Year-end Sale % OFF 
Abstract
In this paper I introduce a lens of mobility for the study of documentary film practices and gender in zones of conflict. By drawing on my qualitative research regarding the practice of the independent filmmaker Iffat Fatima, I will argue that a lens of mobility helps to grasp highly mobile media practices both conceptually and methodologically. Through a lens of mobility, my focus lies on the potential of documentary film to open the imaginative boundaries of conflict zones and to politically and emotionally mobilize the testimony offered from everyday life in a highly militarized zone. This specifically requires the tracing of moments of political mobilization beyond cognitive questions of conflicting narratives and representations.
Highlights
My research focuses on the articulation of subjectivities through the form of an independent digital documentary film in relation to the Kashmir conflict1
In what follows within this section, I shall argue that a lens of mobility is helpful for the study of independent documentary film practices that engage with regions of geopolitical conflict
To make films on the Kashmir conflict means, for Iffat Fatima, not just interrogating dominant visual regimes by confronting them with images of “the everyday”—a category which is itself used to mediate these images, as they are captured as actuality footage—but engaging with questions of affect and its mobilization for political ends: will the audience show empathy, and will they feel what it means to live in an occupied zone, driven by a conflict memory to continue resistance against all odds?
Summary
My research focuses on the articulation of subjectivities through the form of an independent digital documentary film in relation to the Kashmir conflict. From the example of Fatima’s practice, I aim to introduce an interdisciplinary approach meant to open up new theoretical and methodological avenues for the study of conflict cinemas With this intention, my goal is to turn the sometimes-professed lack of method, theory and subject matter of “regional studies” into its strength by linking such work to the new interdisciplinary research paradigm of “new mobility studies” (Sheller and Urry 2006). In Fatima’s Khoon Diy Baarav, depictions of the movements of women, together with the filmmaker’s camera, create a testimony of everyday life in a militarized territory These representations portray the agency of her filmic subjects as women participating in a social movement of political self-determination by showing sequences of people marching through the streets and shouting slogans of “freedom” (azadi). I shall first contextualize my contribution within the emerging field of research that Smets (2015) calls “Cinemas of Conflict” before I clarify the above mentioned intersecting mobilities first methodogically (Section 3) and later by drawing on examples from Fatima’s filmic practice (Sections 4–6)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary 
Published Version (
Free)
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
