Abstract
This part of the book sets out with two aims: to explore the aesthetic challenges to the history of ideas that has shaped the conception of Turkish migrant presence in Germany within nonfiction film, and to reassess the implications of the documentary form as a creative practice and artistic activity that can be singular, nonrepresentational and potentially antithetical to knowledge.
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Notes
- 1.
The series take its title from the first line of the poem “Nachtgedanken” (Night Thoughts) by Heinrich Heine: “Denk ich an Deutschland in der Nacht, dann bin ich um den Schlaf gebracht” (When I think of Germany at night, I lose all sleep).
- 2.
The case of Hatun Sürücü has been the topic of several German and international documentaries. Gerd Monheim’s Mord in Namen der Ehre? Der Tod von Hatun Sürücü (2005) and David Gould’s Two Sides of the Moon: The Honour Killing of Hatun Aynur Sürücü (2011) are examples to such filmic responses. Gould, who is a film scholar based in the U.S.A., explains his motivation in making the film as follows: ‘Choosing to tell Hatun’s story was one of the most illogical decisions I have ever made. I had never been out of the country, don’t speak a word of German, and knew nothing about the culture and psychology behind this horrendous act. My objective was just as naïve: that by somehow telling one woman’s story, I could give a face to countless others. While the jury is still out on my abilities as a filmmaker, my journey to give Hatun a “voice” is over. Now armed with her story, the next step [is] yours…’ (2011). Gould’s documentary has been screened in various documentary film festivals around the U.S.A. as well as at the Society of Cinema and Media Studies Conference in 2012 and is one of the examples of representations of honour killings that aim to raise consciousness about the issue of violence against women.
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Naiboglu, G. (2018). Documentary and the Question of Representation. In: Post-Unification Turkish German Cinema. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-64431-8_4
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