2410 Melnitz Hall
UCLA Campus
Los Angeles, CA 90095
From a portrait by Paul Gauguin of Annah la Javanaise of 1893 to the omnibus films produced by Nia diNata titled Perempuan Punya Cerita (Chants of Lotus) of 2007and Pertaruhan [At Stake] of 2008, this talk will explore how notions of a unified liberal subject are dismantled in re-viewing past and current representations of Indonesian women and sexuality. Drawing from her current book project, Annah la Javanaise, Fatimah Tobing Rony hopes to have a dialogue with other scholars, artists, and media producers about rethinking subjectivity and subject positions in the production and reception of visual media in the globalizing present.
Chants of Lotus [Perempuan Punya Cerita or “The Women Have Stories”], directed by Nia diNata, Lasya Susatyo, Upi, and Fatimah Tobing Rony is an omnibus narrative film about women and sexuality starring some of the most famous Indonesian actresses in contemporary cinema today. When this film was released it was heavily censored by the Indonesian film censor board. The producer and director Nia Dinata campaigned to defend the artistic integrity of the film, taking a request to the Constitutional Court for the MFI (Masyarakat Filem Indonesia or the Indonesian Film Society) to reform the censor system. We will be screening the first twenty minutes of the film, directed by Fatimah Tobing Rony, “Chants from an Island.”
Fatimah Tobing Rony is a filmmaker and a scholar. She was one of the directors of the narrative feature film Chants of Lotus [Perempuan Punya Cerita] (2008). Her book, The Third Eye: Race, Cinema, and Ethnographic Spectacle (1996) won the 1998 Katherine Kovacs Book Prize from the Society of Cinema and Media Studies. Her current book project is Annah la Javanaise. She is Associate Professor at the University of California, Irvine in Film and Media Studies, and Visual Studies.
RSVP is required so that attendees can have read the paper in advance and be fully prepared to take part in the discussion.
RSVP required to EmilyW@women.ucla.edu.
Cost : Free and open to the public but RSVP required.
www.csw.ucla.edu/events/works-in-progress-fatimah-tobing-rony
EmilyW@women.ucla.edu Sponsor(s): Gender Studies
