Decolonizing the lens of power : indigenous films in North America / Kerstin Knopf.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Knopf, Kerstin.

Series:

Cross/cultures ; 100.

Cross/cultures : readings in the post/colonial literatures in English ; 100

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Indian motion pictures--North America.

Indian motion pictures.

Ethnographic films--North America.

Ethnographic films.

Indians in the motion picture industry--North America.

Indians in the motion picture industry.

Indians in motion pictures.

Indian mass media--North America.

Indian mass media.

Indigenous peoples and mass media--North America.

Indigenous peoples and mass media.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (563 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Other Title:

Indigenous films in North America

Place of Publication:

Amsterdam [Netherlands] ; New York : Rodopi, 2008.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

This is the first book that comprehensively examines Indigenous filmmaking in North America, as it analyzes in detail a variety of representative films by Canadian and US-American Indigenous filmmakers: two films that contextualize the oral tradition, three short films, and four dramatic films. The book explores how members of colonized groups use the medium of film as a means for cultural and political expression and thus enter the dominant colonial film discourse and create an answering discourse. The theoretical framework is developed as an interdisciplinary approach, combining postcolonialism, Indigenous studies, and film studies. As Indigenous people are gradually taking control over the imagemaking process in the area of film and video, they cease being studied and described objects and become subjects who create self-controlled images of Indigenous cultures. The book explores the translatability of Indigenous oral tradition into film, touching upon the changes the cultural knowledge is subject to in this process, including statements of Indigenous filmmakers on this issue. It also asks whether or not there is a definite Indigenous film practice and whether filmmakers tend to dissociate their work from dominant classical filmmaking, adapt to it, or create new film forms and styles through converging classical film conventions and their conscious violation. This approach presupposes that Indigenous filmmakers are constantly in some state of reaction to Western ethnographic filmmaking and to classical narrative filmmaking and its epitome, the Hollywood narrative cinema. The films analyzed are The Road Allowance People by Maria Campbell, Itam Hakim, Hopiit by Victor Masayesva, Talker by Lloyd Martell, Tenacity and Smoke Signals by Chris Eyre, Overweight With Crooked Teeth and Honey Moccasin by Shelley Niro, Big Bear by Gil Cardinal, and Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner by Zacharias Kunuk.

Contents:

Preliminary Material

The Foucauldian Lens of Power Decolonized

A Postcolonial Approach to Indigenous Filmmaking in North America

Oral Tradition as Reflected in Film

Short Films

Dramatic Films

Conclusion

Works Cited

Filmography

Internet Sources

Appendix

Index.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references (p. [359]-386) and index.

Includes filmography (p. 380-384).

ISBN:

1-282-59450-8

9786612594502

90-420-2883-1

1-4416-1332-3

OCLC:

659500225

Publisher Number:

10.1163/9789042028838 DOI