Postcolonial affirmations: The return of the Dusky Maiden in Sima Urale's <i>Velvet Dreams</i>

Smith, Jo

doi:10.1080/10304310701713559

Cited by 10 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 1 publication

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“…(1974: 12) introduCtion Hollywood's mid-twentieth century South Seas cinematic archive has been liberally referenced in contemporary Pacific literature, theatrical performance and screen production. A significant number of these references subvert and ridicule stereotype: either the doomed erotic figure of the dusky maiden (Pearson 2005;Smith 2008;Tamaira 2010;Taouma 2004) or the prelapsarian paradisiacal island and often both. Variously theorized as strategic exoticism (Huggan 2001), reverse colonial mimicry (Balme 2007) or revised spectacle (Fresno-Calleja 2012), these analytical frameworks share a common emphasis upon anti-colonial critique, indigenous agency and especially semiotic play.…”

Section: Thaman's Poem 'Thementioning

confidence: 98%

Cowboy contradictions: Westerns in the postcolonial Pacific

Pearson

2013

Studies in Australasian Cinema

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Indigenous scholars have recently focused on the Hollywood western and the figure of the cinematic cowboy as particularly potent sites of identification in twentieth century Oceania. Curiously, neither the genre nor the icon figures prominently in current film scholarship about the Pacific. One of the reasons is that westerns have been considered particularly paradigmatic of cinema's imperial legacy. The genre's tendency to reaffirm the dominance of white masculinity at the expense of Indigenous people, suggests that westerns ought to have attracted utter contempt in colonial settings such as Samoa and New Zealand. The fact that the opposite seems to have been true, that westerns and cowboys were not only admired in Oceania but even imitated, cannot be simply dismissed as yet another example of 'spectators […] unwittingly sutured into a colonialist perspective ' (Shohat and Stam 1994: 12). Instead, the cowboy constitutes a complex site around which political critique, corporeal desire and modern spectacle coalesce. This article interrogates why the western appears to have been overlooked, how the cowboy can be seen as a significant cultural influence in the Pacific, and how he might shed light on historical spectatorial practices and preferences in the region.

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Section: Thaman's Poem 'Thementioning

confidence: 98%

Cowboy contradictions: Westerns in the postcolonial Pacific

Pearson

2013

Studies in Australasian Cinema

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“…Sima Urale's first short, O Tamaiti (1996), depicted the struggles and experiences of Samoan migrants to New Zealand. Her early documentary Velvet Dreams (1997) explored the history of Dusky Maiden imagery, its presence within the kitsch genre of velvet painting and the white men who made and consumed these images (Smith 2008 (2007), a short film depicting the cross-cultural encounters of an Oromo Ethiopian Muslim girl in Mt. Albert, Auckland.…”

Section: Postcolonialism and Apron Stringsmentioning

confidence: 99%

New Zealand cinema and the postcolonial exotic: the case ofApron Strings

Smith¹

2010

Transnational Cinemas

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“…Yet, Māori have long been part of the promotion of Aotearoa and local products. Initially framed as ‘exotic others’, perhaps epitomised by representations of ‘dusky Māori maidens’ and ‘native culture’ in 19th century tourism and immigration promotion, many such tropes continue through to the present-day in dominant advertising and media discourses (Blythe, 1994; Fox et al, 2011; Jones et al, 2000; Smith, 2008). ‘Traditional’ representations of Māori culture remain especially significant in a tourism and sporting context (e.g.…”

Section: Māori Experiencesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Decolonising the Marketing Academy: An Indigenous Māori Perspective on Engagement, Methodologies and Practices

Love

Hall

2021

Australasian Marketing Journal

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In a context where the marketing discipline and its institutions has no choice but to face up to its embeddedness in social issues it is therefore important and timely to consider how marketing in colonial states – in which indigenous lands were/are appropriated, cultures systematically discriminated against, and identities, language and generations stolen – acknowledges its past and confront its future. This essay calls for the understanding and incorporation of indigenous knowledges and worldviews. It further asks for considerations of cultural control, nonappropriation and participatory approaches in marketing. Acknowledging that a university or business school is sited on indigenous lands, or opening a meeting with greetings or formal introductions are relevant, but they become little more than indigenous tokenism unless they are part of a wider journey of change and understanding. Any incorporation of indigenous worldviews into marketing education and research must be cognisant of the potential for exploitation.

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Postcolonial affirmations: The return of the Dusky Maiden in Sima Urale's Velvet Dreams

Cited by 10 publications

References 1 publication

Cowboy contradictions: Westerns in the postcolonial Pacific

Cowboy contradictions: Westerns in the postcolonial Pacific

New Zealand cinema and the postcolonial exotic: the case ofApron Strings

Decolonising the Marketing Academy: An Indigenous Māori Perspective on Engagement, Methodologies and Practices

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