Unruly Bodies of Global Cinema offers a close examination of the cinematic discourses surrounding those bodies that are considered abnormal, queer, weird, and monstrous throughout diverse global contexts with specific attention to those works of global cinema.
In this multilateral search for the intersection of theories of "weird" with the spaces of the other, we will search for the queer, the weird, the outsider, the disgusting, the immigrant, the crip, and more in order to comprehend the limits of an idealized, Cartesian, liberal humanist subject and its decentered power. We will move broadly in time and space within theoretical and cinematic traditions to concentrate on what would be categorized as monstrous, queer, and unruly bodies and how they function to form and/or disrupt a unified, consistent discourse of the vision of the body. We will look at the ways in which the appearance of these forms of embodiments, with their legions and regions, their denial of binary forms of gender, and their cold and mildew skins, disrupt our understanding of "normal" and ask us to reconsider our ways of being, doing, and living. Hence, this course will ask you to think across disciplines and across diverse forms of identities.
One of the central premises of this course is to analyze the way unruly bodies appear on the screen. Hence, we will examine the films both technically and through the lens of several basic film theories and critical approaches to moving images. This examination extends to aspects like shot selection, mise-en-scène, sound, and other formal elements in the films, all within a broader critical context. Concomitantly, throughout the course, we will explore how unruly bodies appear and move in the examples from global cinema while drawing from aesthetic, queer, feminist, and critical disability theories. Our ultimate goal is to foster new modes of thinking by reimagining and reconceptualizing the materiality of the body. Hence, we will question the limits of the proper, intelligible, and readable bodies by asking who and what, in fact, forms and conforms to the norms of our global society and what cinematic images of the weird and unruly bodies enable this formation.
About Professor Sendur