Afro-Asian Solidarities in Arts and Culture I: Cinema Networks in the Spirit of Bandung

Panel Convenor(s)

• LZ

  Ling Zhang

  International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS), Netherlands

Panel Chair(s)

• LZ

  Ling Zhang

  International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS), Netherlands

Panel Discussant(s)

• CS

  Carolien Stolte

  Leiden University, Netherlands

Presenter(s)

• LZ

  Ling Zhang

  International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS), Netherlands
• SN

  Sarah Niazi

  International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS), Netherlands
• PB

  Peter Bloom

  University of California - Santa Barbara, United States

This panel addresses the often-overlooked cultural and historical dimensions of Asian-African relation, which complement the predominant focus on contemporary economic and political ties. Further exploration of these aspects can deepen our understanding of the complex intertwinement between these two continents and their peoples. This panel revisits the anti-colonial solidarity fostered through Asian-African media networks, particularly the transnational and transcontinental circulation of revolutionary fiction and nonfiction films. These films were disseminated via solidarity infrastructure such as Asian-African film festivals and the bourgeoning film industries in certain Asian and African countries. Cinema, as a popular, accessible, and emotionally resonant medium with high mobility, functioned not only as a tool of entertainment and profit but also as a powerful means of fostering mutual understanding, shared anti-colonial sentiments, and cross-continental solidarity. This panel engages with several key questions: How did alternative film distribution networks and film festivals facilitate the circulation of revolutionary films across Third World countries such as Egypt, India, and China? Why did popular film genres such as social melodrama become effective vehicles for political messaging and emotional impact? How did the production of militant and polemical documentaries in other formerly colonized nations such as Algeria demonstrate acts of Asian-African solidarity? The three papers in this panel aim to engage in a productive dialogue to address these questions.  

Viviane Saglier examines contradictions within revolutionary melodrama as a symptom of a persisting capitalist infrastructure in the midst of a transnational socialist revolution in the late 1950s, focusing on Jamila the Algerian (1958, dir. Youssef Chahine). She argues that its transnational nature both contributed to Afro-Asian identity formation and intervened in the development of an anticolonial discourse across local and transregional contexts. Sarah Niazi explores the role of South Asian filmmakers in the Afro-Asian Film Festivals (Tashkent 1958, Cairo 1960 and Jakarta 1964), demonstrating how melodrama in South Asian cinema contributed to fostering non-aligned, South-South solidarities. Ling Zhang discusses Unyielding Algeria (1963), a militant documentary produced by Beijing’s Central Studio of Newsreel Production in Algeria, emphasizing its role in Third World radical documentary traditions and its embodiment of transnational collaboration that transcend profit motives, supported by public-owned studios and anti-colonial solidarity networks.

By addressing these tensions, contradictions, and nuances, this panel contributes to a large conversation under the theme “Afro-Asian Solidarities in Arts and Culture,” organized alongside two other panels, followed by a roundtable discussion.

Presentations:

• 11:15 - 13:00 GMT

  The Camera Has Emotions: Unyielding Algeria (1963) and Sino-African Solidarity
  

  Presenter: Ling Zhang – International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS)
• 11:15 - 13:00 GMT

  Popular Melodrama as a Site of Resistance and Collaboration: Building Solidarities at the Afro-Asian Film Festival (1958–1964)
  

  Presenter: Sarah Niazi – International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS)
• 11:15 - 13:00 GMT

  The Fraught Nature of Afro-Asian Media Solidarities:Restructuring the Ghana Film Unit in the Media Ecologies of a Privatized Future
  

  Presenter: Peter J. Bloom – University of California - Santa Barbara