Participatory Film Projects for Women
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
EMPOWERING WOMEN: PARTICIPATORY FILM PROJECTS FOR WOMEN by YUEN LAM LI A thesis submitted to the University of Birmingham for the degree of MASTER BY RESEARCH IN FILM AND CREATIVE WRITING Department of Film and Creative Writing School of English, Drama and American & Canadian Studies College of Arts and Law University of Birmingham Final Submission on 26th October, 2018 University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository This unpublished thesis/dissertation is copyright of the author and/or third parties. The intellectual property rights of the author or third parties in respect of this work are as defined by The Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or as modified by any successor legislation. Any use made of information contained in this thesis/dissertation must be in accordance with that legislation and must be properly acknowledged. Further distribution or reproduction in any format is prohibited without the permission of the copyright holder. ABSTRACT Women have long had to suffer oppression and gender inequality. Films and filmmaking, which were initially created largely for the purposes of entertainment, now are more accessible and have the power to enhance women’s agency and change people’s attitudes and thereby to create a better world for women. Participatory filmmaking has become increasingly popular for empowerment in a wide range of projects and scholarship. This research focuses on the connection between participatory filmmaking and women’s empowerment by analysing three case studies from NGOs which are providing women in developing countries with positive experiences through participatory film training. It emphasises the roles of NGOs and how different contexts of the projects contribute to different degrees of women’s empowerment. These projects also challenge and add to Bill Nichols’ concept of participatory documentary by highlighting participants’ participation in the filmmaking process. This research investigates how the women make use of filmmaking to create their own voice, messages or stories they deliver to the audiences and how women’s empowerment is achieved in the process. It also hopes to contribute with insight into the potential development of participatory film projects. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would first like to thank my supervisors, Dr Michele Aaron and Professor Rob Stone of Department of Film and Creative Writing at University of Birmingham. I have learnt a lot of under their guidance and mentorship. Dr Aaron consistently allowed this thesis to be my own work, but guided me in the right the direction whenever she thought I needed it. Professor Stone has given me a lot of good suggestions and guidance during the correction period of my thesis. I would also like to thank the organisers and participants of the projects mentioned in this thesis who provided information through emails or conducted Skype interviews, including Dr Alia Arasoughly, Dr Alice Welbourn, Miss Danielle Louise Spencer, Miss Makena Henguva, Miss Dara Khader and Miss Liali Kilani. Without their passionate participation and support, the information of the projects could not have been successfully obtained for analysis. I would also like to express my appreciation to Ms Megan Caine, who provided ‘third party’ editorial assistance and copy-edited this thesis for conventions of language, spelling and grammar. Finally, I would like to express my very profound gratitude to my family and my friends for providing me with support and continuous encouragement throughout my year of study and through the process of researching and writing this thesis. This accomplishment would not have been possible without them. Thank you. TABLE OF CONTENT List of Figures Chapter One: Introduction 1 Chapter Two: The UNAIDS Participatory Film Project: Empowering Women living with HIV in Uganda and Namibia 38 Chapter Three: The WISE Project: Individual-initiated Project on domestic violence in Karachi 78 Chapter Four: Shashat in Palestine: Long-term Impact of Film Training on Women 116 Chapter Five: Conclusion 161 Appendices: (i) Information from Makena Henguva 171 (ii) “What’s Tomorrow”: Shashat’s 10th Women Festival in 173 Palestine (iii) “What’s Tomorrow”: Film synopsis 176 (iv) Shashat’s Work Impact 179 (v) Interview questions with Shashat’s filmmakers 186 (vi) Interview questions with Danielle Louise Spencer 187 Filmography 189 Bibliography 191 LIST OF FIGURES 3.1 Screenshot of WISE Karachi ‘Half-Face’ Documentary Part 2, from 98 YouTube 3.2 Screenshot of WISE Karachi ‘Half-Face’ Documentary Part 2, from 98 YouTube 3.3 Screenshot of WISE Karachi ‘Half-Face’ Documentary Part 2, from 98 YouTube 3.4 Screenshot of WISE Karachi ‘Half-Face’ Documentary Part 2, from 98 YouTube 4.1 Screenshot of A Very Hot Summer, from Vimeo 127 4.2 Screenshot of A Very Hot Summer, from Vimeo 127 4.3 Screenshot of A Very Hot Summer, from Vimeo 127 4.4 Screenshot of A Very Hot Summer, from Vimeo 127 4.5 Screenshot of A Very Hot Summer, from Vimeo 128 4.6 Screenshot of A Very Hot Summer, from Vimeo 128 4.7 Screenshot of Golden Pomegranate Seeds, from YouTube 140 4.8 Screenshot of Golden Pomegranate Seeds, from YouTube 140 CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION Discussions of participatory filmmaking has been scattered widely among scholars in different fields and used for advocacy by different organisations. Filmmaking, as a male-dominated industry, lacks women’s voices, but these can be strengthened through training women to become filmmakers. More and more organisations are using a variety of film training projects to get more women involved in filmmaking for advocacy. How do participatory film training projects aimed at women enhance women’s agency and enable them to use their voice to create change through filmmaking? By showcasing three participatory filmmaking projects for women in developing countries, this thesis examines how participatory film training for women can achieve women’s empowerment. The thesis also intends to consider how this kind of filmmaking differs from the traditional participatory mode of documentary and provides insight into the potential of participatory filmmaking for empowerment in the future. 1.1 Gender Inequality in General Women’s rights merit considerable attention in today’s world and there are more and 1 more campaigns initiated by women and organisations. ‘No country in the world can yet say that they have achieved gender equality’, British actress Emma Watson said in her address to the United Nations (UN), as she launched a campaign called HeForShe in 2016.1 The campaign successfully invited 10 leading global universities to commit to and chart progress on achieving gender equality.2 Following the feminist campaign by HeForShe, in January 2018, a group of women, including many from the entertainment industry, formed an initiative called ‘Time’s Up’ to address and combat sexual harassment and systematic sexism in the workplace.3 As Naila Kabeer describes, long-standing patriarchal constraints have acted to limit women’s agency in everyday life, hindering gender equality.4 Domestic violence, rape, sex slavery and other forms of gender-based violence against women are commonly found in the world, especially in developing countries, which are often patriarchal in culture. The oppression of women has a long history, but it is striking that even today women continue to be disadvantaged when compared with men, in a range of areas, including employment, family relations and education. For example, Women in the Workplace, a 1 UN Women News, Emma Watson: Gender equality is your issue too (UN Women, 2014), <http://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2014/9/emma-watson-gender-equality-is-your-issue-too> [accessed 10 January 2017]. 2 UN Women, Press Release: New UN Women HeForShe IMPACT Report puts spotlight on gender equality in global universities (UN Women, 2016) <http://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2016/9/press-release-heforshe-university-parity-report> [accessed 1 August 2017]. 3 Time’s Up (2017) <https://www.timesupnow.com/> [accessed 30 March 2018]. 4 Naila Kabeer, ‘Empowerment, Citizenship and Gender Justice: A Contribution to Locally Grounded Theories of Change in Women’s Lives’, Ethics and Social Welfare, 6.3 (2012), 216-232 (p.217), <https://doi.org/10.1080/17496535.2012.704055> [accessed 28 August 2017]. 2 comprehensive research project carried out in the United States, states that nearly 50% of men think women are well represented in leadership in organisations where only one in 10 senior leaders is a woman.5 In terms of education, the World’s Women 2015 statistics presented by the UN show that nearly two thirds of the world’s 781 million illiterate adults are women living in developing regions, and that the proportion has remained unchanged for the last 20 years.6 1.1.1 Women in the Film Industry Shifting the discussion to film studies and the filmmaking industry, scholars have criticised the misleading representation or misrepresentation of women in films. According to Laura Mulvey, popular films, especially Hollywood films, attract audiences by manipulating their visual pleasure in ways that are usually patriarchal.7 The relevant visual pleasure is all about the male gaze, which requires women to be regarded as objects. Images of women in mainstream films and other types of media production are often negative, highly sexualised or focused on women as passive. Representations of women in the media are often narrow, which gives rise to certain 5 Alexis Krivkovich and others, Women in the Workplace Study 2017 (Lean In and McKinsey&Company, 2017) < https://womenintheworkplace.com/> [accessed 30 March 2018] 6 United Nations, The World’s Women 2015 (United Nations, 2015) <https://unstats.un.org/unsd/gender/downloads/Ch5_Power_and_decision_info.pdf> [accessed 30 March 2018] 7 Laura Mulvey, ‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema’, Screen, 16 (1975), 6-18 (p.8), <https://doi.org/10.1093/screen/16.3.6> [accessed 14 October 2016]. 3 stereotypes, of women as sex objects, powerless victims, aggressive leaders and over-emotional.