Media's street politics: invisible infrastructures of filming in Cairo

The relationship between media, especially cinema, and cities is subject to anthropological and media studies inquiries alike. This paper analyzes the labor relations of on-location filming in Cairo, which moves across different urban geographies, from the slum to the elite gated community. These la...

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Main Author: Kelada, M
Format: Journal article
Language:English
Published: Anthropological Society of Oxford 2023
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author Kelada, M
author_facet Kelada, M
author_sort Kelada, M
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description The relationship between media, especially cinema, and cities is subject to anthropological and media studies inquiries alike. This paper analyzes the labor relations of on-location filming in Cairo, which moves across different urban geographies, from the slum to the elite gated community. These labor relations defy the formal/informal and exploitation/resistance binaries, because they fundamentally operate on communal dependencies while multiplying to scaffold and sustain the media industry economically. The paper explores whether understanding precarious laborers' tactics and mechanics can offer an alternative conception of media's politics that is attuned to the ambivalences and contradictions of life within neoliberal capitalism. Accordingly, it proposes a consideration of ‘vitalist pragmatics' as a potential capacious ‘verb' for the concept of survivance.
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spelling oxford-uuid:181cff95-1083-4b5e-8e22-fccb5aa07e232024-08-23T18:07:31ZMedia's street politics: invisible infrastructures of filming in CairoJournal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:181cff95-1083-4b5e-8e22-fccb5aa07e23EnglishBulkUploadJASO_articles_36Anthropological Society of Oxford2023Kelada, MThe relationship between media, especially cinema, and cities is subject to anthropological and media studies inquiries alike. This paper analyzes the labor relations of on-location filming in Cairo, which moves across different urban geographies, from the slum to the elite gated community. These labor relations defy the formal/informal and exploitation/resistance binaries, because they fundamentally operate on communal dependencies while multiplying to scaffold and sustain the media industry economically. The paper explores whether understanding precarious laborers' tactics and mechanics can offer an alternative conception of media's politics that is attuned to the ambivalences and contradictions of life within neoliberal capitalism. Accordingly, it proposes a consideration of ‘vitalist pragmatics' as a potential capacious ‘verb' for the concept of survivance.
spellingShingle Kelada, M
Media's street politics: invisible infrastructures of filming in Cairo
title Media's street politics: invisible infrastructures of filming in Cairo
title_full Media's street politics: invisible infrastructures of filming in Cairo
title_fullStr Media's street politics: invisible infrastructures of filming in Cairo
title_full_unstemmed Media's street politics: invisible infrastructures of filming in Cairo
title_short Media's street politics: invisible infrastructures of filming in Cairo
title_sort media s street politics invisible infrastructures of filming in cairo
work_keys_str_mv AT keladam mediasstreetpoliticsinvisibleinfrastructuresoffilmingincairo