Emerging Christian Media in Egypt

Clerical Authority and the Visualization of Women in Coptic Video Films

Datos Bibliográficos

ID8970800
AutoresFebe Armanios, Andrew Amstutz (0000-0003-1190-1376)
Año2013
Volumen45
Número3
Páginas513-533
Fecha de publicación2013-07-30
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaInternational Journal Middle East Studies (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0020-7438 • E-ISSN: 1471-6380
EditorialCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0020743813000457
OpenAlexW2087667003
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas14
Referencias citadas61

This article examines the depiction of women and gender within Coptic Orthodox video films or “hagiopics” produced between 1987 and 2010. As part of a recent religious renewal, hagiopics have expanded, altered, and reinvented traditional stories of saints and pious figures and have also generated, within this traditionally patriarchal setting, a wider space for the articulation of female voices. While their inclusion can be seen as potentially empowering for women, this paper suggests that during Pope Shenouda III's reign (1971–2012), the films became a powerful vehicle for broadcasting the church's conservative teachings on female power and authority, marriage and marital dissolution, spousal abuse, and femininity. By highlighting an array of exemplary female characters, hagiopics capture women's role as custodians of a distinctive Coptic ethos and of family and communal cohesiveness. The films’ emphasis on women's physical modesty, submissiveness, and obedience to male figureheads also hints at the modern church's anxieties about women's increasing autonomy in choosing marriage partners and their growing demands for more equal treatment within the church

Art · Custodians · Depiction · Dowry · Ethos · Literature · Obedience · Political science · Power (physics · Sociology · Taboo · Gender Studies · History · Islamic Studies and History · Law · Marriage and Sexual Relationships · Multiculturalism, Politics, Migration, Gender