Tag Archives: Gender and Sexuality
Situation, Location, Context
by Brian Bergen-Aurand Circumstance (2011). Director: Maryam Keshavarz. Writer: Maryam Keshavarz. Actors: Nikohl Boosheri / Sarah Kazemy / Reza Sixo Safai. Countries: France / USA/ Iran Circumstance– A fact or condition connected with or relevant to an event or action. One’s state of financial or material welfare. Circumstance often tops lists of recent LGBT cinema from the … Continue reading
Reading The Pink Book
by Brian Bergen-Aurand The concept of “obscenity” is tested when we dare to look at something that we desire to see but have forbidden ourselves to look at. When we feel that everything has been revealed, “obscenity” disappears and there is a certain liberation. When that which one had wanted to see isn’t sufficiently revealed, … Continue reading
The Filmic Experience
by Brian Bergen-Aurand The Myths of Blind Cinema Imagine film, or more precisely, the filmic experience in relation to three figures: Gyges, Butades, and Medusa (in contrast to Polyphemus). These three figures, or more precisely, the relations among these three figures raise for us the possibility of addressing the flimic experience in terms of a man … Continue reading
Five Films for International Women’s Day
by Brian Bergen-Aurand To help celebrate International Women’s Day, here are five films directed by women. In no particular order: Elaine May. The Heartbreak Kid. 1972. Fanta Regina Nacro. The Night of Truth. 2004. Li Yu. Fish and Elephant. 2001. Maria Luisa Bemberg. Camila. 1984. Susanne Bier. Love is All You Need. 2012. Continue reading
Sex Work in Our Midst?
by Brian Bergen-Aurand A couple of weeks ago, a friend asked me if I would be okay with sex workers “plying their trade” in my back yard. Since I’ve been asked to run this thought experiment no less than three times in the past month, by three different friends, all with slightly different queer perspectives, … Continue reading
“Once I’ve devoured your soul, we are neither animal nor human.”
by Brian Bergen-Aurand Thai filmmaker Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s 2004 Tropical Malady (Sud pralad) is a film that essays much of what concerns those of us who work at the intersection of Film Studies and Body Studies. In Tropical Malady a young soldier, Keng (Banlop Lomnoi), falls in love with a young man from the country, Tong … Continue reading
The Organization of Gender & Sexuality Across Time and Place
by Brian Bergen-Aurand Gender and sexuality are located in time and place. While the two are not just one thing, never the same thing, and should never be conflated, they remain entangled and mutually constituted. These two points organize the essays collected in Historicising Gender and Sexuality, edited by Kevin P. Murphy and Jennifer M. … Continue reading
Foreign Influence 