Women Editors as Spectators

Abstract:

The paper conducts a bibliographical survey on the history of women editors since the establishment of the film industry, across a range of different national contexts, seeking a closer look at certain aspects of editing that are often referred to as “feminine” - especially the idea of it being a merely manual job, and of the editing room as being separate from the public sphere. By approximating the trajectory of women editors to that of women in found footage cinema, we propose to consider the editing room as an appropriate space for the practice of a critical spectatorship, in which the capacity of pausing, repeating, replaying, makes it possible to burst representation in hegemonic audiovisual productions, and develop a critical view of the gender representations at play at our audiovisual culture.

Keywords:
Editing; Women editors; Women in film; Found footage