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Full-Text Articles in Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies
“He Who Kills The Body, Kills The Soul That Inhabits It”: Feminist Filmmaking, Religion, And Spiritual Identification In Vision, Carl Laamanen
“He Who Kills The Body, Kills The Soul That Inhabits It”: Feminist Filmmaking, Religion, And Spiritual Identification In Vision, Carl Laamanen
Journal of Religion & Film
In this article, I argue that the 2009 film, Vision: From the Life of Hildegard of Bingen, presents an example of feminist filmmaking that seeks to draw viewers into spiritual identification with the protagonist, 12th-century mystic Hildegard, through its narrative and formal techniques, encouraging the audience to share in Hildegard’s visionary experiences. The film does so in an explicitly feminist way, drawing upon unconventional visual and sonic aesthetics to highlight the power and authority of Hildegard’s spiritual experiences. In particular, Vision’s use of music and sound points toward a conception of feminine spirituality that values the …
Seeing The Light, Hearing The Call: Women Religious As Spectators And Subjects Of Popular Nun Films, Maureen A. Sabine Professor
Seeing The Light, Hearing The Call: Women Religious As Spectators And Subjects Of Popular Nun Films, Maureen A. Sabine Professor
Journal of Religion & Film
Though popular films like The Bells of St. Mary’s (1945), Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957), The Nun’s Story (1959), and The Sound of Music (1965) have routinely been criticized for circulating polarized stereotypes about nuns, convent memoirs indicate that some women felt the stirrings of a religious vocation from watching these movies. This article arose out of interest in whether other women heard God’s call through nun films, and is based on a survey of 86 sisters from 28 different communities who had entered the convent between 1947 and 2007, and were prepared to discuss what they saw in these …