Events

The Activist Camera: Class, Sexuality, and Ethnicity in Films of Japan

A Conversation with Masaki Tamura and Tom Gunning, and a screening of Himatsuri

When:
Friday, February 26, 1999, 6:30pm - 6:30pm
Description:
A Conversation with Masaki Tamura and Tom Gunning, and Screening of Himatsuri (1985, color, 126 min., video, Japan) Directed by Mitsuo Yanagimachi, camera by Masaki Tamura. What is activism in filmmaking? Can it or should it be defined? What is the relation between self-proclaimed activist films, other films, and progressive social change? How do different political identities intersect in such films, especially sexual identity with class and ethnicity? This symposium presents an opportunity to think about the political implications of films by hearing from and talking to filmmakers and scholars who hold diverging attitudes toward their work and "activism."
Co-sponsored by Committee on Japanese Studies at the Center for East Asian Studies, the Franke Institute for the Humanities, the Isaac and Viola H. Stern Endowment Fund, the Center for Gender Studies, and the Lesbian and Gay Workshop.