Feminism and Documentary (Visible Evidence) [Paperback]

Feminism and Documentary begins with a substantial historical introduction that highlights several of the specific areas that contributors address: debates over realism, the relationship between filmmaker and subject, historical thinking about documentary and thinking about the historical documentary, biography and autobiography, and the use of psychoanalysis. Other essays, most of which appear here for the first time, range from broad overviews to close analyses of particular films and videos and from discussions of well-known works such as Roger and Me and Don’t Look Back to lesser known texts that might revise the canon.

The collection includes an extensive filmography and videography with useful distribution information and a bibliography of work in this neglected area of scholarship. Lucid, sophisticated, and eye-opening, this book will galvanize documentary studies and demonstrate the need for women’s and cultural studies to grapple with visual media. Contributors: Michelle Citron, Northwestern U; Gloria J. Gibson, Indiana U; Chris Holmlund, U of Tennessee; Alexandra Juhasz, Pitzer College; Ann Kaneko; Anahid Kassabian, Fordham U; David Kazanjian, U of California, Berkeley; Susan Knobloch; Silvia Kratzer-Juilfs; Deborah Lefkowitz; Julia Lesage, U of Oregon; Laura U. Marks, Carleton U, Ottawa; Paula Rabinowitz, U of Minnesota; Michael Renov, USC; Patricia R. Zimmermann, Ithaca College.

"This collection of inventive essays—often stunningly brilliant, always inventively creative—brings the insights of feminist film theory into an illuminating encounter with the practices of documentary films. The exciting result, which pushes the limits of film form and the oversights of feminist thought, energizes both topics, giving new life to what we thought were old debates. In this wonderful endeavor—with an agenda- setting introduction that serves as a clarion call, with its truly international range and mindset, with its clear and urgent social mission—feminism and documentary discover what they always had in common besides a love affair with film: a mutual and urgent regard for the quality and equality of life on this planet. Documentary film and feminist theory were not things we did. They embodied what we are, what we could be." Patricia Mellencamp, Distinguished Professor of Art History, University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, author of A Fine Romance: Five Ages of Film Feminism --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.