Curating Africa in the Age of Film Festivals

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xvii

   PDF

2. Introduction: Film Festivals and/in Theory

   • Lindiwe Dovey

   Pages 1-27

3. Early Curatorial Practices, European Colonialism, and the Rise of “A-list” Film Festivals

   • Lindiwe Dovey

   Pages 29-44

4. Afri-Cannes? African Film and Filmmakers at the World’s Most Prestigious Film Festival

   • Lindiwe Dovey

   Pages 45-57

5. “Where is Africa?” at the 2010 International Film Festival of Rotterdam

   • Lindiwe Dovey

   Pages 59-85

6. African Film Festivals in Africa: Curating “African Audiences” for “African Films”

   • Lindiwe Dovey

   Pages 87-109

7. Moving Africa: African Film Festivals Outside of Africa

   • Lindiwe Dovey

   Pages 111-130

8. The Rise of “International” Film Festivals in Africa

   • Lindiwe Dovey

   Pages 131-158

9. Festive Excitement and (Dis)sensus Communis in Action at Two Film Festivals in Africa

   • Lindiwe Dovey

   Pages 159-176

10. Conclusion

    • Lindiwe Dovey

    Pages 177-180

11. Back Matter

    Pages 181-270

    PDF

Tracing the history of Africa's relationship to film festivals and exploring the festivals' impact on the various types of people who attend festivals (the festival experts, the ordinary festival audiences, and the filmmakers), Dovey reveals what turns something called a "festival" into a "festival experience" for these groups.

• Africa
• film festivals
• festivalization
• digital era
• curate
• curator
• curatorial
• video on demand
• African film
• African video movies
• cinema
• screen media
• filmmakers
• FIAPF
• A-list
• Venice Film Festival
• Cannes
• La Noire
• Chroniques des années de braise
• Yeelen
• African
• amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS)
• colonialism
• Europe
• european colonialism
• experience
• festival
• film
• history
• history of literature
• history of mathematics
• rating
• story
• types

“Dovey’s book provides a crucial intervention by incorporating the responses of actual audiences, instead of the audiences constructed by film texts or assumed by scholars. … Essential reading for all film scholars, Curating Africa in the Age of Film Festivals enriches our understanding of African cinema and the event of the film festival and opens up exciting areas for future research.” (Carmela Garritano, Research in African Literatures, Vol. 47 (3), 2016)

"An essential read. Dovey's book offers rich insights into the circulation of African cinema while expanding our understanding of film festivals." - Cameron Bailey, Artistic Director, Toronto International Film Festival

"Artfully crafted, Lindiwe Dovey successfully combines field research, critical insight and theoretical rigour to provide a highly complex web of analysis. This book provides a further dimension to cinema studies' theoretical approach by recognizing that it is not just the content but also the framing of content that is intrinsic to the manufacturing of meaning and the circulation of manufactured-meanings that is produced through international film festival exhibition circuits. Filmmakers, film scholars, and film curators equally will find this text enlightening." - Jyoti Mistry, Associate Professor, Wits School of Arts, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa

"A highly original contribution to the study of African screen media, and an intriguing account of the curatorial practices mobilized for defining 'African film' on film festival circuits. Dovey's book provides the most comprehensive review to date of Africa's place in African, African diasporic, and European film festivals. Any scholar interested in the positioning of African arts writ large, nationally and globally will find this an engaging and thought-provoking work." - Moradewun Adejunmobi, University of California, Davis, USA

"Original and meticulously researched, Curating Africa in the Age of Film Festivals is indispensable reading for scholars and students of African film. It brings African film studies into conversation with film festival studies to investigate film festivals as sites of meaning creation and (dis)sensus communis. Written in lively and evocative prose, this interdisciplinary book engages with a range of writers and theoriststo suggest exciting new possibilities for defining and researching African cinema." - Carmela Garritano, Associate Professor, African Studies and Film Studies, Texas A & M University, USA

"Drawing from her extensive fieldwork, Lindiwe Dovey incisively examines the modes in which the continent and its affiliated films and filmmakers are selectively represented within international and regional festivalscapes. In this vital book, Dovey reveals intertwined and divergent case histories as she considers questions of festivalized audience and/as agency - and possibilities of meaning-making, resistance, dialogue and debate, consensus-building, identity-assertion, and participatory spectatorship through curated communal film-viewing." - Anne Ciecko, University of Massachusetts-Amherst, USA

Lindiwe Dovey is Senior Lecturer in African Film and Performance Arts at the University of London, UK.

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