On Tuesday, 19th February 2012, I will be presenting a seminar on my PhD research as part of the Centre for Southeast Asian Studies Seminar Series (abstract below). Religion in film is a relatively new and under-explored branch of (principally) film, cultural and area studies. Currently, the study of religious representations in cinema goes down… Continue reading My talk: ‘Dakwah at the Cinema: Identifying Indonesia’s ‘Islamic’ film as a genre’
Author: Angry Malay Woman
I like plants.
January home cooking with l’oeuf
Perhaps not many people know this, but I love cooking second only to my holy trinity of reading, writing, and research. This month, I attempted easy winter dishes with eggs. The first is a relatively stripped down version of the Israeli Arab (principally Tunisian) dish, shakshuka, with merguez sausages: The other dish (I felt compelled… Continue reading January home cooking with l’oeuf
2013: Let’s celebrate the banal
In the last three years, this blog served mainly as a repository of my writings. But this year, I’m going to attempt something different; I’ll begin to post photos of my cooking and the less than artful snapshots of my life on this blog. Perhaps at times, if I am feeling reckless, I may even… Continue reading 2013: Let’s celebrate the banal
Rape, media coverage and our bloodstained hypocrisy
First published on the 30th of December 2012 on Loyarburok Early yesterday morning, an Indian woman died from severe internal injuries after being raped by six men in New Delhi. The global reportage of an unnamed rape victim is an unprecedented event for a crime that is depressingly commonplace and downplayed or sensationalised in the… Continue reading Rape, media coverage and our bloodstained hypocrisy
My interview with film director Nia Dinata
Nia Dinata is one of Indonesia’s most important film-makers. Known for tackling subject matters such as abortion, polygamy, and sexualities in a profoundly refreshing way, the films of teh Nia have received worldwide acclaim outside the geographically parochial national film industry of Indonesia. I had the valuable opportunity to ask teh Nia about her views… Continue reading My interview with film director Nia Dinata
On skodeng visual culture
Marshall McLuhan perhaps never foresaw how the global village would one day become like a Malay village where a person’s code of morality was carefully circumscribed and their private life is everybody’s business. One aspect of the online Malay village is the exchange of saliva-inducing moral tut-tutting and cruel assassination of character between internet users… Continue reading On skodeng visual culture
Reader response criticism and sacred texts
Question: how useful is reader response criticism in understanding a community’s relationship with its ‘sacred texts’? In what ways does reader response criticism challenge the meaningfulness of the term ‘sacred’? A book does not read itself. Meaning does not happen when there is no one there to make it. Reader response (RR) criticism or theories… Continue reading Reader response criticism and sacred texts
On the viability of ‘gender’ and ‘sexuality’ as categories in Malaysia
The first thing that would be useful when thinking about genders and sexualities in Malaysia is that the categories of ‘gender’ and ‘sexuality’ are far from native and natural in the national language, Bahasa Malaysia. What is meant by ‘native’ and ‘natural’ refers to the fact that gender and sexuality are relatively recent loanwords. And… Continue reading On the viability of ‘gender’ and ‘sexuality’ as categories in Malaysia
Derrida, the life of the philosopher, and the ‘biopic’
‘He was born. He thought. He died’ Heidegger on the ‘life’ of Aristotle A review of Derrida’s biography by Benoît Peeters in The Guardian today made me think about whether or not the biography is crucial or incidental to understanding a philosopher’s thought. Does knowing (or not knowing) about Derrida’s life enable us to… Continue reading Derrida, the life of the philosopher, and the ‘biopic’
The cinema as house of worship
The cinema and house of worship might come across as incongruent bedfellows. From its earliest days to the present day, cinemas have either been burned to the ground or, more mercifully, closed down for being places of moral decay. Where there is compromise (thanks to heterosexist logic), female audiences are made to sit apart in… Continue reading The cinema as house of worship
Alicia Izharuddin 