The Other: Homage to Edward Said

Abstract

The current investigation aims to explore the multimodality of the visual language in cinema, which articulates pictures and words into a creative medium of contemporary aesthetics and criticism. This multimodal discourse analysis focuses on Al-Akhar (The Other, 1999), a film that renders the postcolonial philosophy of Edward Said (1935-2002), the Palestinian-American critic. Youssef Chahine (1926-2008), the Egyptian cinematic artist, produced this film. The present creativity of multimodal cinematic visual language is significant in articulating form and content, where expressive components manifest through graphic, aesthetic, and semiotic symbolisms overlapping with local/global cinematographic ecologies. Three decades ago, Al-Akhar imagined today's media dominance when it criticised the sociopolitical landscape of the 1990s, which led to a series of inhumane incidents across different geographies at the beginning of the new millennium. It investigates the impacts of media and globalisation on Arabic social systems, discussing economies and cultural heritage with imperialism, colonialism, and capitalism. This paper aims to identify Youssef Chahine's cinematic art as a medium of Edward Said's criticism. Methodologically, it adopted the aesthetic analysis as a qualitative research method to explore the visual language in the cinematic medium. The research's question corresponds to the critical role of media in rendering the cultural issues of identity from aesthetic perspectives. This paper is significant because it explores the impact of critical thinking on multimodal media, which aesthetically incorporates language, fashion, architecture, sociology, philosophy and education. Furthermore, it identifies a significant dualism in art resembling a multimodal articulation of Edward Said's criticism and Youssef Chahine's cinema.