English, Media and Performance Studies

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Beyond the biopic an exploration into the nature of biography through the medium of film.
(2017) van Eeden Harrison, Janet.; Arnott, Jill Margaret.
This research deals with the process of writing a biographical screenplay which sheds light and insight into the life of Mary Wollstonecraft, the eighteenth-century writer of ground-breaking works such as A Vindication on the Rights of Woman (1792). Although the facts around Wollstonecraft’s life are relatively well-known, especially in Britain, I wanted to write the screenplay to explore how her struggle to be taken seriously as a woman is still relevant today. For this reason I chose to create the modern, parallel narrative of Khetiwe’s story to illustrate the struggle for emancipation, which still continues in some parts of the world. Primarily, I aimed to create a structure which illustrates the defining characteristics of the protagonists, and ensures that the form of the screenplay enhances the hermeneutics of the narrative. This practice-based research begins with an examination of the most popular writing techniques which could be employed as obvious structural solutions. I begin with an exploration of the biographical genre itself, to discover how genre usually dictates structure. I then examine traditional storytelling structures, namely the hero’s journey. Next, I explore ways of making these traditional structures move beyond the privileged masculine point of view. I subsequently explore the hero’s journey’s apparent opposite, the heroine’s journey. Then, I document how I stumble across the use of the mise en abyme through writing and producing one of my short films. This leads to an examination of the exact nature of this particular literary device. I examine two biographical feature films, La Vie en Rose and Saving Mr Banks, to show how they make use of the mise en abyme, and show how successful these applications are. Finally, I track the process of writing A Hyena in Petticoats, making note of the structures I have employed. In conclusion, I collate a template to illustrate my structural choices with the use of the mise en abyme as a hyper-structure, on top of a baseline structure. I suggest that the template proffers a new way of approaching biographical feature-film writing, and offers opportunities for biographical feature scripts, as well as possibilities for narrative-feature scripts.
Dead reckoning : an analysis of George Romero's 'Living dead' series in relation to contemporary theories of film genre and representations of race, class, culture and violence.
(2008) Hemmings, Jonathan Michael.; Arnott, Jill Margaret.
This thesis is an in-depth analysis of George Romero's 'Living Dead' tetralogy of films, comprising Night of the Living Dead (1968), Dawn ofthe-Bead (1978), Day of the Dead(\985) and Land of the Dead (2005), examined through the lensf of contemporary film genre theory. The project focuses specifically on issues of the representation of race, class, culture and violence in the four films, and how these representations, along with the concomitant social critique evident in Romero's work, change in response to the upheavals and developments which have occurred in the American social, cultural and political climate over the past four decades. It also focuses on how Romero's films respond to changes in the horror genre, and how Romero both structures his films on the binary oppositions which are central to the genre and deconstructs these oppositions, and the implications that this deconstruction (most notably that of the figure of the zombie, which occupies a zone of constantly shifting liminality between the human and the monstrous) has in relation to Romero's socio-cultural and political commentary implicit in the films.
Exploring the South African gangster film genre prior and post liberation : a study of Mapantsula, Hijack Stories and Jerusalema.
(2011) Govender, Poobendran.; Arnott, Jill Margaret.
This dissertation is a study of the gangster film genre and how it has been used to represent the sociopolitical and economic conditions of South Africa over an extended period of time. Firstly, by looking at the early history of the influence of the gangster genre on South African audiences, specifically the Sophiatown generation, a history of the genre being strongly linked to sociopolitical conditions in South Africa is established. The project then focuses on South African-made gangster films, beginning with Mapantsula (1988) and how it speaks to the tumultuous times of the 1980s prior to liberation. It then proceeds to examine Hijack Stories (2000) as a gangster film that represents South African society post-liberation. Lastly, it examines Jerusalema (2008) as a recent example of the gangster film and its representation of current issues, problems and tensions within South African society. The project delves into the messages that the gangster genre in particular holds as a genre that is intimately linked to social, economic and political conditions. The use of the genre as a tool to represent the experiences of South Africans prior to and post liberation is of particular interest to this research. Introduction: Genre and the Gangster Film This chapter attempts briefly to define genre in film studies, discuss how genres operate and explore the importance of genre. It also offers an elaboration of the history of the gangster film as well as discussion of the ideas of its three most significant theorists. Chapter 1: The Hollywood gangster figure in Sophiatown This chapter examines the influence of the Hollywood gangster figure on the audiences of Sophiatown. It explores the emulation of the style, mannerisms and behavior of the cinematic gangster by the residents of Sophiatown as a way of adopting a resistant urban identity in opposition to the dominant ideology of the time. However, it is found that this resistance fails to effectively become political in the form of an anti-government resistance. Chapter 1: The Hollywood gangster figure in Sophiatown This chapter examines the influence of the Hollywood gangster figure on the audiences of Sophiatown. It explores the emulation of the style, mannerisms and behavior of the cinematic gangster by the residents of Sophiatown as a way of adopting a resistant urban identity in opposition to the dominant ideology of the time. However, it is found that this resistance fails to effectively become political in the form of an anti-government resistance. Chapter 2: Mapantsula as Pre-liberation South African Gangster Film This chapter explores the relationship between the ‘pantsula’ subculture and the cinematic gangster and thereafter makes a case for how Mapantsula can be read as a gangster film. Furthermore, it goes on to study how Mapantsula works within the gangster genre framework looking at the politicization of Panic with a focus on pre-liberation South Africa. Chapter 3: Hijack Stories as Post-liberation South African Gangster Film This chapter examines Hijack Stories as a South African example of the gangster film by firstly situating it within the genre and then examining how it functions as a post-liberation South African gangster film around the period of its release. The gangster figure here is linked to ideas of authenticity and black experience. Chapter 4: Jerusalema as recent Post-liberation South African Gangster Film This chapter examines how Jerusalema uses the conventions of the gangster genre to explore current South African issues in particular, the tension between the ideology of capitalist entrepeneurship and that of restitution and social justice. It goes on to then study how it works as a post-liberation recent gangster film exploration of modern day South African society. Conclusion This chapter briefly examines how the gangster film genre has survived in South Africa over a long and shifting period of time and how it has spoken to different periods in South Africa’s history through the films discussed in this research. The gangster figure starts as a resistant figure in Mapantsula who slowly moves away from material pursuits and becomes politicized. Thereafter in Hijack Stories, the gangster figure is used to explore issues of black identity in the post-liberation period and to explore the growing divide between the recently advantaged and the still disadvantaged black South African. Finally, Jerusalema uses the gangster genre to stage the contradictions of the “South African Dream” and the lack of a firm direction for South Africa as the ideologies of capitalism and social justice clash while the period after the fall of an order leaves much in question as a nation finds its identity.
The familial reconfiguration of the subject of cultural discourse in Tsitsi Dangarembga's Nervous conditions.
(1996) Masemola, Kgomotso.; Arnott, Jill Margaret.
Abstract available in PDF.
'Who is the other woman?' : representation, alterity and ethics in the work of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak.
(1998) Arnott, Jill Margaret.; Attwell, David.
This dissertation analyses a number of key themes in the work of postcolonial theorist and literary critic Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, and uses her ideas to argue for the usefulness of both deconstructive and postmodern thought in a postcolonial context generally, and in South Africa in particular. The early part of the thesis presents a brief overview of Spivak's work (Chapter 1) and discusses its relationship with Derridean deconstruction and what I have called "progressive postmodern thought". Chapter 2 explores in detail Spivak's use of theoretical concepts adapted from, or closely related to, deconstruction. Perhaps the most important of these is catachresis - the idea that all naming is in a sense false, and the words we use to conceptualise the world must be seen as "inadequate, yet necessary". The thesis looks at how Spivak foregrounds the methodological consequences of this insight in her own practice of constantly revisiting and rethinking her own conclusions, and also at the political consequences of recognising specific terms like "nation", "identity" or "woman" as catachrestic. Closely related to this area of Spivak's work are her idea of "strategic essentialism" and her adaptation of Derrida's concept of the pharmakon -- that which is simultaneously poison and medicine. Chapter 3 relates Spivak's work to three key areas of postmodern thought: alterity, and the ethics of the relationship between self and other; Lyotard's notions of the differand and the "unpresentable"; and aporia, or the ethical and political consequences of undecidability. I argue here that all of these emphases are potentially very useful in postcolonial studies, particularly in relation to the predicament - of the gendered subaltern, and that they help to define a progressive postmodern politics. The remainder of the dissertation discusses individual essays at greater length. Chapter 4 focuses in the main on "Can the Subaltern Speak?" (1988) and Spivak's arguments concerning the nature of subalternity and the politics of representation. Chapter 5 examines Spivak's engagement with French Feminism and her feminist critiques of mainstream deconstruction, arguing that Spivak's use of deconstruction undermines the opposition between linguistic and material forms of oppression and hence between theory and practice. Chapter 6 focuses on Spivak's reading of literary texts and raises issues concerning, inter alia, the production of the first world self at the expense of the third world other; the limits of both metropolitan theories and narratives of national liberation, democracy and development in relation to the experience of the gendered subaltern; reading the text of the subaltern body; the (impossible but necessary) ethical relationship between first world feminist and the subaltern in neocolonial space; rights and responsibility; the need to respect subaltern selfhood; and the possibility of what Spivak calls "learning from below". Finally, I look at the relevance of Spivak's thought to three areas of South African political and academic life: conflicts over representation within the local Women's movement; notions of national origin and national identity; and debates over deconstruction and the relationship between the academy and society.

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Browsing English, Media and Performance Studies by Author "Arnott, Jill Margaret."