The Digital Film Event

by Trinh T. Minh-ha

Endless travel in cyberspace, virtual reality, and the dream of limitless technology changes our sense of self. In her new book, Trinh Minh-ha explores the way technology transforms our perception of reality.

"We are all engaged in social rituals in our daily activities, she writes, "and by remaining unaware of their artistic ritual propensity, we remain 'in conformity'." Her goal, as a thinker and an artist, is to transform our understanding of technology and speed so that we are able to "turn an instrument into a creative tool and to step out of the one-dimensional, technologically servile mind."

The paradox that "stillness contains speed within it" is central to Trinh's concept of the digital apparatus. With her signature amalgam of feminism, Eastern philosophy, and practical understanding of filmmaking, Trinh Minh-ha presents a much-needed advance in our concept of the real in a technological age.

246 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 2005

About the author

Trinh T. Minh-ha (born 1952) is a filmmaker, writer, academic and composer. She is an independent filmmaker and feminist, post-colonial theorist. She teaches courses that focus on women's work as related to cultural politics, post-coloniality, contemporary critical theory and the arts. The seminars she offers focus on Third cinema, film theory and aesthetics, the voice in cinema, the autobiographical voice, critical theory and research, cultural politics and feminist theory.[1] She has been making films for over twenty years and may be best known for her first film Reassemblage, made in 1982. She has received several awards and grants, including the American Film Institute’s National Independent Filmmaker Maya Deren Award, and Fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts and the California Arts Council. Her films have been the subject of twenty retrospectives.

Reviews

[Minh-Ha · Rating 5 out of 5]

Included in this book are interviews and photographs of Trinh's art installations!