Cinematography - A Medium for International Studies: Applying Film to Advocacy & Social Change

Abstract

Mutation and adaptation of an idea and its appropriation by distinct cultures, whether national or imagined, is at the core of this article. It explores discourse generated by the documentary BROKEN and leans on the previous articles in the Trilogy. Here, discourse gets re-constructed by local circumstances.

This applied research takes its cues from two distinct groups of interviewees, those creating discourse and those absorbing and mutating it. It aims at defining to what degree global culture is absorbed, reflected upon and recreated locally.

The documentary targets audiences concerned with International Law at the example of the 2004 International Court of Justice’s Advisory Opinion on Israel’s Wall in the West Bank. Here the film’s journey and its metamorphosized meanings are documented while on tour to a different country in conflict, Armenia. The discourse around BROKEN witnesses’ transformation being exposed, for the first time, to an audience other than that for which it had been conceived. The article highlights the universality of law, a film’s potential for advocacy and social change.