A Fellow at Cornell's Society for the Humanities this year, Safaa Fathy is the author of plays, poem books, translations, prose and theory texts, as well as a filmmaker. Born in Egypt, she studied English literature there, graduated in Theatre studies from the University of Paris VIII (St. Denis) and became a doctor in Literature at the Sorbonne, University of Paris IV with a thesis on Brecht and epic theatre in Great Britain.
In 1994 she made her first documentary, Ghazeia, danseuses d'Égypte, the story of two dancers, one from the city and the other from the countryside. In 1995 she directed a short film, Le Silence, about the tensions between a father and daughter in an Arab immigrant family living in the suburbs of Paris, and in 1997 she made Maxime Rodinson, l'athée des Dieux. In 1999 she made D'ailleurs Derrida (1999) or Derrida's Elsewhere. The film was accompanied by a book, Tourner les mots. Au bord d'un film (Galilée-Arte éditions, 2000), which she co-authored with Jacques Derrida. More recent work includes the feature-length documentary Dardasha, Socotra, two film poems, and the short feature On a dit based on a story by Dylan Thomas.
Cornell Cinema, with the support of the Society of the Humanities, is pleased to present a selection of Fathy's work in this calendar, beginning with Derrida's Elsewhere. The film “brings together elements of Derrida's biography with some fundamental ideas of his trend of thought. Therefore, the relationship among some of the philosopher's life events and his work are made noticeable in several scenes. Filmed in four countries (Algeria, Spain, United States and France), Fathy's film explores the notions of interculture and acculturation as well.”(www.casarefugio.com) The screening will be followed by a panel discussion with Safaa Fathy and members of Cornell's faculty.
The article at www.casarefugio.com continues:
“In several of her literary works as in her films, Safaa Fathy displays the ambiguous and complex relationship that exists in Egyptian society—and, by extension, in the rest of the Arab world—concerning the body, and the social role of females or night life. 'A complexity,' stated Safaa, 'that is not usually taken into account in the Western world.' Therefore, she exhibits the restrictions that social standards establish concerning the female body, which is often censored in even the smallest of its manifestations. An example is Ghazeia, Egyptian dancers, a documentary that narrates the restrictions of Egyptian morals and the social role of women through the characters of two dancers. 'It is a film made for the memory, to leave testimony of the tradition of these rural dancers that, due to the expansion of fundamentalism as to the cultural homogenization favored by globalization, are having increasing difficulty to survive.'”
Fathy is teaching the Spring '08 seminar: Cutting and Film Cutting: A Deconstructive Reading of the Inherent Testimonial Aspect of Female and Male Genital Cutting, Notably in Film Making