Female Authorship and the Documentary Image
Theory, Practice and Aesthetics
Edited by Boel Ulfsdotter and Anna Backman Rogers
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Book Presentation:
Examines the politics of female authorship in relation to contemporary documentary practices
This book, like its twin volume Female Authorship and Documentary Strategies, centres on pressing issues in relation to female authorship in contemporary documentary practices. Addressing the politics of representation and authorship both behind and in front of the camera, a range of international scholars now expand the theoretical and practical framework informing the current scholarship on documentary cinema, which has so far neglected questions of gender.
Female Authorship and the Documentary Image engages with the relationship between female documentary filmmakers and the documentary image. With a thematic focus on the documentary image directly, within the more traditional arenas of theory and practice and especially within the context of gaze and author theory, the book also considers more philosophical questions of aesthetics, home and identity within the contexts of female subjectivity, globalisation and trauma. The book also includes a dialogue on two key photographers, Hannah Wilke and Jo Spence, as well as an interview with Taiwanese documentary filmmakers Singing Chen and Wuna Wu.
Contributors
• Anna Backman Rogers, University of Gothenburg
• Chris Berry, King’s College London
• Elizabeth Coffman, Loyola University Chicago
• Sharon Daniel, University of California, Santa Cruz
• Lisa French, RMIT University
• Gabrielle McNally, Northern Michigan University
• Sophie Mayer, Author and Journalist
• Rona Murray, Lancaster University
• Annelies van Noortwijk, University of Groningen
• Aparna Sharma, UCLA
• Belinda Smaill, Monash University
• Erica Stein, Marymount Manhattan College
• Catherine Summerhayes, Australian National University (ANU)
• Boel Ulfsdotter, Independent Scholar
• Nakane Wakae, Nagoya University
About the authors:
Boel Ulfsdotter is Reader in Film and Media Studies at Gothenburg University, Sweden. Ulfsdotter has recently published articles in International Journal of Fashion Studies (2021) and Journal of Film, Fashion & Consumption (2022). Additionally, she has published the twin volumes Female Authorship and the Documentary Image: Theory, Practice and Aesthetics, and Female Agency and Documentary Strategies: Subjectivities, Identity, and Activism (2018) with Edinburgh University Press. Ulfsdotter is a formally trained dressmaker, and freelance fashion and visual arts critic.
Anna Backman Rogers is a Senior Lecturer in Film Studies at the University of Gothenberg, Sweden.
Press Reviews:
This book serves as map and compass in the first concerted investigation of a crucial field of documentary studies as yet severely neglected. Mobilising a range of dynamic conceptual frameworks, it brings major paradigm shifts into focus, with compelling insights into women’s documentary production globally and timely directions for future explorations.– Professor Laura Rascaroli, University College Cork
See the publisher website: Edinburgh University Press
> From the same authors:
Female Agency and Documentary Strategies (2018)
Subjectivities, Identity and Activism
Dir. Boel Ulfsdotter and Anna Backman Rogers
Subject: Genre > Documentary
Feminisms (2016)
Diversity, Difference and Multiplicity in Contemporary Film Cultures
Dir. Laura Mulvey and Anna Backman Rogers
Subject: Sociology
American Independent Cinema (2015)
Rites of Passage and the Crisis Image
Subject: Genre > Independent cinema
> On a related topic:
Women and Global Documentary (2025)
Practices and Perspectives in the 21st Century
Dir. Najmeh Moradiyan-Rizi and Shilyh Warren
Subject: Genre > Documentary
Francophone African Women Documentary Filmmakers (2023)
Beyond Representation
Dir. Suzanne Crosta, Sada Niang and Alexie Tcheuyap
Negotiating Dissidence (2017)
The Pioneering Women of Arab Documentary
Subject: Countries > Middle East
Between Reality and Documentary (2025)
A Historical Representation of Gaza Refugees in Colonial, Humanitarian and Palestinian Documentary Film
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Stories Make the World (2025)
Reflections on Storytelling and the Art of the Documentary
by Stephen Most
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The Oxford Handbook of American Documentary (2025)
Dir. Joshua Glick and Patricia Aufderheide
Subject: Genre > Documentary