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Zusatztext It is refreshing to see a scholar incorporate modes of analysis largely developed in the religious and intellectual discourses of enslaved people. Beckford does so respectfully and creatively…Beyond its intended audience, Documentary as Exorcism contains valuable scholarship for other artists and academics. Informationen zum Autor Robert Beckford is a scholar-activist, multi-award-winning broadcaster and currently the Professor of Climate and Social Justice at the University of Winchester, UK. Klappentext Documentary as Exorcism is an interdisciplinary study that builds upon the insights of postcolonial studies, critical race theory, theological and religious studies and media and film studies to showcase the role of documentary film as a system of signifying capable of registering complex theological ideas while pursuing the authentic aims of documentary filmmaking.Robert Beckford marries the concepts of 'theology as visual practice' and 'theology as political engagement' to develop a new mode of documentary filmmaking that embeds emancipation from oppression in its aesthetic. In various documentaries made for Channel 4 and the BBC, Beckford narrates the complicit relationship of Christianity with European expansion, slavery, and colonialism as a historic manifestation of evil. In light of the cannibalistic practices of colonialism that devoured black life, and the church's role in the subjugation and theological legitimation of black bodies, Beckford characterises this form of historic Christian faith as 'colonial Christianity' and its malevolent or 'occult' practices as a form of 'bewitchment' that must be 'exorcised'. He identifies and exorcises the evil practices of colonialism and their present impact upon African Caribbean Christian communities in Britain in films such as Britain's Slave Trade and Empire Pays Back through a deliberate process of encoding/decoding. The emancipatory impact of this form of documentary filmmaking is demonstrated by its ability to bring issues such as reparations to the public square for debate, and its capacity to change a corporation's trade policies for the good of Africans. Vorwort The documentary maker reflects on his art, and how he navigates between theology and visual culture as an academic, activist and practitioner. Zusammenfassung Frames colonial theology in the Caribbean as a form of witchcraft practice that bewitched Africans and later black colonial subjects, and discusses the continued impact of this bewitchment, namely in politics and anti-intellectualism in contemporary Black Pentecostal Church life, especially in the UK. Inhaltsverzeichnis Introduction 1. A New Position in Black Christian Representation: Beyond Confinement, Misrecognition and the Ubiquitous black choir 2. Emancipatory Framework: Set On, Cast Out 3. Witchcraft 4. Exorcism: Jesus the Healer 5. Christian Complicity with the Bewitchment of Empire 6. Memory Cannibalism as the a Continued Influence of Colonial Christianity 7. Zombie Worship 8. Signs and Wonders: Translating the Emancipatory Framework 9. Documentary Film: Poetic Justice 10. Encoding Bewitchment in Documentary 11. The Prophetic and the Political Documentary 12. Hermeneutic of Suspicion Academic Theological Practice and the Bible Documentary Conclusion: Towards an Exorcism Aesthetic Bibliography Index ...
