[ecrea] Call for papers, 7th Annual Southeast Asian Cinemas Conference: THE POLITICS, PRACTICES, AND POETICS OF THE ARCHIVE

Call for papers

7th Annual Southeast Asian Cinemas Conference

THE POLITICS, PRACTICES, AND POETICS OF THE ARCHIVE

SINGAPORE
19 - 22 JUNE, 2012

Eight years since the first Annual Southeast Asian Cinemas Conference
which heralded the resurgence of cinematic new waves in the region, we
turn our eyes to the state of film archiving and the relationship
between cinema and the archives. Filipino film critic Alexis Tioseco's
2009 open letter to the Film Development Council of the Philippines
mentions current holdings stored in 'deplorable conditions'. In his
letter, Tioseco praises the National Film Archive of Thailand for its
work in doing so much with so little. In Indonesia, the Sinematek
Indonesia which was established in the early 1970s has also seen cuts
that make the archive a shadow of its former glory. It is only in
Singapore that a young Asian Film Archive (est. 2005) has taken root.

The 7th Southeast Asian Cinemas Conference (2012) emphasizes the
politics, practices, and poetics of the archive. How does one define
an archive? And who can be said to do archival work? Might DVD
pirates, private collectors, cinephiles, film bloggers and film
societies be considered film archivists of a sort when governments do
not or no longer perceive the need to fund national film archives? If
so, how does this change the public nature of an archive, and what
implications does it have on the production of knowledge? What might
film curators take into consideration when they select and preserve
films for the archive? What are the social, political, aesthetic, and
scholarly roles of the archive? How does the archive negotiate issues
of power and accessibility?  What is the role of the archive in the
digital age of new media?

At the same time, in interrogating the relationship between film and
the archive, might film itself as a socio-cultural text not be
regarded as an archive and as a necessary site to re-think
temporalities and the reasons for nostalgia? As Derrida reminds us,
"The question of the archive is not a question of the past" but rather
"a question of the future itself." Where does the archive lie in
creating, defining, and constructing cultural memory or cultural
heritage? This conference then invites papers that comment not only on
the nature of what an archive is and the role it plays in South East
Asia, but also how films and film archives ask us to think about the
timeliness of cultural work.

Each year, the conference has included film practitioners in
recognition of the crucial role they have played in increasing film
education and discourse in the region. We have previously provided
space for independent filmmakers and screenings of their works,
focused on curriculum development, and highlighting alternative
cultures of cinema. This year, the conference seeks to include
workshops that bring together film archivists from within the region.

We invite panels that address this theme, particularly questions concerning:

*       Film Archival Materials as Intertexts
*       Comparative Studies of Archives or Case Studies of Specific Archives
*       Role of the Academic / Film Critic / Filmmaker in Relation to
the Archive
*       Technology / New Media
*       Production of Temporalities and Spatialities
*       Politics of Taste
*       Preservation and Dissemination
*       Archival Research Methods
*       Intellectual Property
*       The Relationship between Southeast Asian Archives and the
International Federation of Film Archives (FIAF)
*       Historiography
*       Scholarly Accessibility
*       Subtitling and the Archive
*       Film Policy and the Archive
*       The State and the Archive
*       Short Films and the Archive

We also welcome submissions for the open call. Please check our
website archives and conference programs for past paper topics as we
are less likely to accept topics that have been covered before:
http://seaconference.wordpress.com/conference-program/

Abstract Submission Deadline: Nov 30, 2011 Please send an abstract
(max. 500 words) and short bio (max. 100
words) to: Sophia Siddique Harvey ((soharvey /at/ vassar.edu)), Khoo Gaik
Cheng ((gaik.khoo /at/ gmail.com)) and Jasmine Nadua Trice
((jntrice /at/ gmail.com)). We are currently attempting to get funding for
travel subsidies and accommodations but cannot offer any as of yet.



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