The Wild Child's Desire: Cinema, Sexual Politics, and the Experimental Nation in Post-Authoritarian Indonesia
說明
438 p
附註
Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 76-01(E), Section: A
Adviser: Zhang Zhen
Thesis (Ph.D.)--New York University, 2014
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A study of Indonesian cinema, this dissertation focuses on a new generation of cultural producers -- film directors, producers, scriptwriters, festival organizers, programmers, and activists -- who emerged in the period of political reform (Reformasi) in 1998. While offering new perspectives particularly on youth and sexuality in their films, members of this generation have also proposed a film law reform and demanded the abolition of film censorship. Emphasizing both artistic practices and political activism, my research is built on the following questions: Why do these cultural producers, who project their aspirations in the transnational landscape, actively invest in the process of redefining the nation through film practices and a collective engagement in the advocacy against censorship? How does the sexuality discourse in the censorship case relate to the larger debates around sexuality and national morality that have been haunting the nation for the past decade? This dissertation investigates how the new generation's desire for the nation in post-authoritarian Indonesia is articulated through sexual politics; it analyzes how such desire is shaped and limited by the discourses of paternalism, transnationalism, and religion, within which other national actors are implicated
I use the term "Wild Child" to describe how this generation conceptualizes itself vis-a-vis persisting state and cultural paternalism; sexual politics serves as a tool for cultural producers to perform their status as mature, knowledgeable citizen subjects. In characterizing the "Wild Child," I propose two interrelated concepts: the first is "taking to the streets," a rhetoric inspired by the 1998 student movement, which fuels political engagement as an indispensible part of new performances of citizenship; the second is what I call the "scenario of experiment," a paradigm that frames the new generation's cultural practices, in which the roles of youth in inventing and experimenting with new spaces, language, and modes of production are constantly reactivated. The larger landscape of sexual politics in Indonesia demonstrates that the state and the Islamist groups are also experimenting with laws, public policies, and new visibility tools; this dissertation examines how the Wild Child's position is challenged and readjusted as they encounter experiments of other national actors
