Aims and Objectives of this Project
The Research Network undertakes collaborative research in order to develop a comparative framework in which to analyse (post-)migrant and diasporic cinemas in contemporary Europe, addressing the following aims and objectives:
- To map the field of investigation by critically examining the heuristic value and socio-political implications of existing terminology (e.g. ‘migrant’, ‘diasporic’, ‘accented’, ‘minor’, ‘displaced’, ‘transcultural’, ‘transnational’ and ‘cinéma de métissage’ ). The cultural and linguistic diversity of the network participants will enable us to examine how the terminology adopted across different linguistic and ethnic communities relates to the standing of migrant/diasporic cinemas in a variety of cultural and national contexts.
- To understand the specificities of film production and distribution of migrant and diasporic cinema in a variety of different national and cultural contexts in contemporary Europe.
- To compare the reception of these films in different countries and contexts.
- To explore issues of representation in contemporary migrant and diasporic cinema in Europe, investigating in particular the following questions:
- How do these films articulate difference? To what extent are the axes of nation, race, gender, sexuality, religion, language and class intersecting, resulting in over-determined identities of otherness and marginality?
- How is cultural hybridity constructed in the films’ generic templates, the languages/subtitles and the music used?
- Does the evolution of migrant cinemas across Europe over the past twenty-five years follow similar patterns? How have funding and policy changes as well as generational shifts affected the development of diasporic cinemas?