[Commlist] Call for Papers: Epistolary Forms in Film, Media and Visual Culture

Call for Papers:

_Epistolary Forms in Film, Media and Visual Culture_

Edited by Catherine Fowler and Teri Higgins

https://epistolaryforms.home.blog/2019/10/31/call-for-papers-epistolary-forms-in-film-media-and-visual-culture-2/

"We are living in a great epistolary age, even if no one much 
acknowledges it. Our phones, by obviating phoning,

have reestablished the omnipresence of text. Think of the sheer 
profusion of messages … that we now send. "

(Sally Rooney, 2019)

As Irish novelist Sally Rooney observes, despite the frequent assumption 
that technological advances

provide constantly new forms of communication, these new forms: the 
email, the blog, the text message,

the tweet, the update are actually haunted by old ‘epistolary’ forms: 
the letter and the diary. Both the letter

and the diary have strong historical relationships to privacy, secrecy 
and intimacy, as well as to anonymity

masquerade and deception, all notions that are both prevalent and highly 
contested in our current age.

By focusing on the connection between a wide-range of media and these 
epistolary forms our aim is to

consider their continuing significance for the mediation of 
self-expression and the building of relationships.

On the one hand, in mainstream cinema epistolary forms appear to produce 
storytelling that focuses

on emotion rather than action, as such, they challenge the 
superficiality of post-feminist narratives centered

on consumption and continue the melodramatic tradition, specifically the 
protagonist's “desire to express all… [and]

give voice to their deepest feelings” (Brooks, 1991) (See /You’ve Got 
Mail/ [1998], /Bridget Jones’s Diary/ [2001],

/Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants /[2005], /The Lake House/ [2006] 
/P.S I Love You/ [2007], /The Young Victoria/ [2009],

/Julie and Julia /[2009], and most recently, /I Love Dick/ [2016], 
/Love, Simon/ [2018], and /To All The Boys I’ve Loved/

/Before/ [2018]). Several films also ask us to consider emotional 
masculinity; specifically the relationship between men,

vulnerability, and letter writing ([/Dear, John /(2010], and /Love, 
Simon /2018], and Charlie in /The Perks of Being a Wallflower/ 2012]).

On the other hand, we find masquerade and deceit as the counter to 
intimacy and emotional expression. These

themes are increasingly prevalent as epistolary forms move online (/A 
Cinderella Story /[//2004] as a digital

take on a classic, /Sierra Burgess Is a Big Loser/, [2018], as the most 
recent re-telling of Cyrano de Bergerac,

and in the omniscient narration of /Gossip Girl /[2007-2012])/. /

In less mainstream film and media letters, diaries, emails, and blogs 
have provided ways to play with the space of the personal

and auto-biographical, providing intersections with the Essay Film 
genre. In this space epistolary forms offer genres of self-expression

that adopt intimate, emotional, confessional tones; in contrast to the 
essayistic they are often characterised by a lack of reflection,

as writers are too close to experiences, unable to make sense of them, 
writing them in the moment and/or caught up in the quotidian

detail. Hamid Naficy finds epistolary forms particularly prevalent for 
expressions of exile ‘driven by distance, separation, absence

and loss’ (Naficy, 1992: 101), (for example, Mona Hatoum’s /Measures of 
Distance /[1988]//and//Fernando Solanos/ Tangos: Exile of/

/Gardel /[1985]). Naficy’s words fit Indigenous collectives: the Chiapas 
media project (for Zapista communities in Mexico) who have

created politicised videos that use ‘letters, interviews and 
testimonials’ (Davis et al, 2015: 54) and independents from Chantal

Akerman and Jonas Mekas to Abbas Kiarostami (with Victor Erice).

Beyond cinema, in the art world and on other media, it is the themes of 
intimacy, privacy self-expression and masquerade raised by letters

and diaries that we find most frequently addressed. Artist Hito Steyerl, 
writing about online scamming letters, has gone so far as to argue

that: ‘[t]he strongest affective address of the digital happens in the 
epistolary mode. As a brush with words divorced from actual bodies.’(58)

Meanwhile visual artists including Sophie Calle and Miranda July have 
created subversive melodramas from their use of letters and diaries.

The goal of this proposed collection is to embark on a deep engagement 
with epistolary forms and their presence in culture and on screen.

We look forward to hearing from contributors working on all aspects of 
film, media and visual studies who share an interest in the many

connections between the audio-visual and epistolary forms. Contributors 
may choose to focus on a specific film or media text or pursue

an analysis that draws from a range of examples. As ‘epistolary forms’ 
we include letters, diaries, emails, blogs, texts, tweets and online

social media.

Proposals may consider (but should not be limited to) the following 
themes and issues:

·Histories of epistolary forms in film and media

·Re-defining self-expression on screen

·Implications for contemporary representations of intimacy

·Relationships with gender & sexuality, especially masculinity

·Intersectionality and epistolary forms

·Centrality to cultures of confession,

·Re-inventions of emotionality

·Extending notions of masquerade

·Relationships with genres (melodrama, romantic comedy, exile cinema, 
essay film)

·World Cinema/race, ethnicity, the inter-cultural

·Relation to other media forms (television; video games; social media)

·The letter in the digital age (social media; scams)

·Instagram and other social media platforms as diaristic forms

Proposals of up to 350 words, along with a short bio should be sent to 
the editors: (Catherine.fowler /at/ otago.ac.nz) 
<mailto:(Catherine.fowler /at/ otago.ac.nz)> and (theterihiggins /at/ gmail.com) 
<mailto:(theterihiggins /at/ gmail.com)> by *January 10th 2020*. Final chapters 
will be due January 2021. Details regarding publication (publisher and 
timeline) will be sent when proposals are accepted.

_References_

Brooks, Peter. "The Melodramatic Imagination." _Imitations of Life: A 
Reader on Film and_

_Television Melodrama._ Ed. Marcia Landy. Detroit: Wayne State 
University Press, 1991.

      50-68.

Davis, Glyn, Kay Dickinson, Lisa Patti and Amy Villarejo. _Film Studies 
- A Global Introduction_. London and New York: Routledge,

     2015.

Naficy, Hamid. _An Accented Cinema: Exilic and Diasporic Filmmaking_. 
Princeton: Princeton

      University Press, 2001.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/01/07/sally-rooney-gets-in-your-head 
<https://apc01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newyorker.com%2Fmagazine%2F2019%2F01%2F07%2Fsally-rooney-gets-in-your-head&data=02%7C01%7Ccatherine.fowler%40otago.ac.nz%7C4cc29e5100c34b38c97008d70e39eb63%7C0225efc578fe4928b1579ef24809e9ba%7C1%7C1%7C636993514246540079&sdata=80BocCqAF4Jk%2B8ASD%2Brz9aKe%2Fe8XwW91y%2F6qpNyGPKs%3D&reserved=0>

Steyerl, Hito. “Epistolary Affect and Romance Scams: Letter from an 
Unknown Woman.”

/     October,/ Vol. 138, (Fall 2011), pp. 57-69.


---------------
The COMMLIST
---------------
This mailing list is a free service offered by Nico Carpentier. Please use it responsibly and wisely.
--
To subscribe or unsubscribe, please visit http://commlist.org/
--
Before sending a posting request, please always read the guidelines at http://commlist.org/
--
To contact the mailing list manager:
Email: (nico.carpentier /at/ vub.ac.be)
URL: http://nicocarpentier.net
---------------