Shaping Global Cultures through Screenwriting: Women Who Write Our Worlds

Shaping Global Cultures through Screenwriting: Women Who Write Our Worlds is a powerful testament to the undeniable impact of an international collection of female screenwriters. Spanning film, television, virtual reality, games, and digital media, these case studies showcase instances when women have used screenwriting to challenge injustice and give voice to communities across the globe. Acknowledging global disparities in wealth and power, the book exposes screenwriting as activism, which shifts attitudes and alters lived experiences. Whether about gender and race or war and colonization, or other serious issues, each chapter reveals the deep connections between storytelling and social change. More than just a study of the craft, this is a celebration of the women writers who use their artistic lens to educate and empower others. Geared toward readers interested in screenwriting, media studies, sociology, women’s studies, and a wide range of humanities subjects, including history and population studies, this book brings long-overdue attention to the vital role women take in shaping global cultural landscapes.

Table of Contents:
List of Figures Introduction – Rose Ferrell SECTION ONE: AFRICAN WORLDS African Worlds: Section introduction – Rose Ferrell   1. Differently abled and definitely able: Resilience and inspiration in the films and life of Zambia’s Musola Catherine Kaseketi – Elastus Mambwe 2. We aren’t all cis straight white men: Expanding depictions of autism – Karen Jeynes 3. Voicing our opinion: Challenges of female rap artists in north-west Nigeria – Ummi Muhammad Hassan SECTION TWO: AMERICAN WORLDS American Worlds: Section introduction – Rose Ferrell 4. The first female filmmaker in Central America: Patricia Howell, on a life of defending women’s rights and pioneering national cinema in Costa Rica – Aarón Acuña Cordero 5. Marta Rodriguez: Documentary films with social impact – Sara Manuela Duque García 6. Violence and fire in Latin American women’s scripts: Tatiana Huezo (Prayers for the Stolen, 2021, Mexico) and Claudia Huaiquimilla (My Brothers Dream Awake, 2021, Chile) – Juan Carlos Carrillo, Sebastian Gonzalez 7. How nice to see us alive: Memory, trauma and resistance in scripting How Nice to See You Alive (1989, Brazil) – Lara Caravalho 8. The screenwriting process of Anna Muylaert’s film The Second Mother (2015, Brazil) over 20 years: In search of a different ending for the female characters – Patricia Dourado, Mirian Tavares SECTION THREE: ASIAN WORLDS Asian Worlds: Section introduction – Rose Ferrell 9. Afia Nathaniel and Pakistani minor cinema: The Amazon of the screen – Azam Sarwar 10. The ‘invisible’ in The Way We Are (2008, Hong Kong): The scriptwriter, the script, the everyday, and the audience – Ian Fong 11. Young-Ah Yoo’s controversial adaptation of Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 (2019, South Korea): A response to the South Korean #MeToo movement – Thomas Carter SECTION FOUR: ENGLISH-SPEAKING WORLDS English-speaking Worlds: Section introduction – Rose Ferrell 12. 'This is a true story': Women artists and narratives of disability in Ida Lupino’s Never Fear (1950, USA) – Gabrielle Stecher 13. How to perceive Cassie Thornton? The translation of blindness in Perception (2017, USA) – Polly Ellen Goodwin 14. Exploring homelessness in virtual reality documentary: The scripting of Rose Troche’s We Live Here (2020, USA) – Kath Dooley 15. Catherine Hill: Women who write our worlds – shaping global screen culture with Some Happy Day (2021, Australia) – Joanne Tindale 16. Rewriting Australia’s colonial mythologies: Leah Purcell’s The Drover’s Wife: The Legend of Molly Johnson (2021, Australia) – Andrew James Couzens 17. Bluey worlds (2018 – 23, Australia) – Andi Spark 18. Miranda July’s Kajillionaire (2020, USA) and queer utopias – Angie Black and Anna Dzenis 19. Young women who write: Little Women (2019) – Armando Fumagalli 20. Pan-Asian storytelling for Aotearoa New Zealand screens – Ghazaleh Gol, Shuchi Kothari SECTION FIVE: EUROPEAN WORLDS European Worlds: Section introduction – Rose Ferrell 21. Exploring war’s trauma through a feminist lens: Resilient women in the films of Jasmila Žbanić – Miriam Hernandez and Bruno Lovric 22. Desire-driven filmmaking: Celine Sciamma and Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019, France) – Philippa Burne and Angie Black 23. A Trial for Rape (1979, Italy): The transformative power of the female gaze – Milly Buonanno SECTION SIX: ISLAND WORLDS Island Worlds: Section introduction – Rose Ferrell 24. Malu tatau: Rite of passage for women’s empowerment – Agapetos Aia-Fa’aleava and Vaoiva Natapu-Ponton 25. Island Time (2022): Cultural revival in the Mariana Islands – Rose Ferrell 26. Island women use screenwriting in music videos to lead the campaign for global-level climate action – Rosanne Welch Notes on Contributors Index

About the Author :
Rose Ferrell is a writer-filmmaker and researcher with experience both as a technician on long-form drama and documentary, and as a lecturer-trainer with students of all ages. Her work can be found in the Palgrave Handbooks, the Journal of Screenwriting, and assorted other publications. Rosanne Welch is a television writer and university professor of Humanities in the IGE Department at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, USA; and is the Executive Director of the MFA in TV and Screenwriting for Stephens College.