Women and Turkish Cinema ─ Gender Politics, Cultural Identity and Representation

Following their coup in September 1980, the Turkish military engaged in a program of coercive depoliticization that Atakav (film and television studies, U. of East Anglia, England) argues had a profound impact on Turkish cinema, including a renewed focus on the individual and, in particular, individual women. She examines case studies of women's films of the 1980s (i.e. presented from the narrative point of view of female characters and focused on women's issues) during this period, finding that despite major shifts in narrative and representation of character, Turkish film "continued to objectify women; to present them as having a necessarily limited range of choices in a patriarchal society; and to remain ambivalent about whether women are ultimately capable of exercising independent agency." She focuses on four films in particular: Nisan Akman's Dunden Sonra Yarindan Once (After Yesterday Before Tomorrow), Atif Yilmaz's Mine and Asiye Nasil Kurtuhur (How can Asiye Survive), and Serif Goren's Kurbagalar (The Frogs). Annotation c2013 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Dr. Atil Eylem Atakav is Lecturer in Film and Television Studies at the University of East Anglia. She is the editor of Directory of World Cinema: Turkey (2012). She is currently working on two co-edited collections Women and Contemporary World Cinema and From Smut to Soft Core: 1970s and World Cinema. She is on the editorial board of Sine/Cine: Journal of Film Studies. She teaches Women, Islam and Media; Women and Film and World Cinemas modules at UEA. Her current research interests are on the representation of ‘honour’ based violence in the media. She writes regularly on issues around gender and womanhood for the Huffington Post (UK) and for her co-authored (with Melanie Williams) blog on women’s cinema: Auteuse Theories.