[Reader-list] one billion eyes

[Shivam Vij]

The last date is July 15! Jury Prize: Rs 25,000!

One Billion Eyes 2007
Indian Documentary Film Festival
The Prakriti Foundation, Chennai
in association with
Alliance Francaise, Chennai


Caste

One Billion Eyes, the annual Indian documentary film festival
organised by the Prakriti Foundation, Chennai, is in its third year.
This year's theme is Caste. The theme for 2005 was 'Arts, Activism,
Animals', and for 2006 it was 'Our Cities: the Real and the Imagined'.

In India, caste consumes everyone. From the brahmin priests of the
Chidambaram temple who continue to practice child marriage, to
McDonalds substituting panneer for beef in their Indian burgers, to
the dalits of Khairlanje who get lynched for asserting their humanity.
But such has been the conditioning of mainstream, contemporary, urban
sensibilities that to talk caste has meant to talk of reservation,
dalits, OBCs, government/sarkari brahmins, atrocities against dalits,
Mandal, Mayawati, gurjjars, meritocracy, state policy. Suddenly, it
appears that caste is not a system of domination, discrimination and
exploitation, but just a classificatory category. It appears as if
brahmins, kayasths, banias and other privileged castes do not have
anything to do with caste. It appears that matrimonial advertisements
that demand a 'wheatish complexion Iyer Vadama non-Koundinya gotra
25–28 girl' for a caste-compatible IIT-IIM–educated brahmin based in
Connecticut, or ads that explicitly seek to rent houses 'only for
vegetarians' do not encode caste. In fact, the anti-reservation
brigade recently managed to project itself in the media as anti-caste.
Does the world of documentary films in India exhibit similar anxieties
and stereotypes? While so many films get made about dalits and around
dalit themes, do dalits get to make their/our films? What is the
existing filmic discourse on caste? Have makers of short films sought
to rethink caste?

This festival—juxtaposing screenings with literary readings, panel
discussions and interventions from the audience—will seek to broaden
the contours of the discourse on caste. Besides filmmakers and their
films, it will feature poets, activists, students, victims, agent
provocateurs, academicians, and of course a panel of judicious and
judgmental but jolly judges who will decide on the best film for a
prize of Rs 25,000.

We hope to have a wide range of caste subjects to choose from for this
festival. And if this note makes you think afresh on caste, there's
time to make a quick short and submit it by 15 July. Broad
areas/themes where submissions are encouraged vis-à-vis caste are:

Advertisements, Apartheid, Atrocities, Arts, Bureaucracy, Class,
Communalism, Cinema, Culture, Education, Environment, Fashion, Food,
Gender, Geography, Healthcare, Labour, Media, Nationalism, Natural
Disasters, Occupation, Race, Religion, Reservation, Science &
Technology, Sports, Touchability, Untouchability, Violence,
Xenophobia.

The entry form is available on our website www.abillioneyes.in

Key Dates:
Last date for entries: 15 July 2007
Festival dates: 15 to 19 August 2007

Selected list of films and detailed programme list will be circulated
by 25 July.

Preferred entry format: DVDs/ VCDs

For further details contact abillioneyes at gmail.com or anand.navayana at gmail.com

-- 
S.Anand
Publisher
Navayana

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