays in, clings to even, because it constrained) and being 'third world' (read: Women of nourishes one's capacity to resist. ignorant, poor, uneducated, tradition-bound, colour It offers to one the possibility of religious, domesticated, family-oriented, have to radical perspective from which to victimized, etc). This ... is in contrast to the become see and create, to imagine (implicit) self-representation of western active alternatives, new worlds. women as educated, modern, as having partici- control over their bodies and seocualities, and in pants It is in the nature of the border- the freedom to make their own decisions their self- crossing journeys of identity and the (Williams and Chrisman, 1992:200). presenta- marginal resistance of the female tion characters in the 'accented' films of Mohanty suggests that a change be made such Nair and Mehta, that postcolonial that the representation of Third World women feminisms become significant. is a truer reflection of their contexts/ circumstances/conditions8. This can occur in two Postcolonial feminisms ways: Third World women, women of colour or women previously belonging to the Third World Postcolonial feminisms is a rich and diverse have to become active participants in their self- field of study that has arisen as a reaction to, presentation9, or Western scholarship has to and as a transformation of, the various forms of become more open, taking into account that western feminism6. factors such as race, class and ethnic origin play a significant role in the lives of Third World women. Chandra Talpade Mohanty's ideas (1988,1991) begin with a critique of some forms of western Naficy, in identifying 'accented' cinema, shows feminism, arguing that they can sometimes be that dominant, 'western' cinematic practices too narrow to be applied to the plight of the are not always applicable to all groups of people Third World woman/ woman of colour7. The (specifically people originating from countries

70 Agenda 58 2003 Focus considered to be Third World or non-western). This is a vital concern in the analysis of Nair and The conventions of the Hollywood discourses Mehta's films. The journeys of identity that their and narratives are not sufficient to tell their characters undergo, begin at a point when they stories or effectively capture their experiences. realise that their identities are constructs of the However, when these people do move into the ideology of Indian womanhood and its historical western spaces, the access to appropriate attachment to Indian nationalism. resources and established frameworks, and the ability to express the self allow for the creation Mohanty therefore welcomes and encourages of new discourses such as 'accented' cinema writing by Third World women; specifically writing and postcolonial feminisms. Similar to Mohanty, relating to history, the lives and communities of Naficy also proposes the consideration of other Third World women and the writers factors such as race, class, gender, ethnicity, themselves. This, she says, aids in 'the creation of a politics and nationalism in the understanding discursive space where (self-) knowledge is of where these filmmakers are coming from produced by and for Third World women' (Mohanty and where they are going. This is important et al, 1991:34). Writing and the ? in establishing a framework for the analysis production of female (and feminist) A consid- - of Nair and Mehta's films being Indian narratives becomes a site of conflict, eration of is specific to them. It is therefore crucial confrontation, resistance and agency history to draw on the above-mentioned factors in where discussions surrounding reveals the order to understand the Indian female consciousness and subjectivity are signifi- experience of identity and how it takes form in engaged in, and where political cance of their films. identities can be established, formed race in or shaped. In creating their own feminist Furthermore, a consideration of history reveals narratives, they foreground that which analyses the significance of race in feminist analyses. has been ignored or neglected by One of the most prominent criticisms of dominant hegemonic narratives of the west: western feminisms has been their heavy concern with gender inequality at the expense ftjhe very practice of remembering the grain of race and its inscription in gender injustice. of 'public' or hegemonic history, of locating the Mohanty views gender and race as relational silences and the struggle to assert knowledge concepts. A woman, she says, is not a woman which is outside the parameters of the because she is biologically female. Historical dominant suggests a rethinking of sociality constructions and ideologies of womanhood itself (Mohanty et al, 1991:38-39). are linked as much to class and race as they are to sex: This has implications for both Naficy's theories and Nair and Mehta's filmmaking. The films of fijt is the intersections of various systemic Nair and Mehta, falling under the category of networks of class, race, (hetero)sexuality, 'accented' cinema and employing its techniques and nation, then, that position us as 'women' to defy convention and make controversial, (Mohanty et al, 1991:12-13). political statements about the representation of

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the Indian woman, are creating discursive Spivak sometimes uses the term in reference to spaces for female and feminist narratives. the Third World Indian woman. She argues that the subaltern cannot speak because, as such, she This then filters into Gayatri Chakravorty is not heard by the privileged of either the First or Spivak's ideas surrounding the notion of the Third Worlds. She believes that the status of the subaltern. Spivak has been extensively involved subaltern would change completely, were she to in both literary and postcolonial studies. Her make herself heard, such that she would cease to exist - theories relating to the subaltern emerged out of as a subaltern 'a most oppressed and invisible this involvement and they have had a significant constituency'. Spivak perceives this as the ultimate as she is not interested impact in the area of postcolonial studies (and, goal in and in particular, postcolonial feminisms). preserving subalternity (Landry Maclean, 1996: 5). She suggests, at this point, the consideration of two levels of Taking the term from the writings of Antonio representation10. Gramsci (1971), Spivak's main concern 'Representing', as it refers to regarding the subaltern was: 'can stands, political representation in the sense that someone The status the subaltern speak?' (Williams assumes the place of someone else and speaks of the and Chrisman, 1992). In response, for or on behalf of that person. The hyphenated subaltern she posits that the subaltern is not 're-presenting' relates to the portrayal of would heard and, as a consequence, someone in some form or another, such as art. change cannot speak. These two levels are nature and complete- complicit by have to be ly, were considered in conjunction to one The Oxford Dictionary suggests that she another when applied to the concept of the the term 'subaltern', in reference to to make subaltern. an officer of lower rank, has its herself origins in the military It has, heard This is the point Naficy makes when he speaks however, developed to mean inferior about how the tension, created by the filmmaker's or subordinate. Spivak subscribes to a very diasporic or exilic position, finds expression in the specific notion of the term. Although she films that they make. Having left their homeland, appropriated it from the work of Gramsci, she a potentially restricted place, they create a prefers Ranajit Guha's conception: political space (accented filmmaking) from which to represent people sharing their ethnicity. In the space that is cut off from the lines of other words, 'accented' filmmakers speak on mobility in a colonized country. You have the behalf of the people in or from their countries, as foreign elite and the elite. Below indigenous directors, through the depiction of these people. that will have the vectors you of upward, In terms of Nair and Mehta, they are both Indian sideward and backward downward, mobility. women filmmakers who, as directors, are creating But then there is a space which is for all narratives about other Indian women in various practical purposes outside those lines (Spivak, contexts, through the portrayal of these women in Landry and Maclean, 1996:289). in their female protagonists.

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In this way, Nair and Mehta work toward as an oppressed, colonised nationalist metaphor, eliminating the subaltern (sometimes in the way in others. Spivak conceives of the term, but also in the sense of inferior, subordinate and oppressed). Conclusion Nair and Mehta's female characters may not all be subaltern, but the construction of each of This focus has worked toward establishing a these women exhibits, at some level, aspects of a theoretical framework of analysis not only for subaltern identity. Therefore, by allowing their the films of Mira Nair and Deepa Mehta, but characters agency in representation, these one that could also potentially argue for an directors are subsequently allowing the Indian emerging postcolonial feminist film practice. woman to make herself heard.

The framework proposes that Nair and Mehta, as Spivak often, in her writings and interviews, a result of their diasporic positions, portray relates the story of Bhuvaneswari Bhaduri, a Indian women in unconventional teenage woman who committed suicide in ways. These unconventional ways I Calcutta in 1926, because she was unable to result from a comparison of the These execute an assassination entrusted to her by a construction of Nair and Mehta's directors political movement that was involved in the female characters to that of are armed struggle for Indian independence and that popular Indian cinema, Bollywood. allowing the she belonged to (Spivak, in Williams and Indian women have been made to Indian Chrisman, 1992). In an interview entitled, 'The maintain nationalist ideals through woman problem of cultural representation' (Harasym, the perpetuation of Hindu values to make 1990:50-58), Spivak explains that the complexity and beliefs. Religious and social herself of the act of relating Bhuvaneswari's story lay in rules governing the behaviour of heard the fact that she was not giving this young woman Indian women have ultimately led a voice, but she was rather (re)-presenting her by to their oppression and patriarchal writing her narrative to be read (Spivak, in control of their bodies. It was the Harasym, 1990:57). ideal wife, mother and daughter who respected and devotedly obeyed the rules governing This could also be said of Nair and Mehta (and behaviour that were favourably portrayed in other filmmakers falling under Naficy's concept popular films. Indian women thus developed as of an 'accented' cinema): they represent the symbols of nationalism. texts of other Indian women, where the text is the nationalism of India inscribed in the notion of Nair and Mehta subvert this concept of the Indian the ideal Indian woman and the consequences woman. They depict Indian women as reclaiming that accompany this. They are not speaking for their bodies and sexual identities. It is at this these women but are allowing them a resistant point that Naficy is introduced to argue for the space in which to be heard. In this way, Nair and similarities in Nair and Mehta's work, and to Mehta contribute to the ailing existence of the attribute these similarities to their displacement Indian woman as subaltern in some instances, or as diasporic filmmakers and its consequences.

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Postcolonial feminist discourses provide an Mehta D (date unknown) Water (production company - unknown as film is understanding of how text and narrative the incomplete). - Nair M (1991) Mississippi M?sala, Mirabai Films, medium of film in this focus can be specific to Inc. different groups of people, occupying the Nair M (1996) Kama Sutra, Mirabai Films Inc. the of margins, through incorporation defining Nair M (2002) Monsoon Wedding, Mirabai Films, elements such as race, gender, history, Inc. geography, ethnicity and nation; and, in this Notes specificity, become a tool of resistance and 1. Naficy, himself an Iranian living in the diaspora, transgression. has researched and written extensively about the media practices of diasporic and exilic Iranian References communities in America. These media practices Bhabha HK (ed) (1990) Nation & Narration, New are, he argues, an attempt at remembering the York: Routledge. homeland (Iran) and either rejecting or retaining Chatterjee ? (1989) 'Colonialism, nationalism, and all that it stands for. In An Accented Cinema: colonialized women: the contest in India' in Exilic and Diasporic Filmmaking (2001), America Ethnologist 16,4. Naficy broadens his theories to include the Dasgupta SD (ed) (1998) A Patchwork Shawl: filmmaking of other exilic and diasporic Chronicles of South Asian Women in America, nationalities. Through the study of filmmakers of New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press. diverse backgrounds, Naficy illustrates the Harasym S (ed) (1990) The Post-Colonial Critic - appropriateness of his theories to various Interviews, Strategies, Dialogues, New York: filmmakers in the diaspora. His ideas are therefore Routledge. significant, for the purposes of this focus, as they Hooks ? (1990) Yearning: Race, Gender, and allow for the establishment of similarity between Cultural Politics, Boston: South End Press. the chosen filmmakers. I have not encountered any Landry D & Maclean G (eds) (1996) The Spivak other work in the field that so coherently captures Reader-Selected works of Gay atri Chakravorty the concept of diasporic film practice. Spivak, New York: Routledge. 2. 'Interstitial' is an adjective derived from the noun Mohanty CT, Russo A & Torres L (eds) (1991) Third 'interstices', which refers to a gap or small space World Feminism and the Politics of between two things or component parts. The term Feminism, Bloomington & Indianapolis: Indiana 'interstitial' therefore describes the 'in-between', University Press. trapped or undecided position that finds Naficy H (2001) An Accented Cinema: Exilic and expression in 'accented' films or that 'accented' Diasporic Filmmaking, New Jersey: Princeton films occupy as a result of the filmmakers' personal University Press. and internal experiences of living either in the Pines J & Willemen P (eds) (1991) Questions of diaspora or in exile. Third Cinema, London: British Film Institute. 3. Both Nair and Mehta are women filmmakers of the Indian Spivak GC (1999) A Critique of Postcolonial diaspora. 4. Two of Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Nair's more acclaimed films include Present, Massachusetts: Harvard University Mississippi M?sala (1991) and Monsoon Press. Wedding (2002). 5. Williams ? & Chrisman L (eds) (1994) Colonial Bhattacharjee is referring here to theorist Partha Discourses and Post-Colonial Theory, New Chatterjee's (1989) article, 'Colonialism, York: Columbia University Press. nationalism, and colonialized women: the contest in India'. Films 6. Western Second Wave feminisms is a term used in Mehta D (1995) Fire, Trial by Fire Films. this focus to describe various forms of feminism (eg Mehta D (1999) Earth, Cracking the Earth Films radical, socialist, Marxist) that have developed in Ine, Goldwyn Films. the west. This focus does not aim to completely

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alienate or berate western feminisms, for they have focus, the category 'Third World women/women of earned their place. However, some forms of these colour' can be understood as women of colour who western feminisms have tended to speak, on are natives of or have connections to Third World behalf of all women, from a middle-class white countries, and have suffered gendered oppression perspective. In doing so, western feminisms have influenced by ethnicity and a lack of resources. unwittingly tended to assume that the struggle and 8. Third World women are not always powerless plight of all women (no matter their differences) are victims (Williams and Chrisman, 1992). the same. The experiences of women of colour and 9. This has implications for Nair and Mehta (formerly women from underprivileged backgrounds were citizens of India, a Third World country) in the thus not allowed the importance they deserved. It sense that they are changing the self-perception of cannot be assumed that all women experience the women by firstly representing them in films and by same things in the same way. Third World women/ secondly representing them with critical agency, women of colour have therefore begun to speak out identity transformation and decision-making and, as a result, have given rise to postcolonial power. 10. two feminist discourses - a more holistic approach to Spivak appropriated these particular of from Karl Marx the struggles of women. meanings/uses representation in his The Brumaire of Louis 7. The use of these terms in the focus is in no way an book, Eighteenth in 1852 in New attempt to perpetuate a homogenising category, as Bonaparte (published York): Vertreten Darstellen this would contradict the argument that Mohanty (represent) (re-present). proposes. Trinh ? Min-ha (in Pines and Willemen, 1989) and Grace Poore (in Dasgupta, 1998) explain that these terms initially emerged as a way Subeshini Moodley is a student at the University of of including or giving space to those women who Natal, Durban, completing her Masters in Culture, were overlooked by white/western/European Communication and Media Studies. She is working privilege and discourse. However, these terms towards a specialisation in film studies and feminist have developed into a category that perhaps theory. She has recently been offered a one-year women of various and homogenises backgrounds contract lectureship for 2004 teaching first, third have become of - part mainstream vocabulary an and honours/masters level film courses inescapable process. For the purposes of this

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