Masters Degrees (Drama)

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Browsing Masters Degrees (Drama) by browse.metadata.advisor "Pieterse, Annel"

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    Finding balance : a study of the text and context of two Afrikaans festival comedy scripts
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2018-03) Hattingh, Maria Susanna; Pieterse, Annel; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Drama.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study explores two critically acclaimed Afrikaans festival comedies, which are situational and predominantly located in a specific time and place, and the question how they can gain continuity in the wider theatre realm. Central to this investigation is the context in which these spectral productions have been formed and performed. Through a close analysis of the comedy texts that have enjoyed great success on recent festival circuits, this thesis seeks to identify aspects of these comedies that may account for their unusual endurance and acclaim within the festival context. A correlative aim of this research is to contribute towards creating an afterlife for the chosen scripts by making them available to other researchers. To this end, the two original scripts, N is vir Neurose (2012) by Christiaan Olwagen and Amper, Vrystaat (2015) by Nico Scheepers, are included as addenda to this thesis. These texts are analysed within their respective original performance contexts. Given the context in which these productions have been formed, the festival space in general and the respective physical performance space in particular, have a powerful impact on the potential afterlives of the productions: these spaces are as transitory as the plays themselves. Comedy as a genre appears inherently ghost-like in this distinctly localised situation. A contextual as well as thematic analysis of these two plays show a subtle balance between wit and taboo, as well as comedy and drama. The plays adhere to generic comedy characteristics as well as combining various techniques of humour to create refreshingly local dark comedy. These comic techniques, along with the inherent dark comedy qualities of the plays, transcend language and culture, thus increasing the potential for their continuity beyond the festival context.
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    Self-reflexive online documentation in the films Catfish, Four eyed monsters and We live in public
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2016-03) Pietersen, Greta; Pieterse, Annel; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept of Drama.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: It is widely held that the documentary mode of filmmaking is a subjective endeavor. Bill Nichols identifies an unspoken contract between the viewer and the filmmaker, that what is seen is to be believed. Often, when it comes to documentary films, viewers neglect to acknowledge how the filmmaker goes about in selectively interpreting “reality” for an audience. Bertolt Brecht believed that it is the encoder's responsibility to make the viewer aware of construction processes in a given representation. In this way a critical involvement with the material is ignited and consequently the viewer distances herself emotionally from the representation. Self-reflexive modes of filmmaking foreground the subjective nature of film by highlighting the process of construction. The viewer is thus prevented from suspending her disbelief, and prompted to decode the material actively. These signifiers of reflexivity can be indicated by the overt involvement of the filmmaker and the inclusion of filmic equipment. The presence of the camera is often obvious in reflexive representations, and the viewer becomes acutely aware of how it might influence authentic behavior of the subject filmed. The viewer is therefore not always able to see how a subject might react in her natural environment. The camera essentially represents the presence of an observing other. The documentaries to be discussed in this thesis all investigate subjects against a backdrop of social and interactive media. On these online platforms individuals are faced with the presence of gazing others who might interact or just voyeuristically observe. Here the subject internalizes the gaze and acts according to how she imagines the desire of the gazing other. The various social networking platforms documented in these films provide the individual with an environment in which she can construct and re-construct an image of self until she attains what she imagines is considered as ideal. A flexible form of narration is thus born due to the technical features characteristic of such online environments. The self might always go back and adapt and further manage/manipulate her image of self as she feels persistently surveyed by a community of gazing equals. Here there exists no gazing hierarchy: everyone is visible to everyone all the time, making selective self-fashioning and subsequent self-documentation challenging. The film and computer screens in which the self sees a reflection of her constructed self becomes something of a mirror: when the self witnesses her own reflection in this screen/mirror, she is faced with psychological processes of self-contextualizing. She must attempt to live up to that which she believes is desired by her societal Other. The self, forever aware of the ubiquitous gazing others in these environments, is always adjusting her concept of self accordingly. Her constant re-adjustment of her mediated self in such environments serves as a form of self-documentation also orientated towards the imagined perception of an other. My thesis surveys the representational politics of the process of producing a filmic documentation of these processes of online self-documentation.
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    South Africa's celluloid closet : the reproduction of Hollywood LGBTQ+ stereotypes and tropes in South African films
    (2022-12) Erasmus, Mone; Pieterse, Annel; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Drama.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The recurring stereotypes and tropes that arise in films depicting LGBTQ+ characters have negative impacts on how LGBTQ+ people see themselves, each other, and how other people see them. These depictions also promote homophobic myths and heteronormative ideologies. This dissertation provides a comprehensive exploration of Hollywood’s LGBTQ+ stereotypes and tropes and examines how these are reproduced in South African films. Therefore, the methodology consists of a qualitative semiotic analysis of LGBTQ+ representations to determine the value of, and meanings behind these depictions. The primary films consist of five South African queer-films that were released in the last decade, namely: Oliver Hermanus’s Skoonheid (2011), John Trengove’s Inxeba (2017), Christiaan Olwagen’s Kanarie (2018), Wanuri Kahiu’s Rafiki (2018), and Oliver Hermanus’s Moffie (2019). These films are evaluated according to five criteria to determine whether they constitute fair LGBTQ+ representations. My criteria state that a film’s LGBTQ+ character(s) must be explicitly queer, not conform to most stereotypes or tropes, be complex and experience growth, not be a token character, and not embody the Other. Most of Hollywood’s mainstream films fail to meet these criteria and depict LGBTQ+ characters in line with outdated practices. Similarly, South Africa’s films also fail to meet the criteria – with single exceptions – and perpetuate regressive myths about LGBTQ+ people. Although the five primary queer-films offer more complex LGBTQ+ representations, many employ harmful tropes that vilify or Other LGBTQ+ people. Notably, Kanarie and Rafiki subvert the more harmful tropes, pointing to the possibility of better future LGBTQ+ representations in South African films. These findings indicate a need for new types of queer-films and LGBTQ+ depictions in Hollywood and South African films, and problematise the ways in which LGBTQ+ stereotypes and tropes are discussed in academia. Moreover, the findings support existing theories on how identities and meanings are constructed and distributed. Finally, this dissertation serves as a call for, and template of, further research into transgender- and bisexual-specific stereotypes in mainstream films.