It reminds me that so much of the well-meaning yet intellectually flaccid liberal language around things like “diversity in film and literature” banks heavily on ideas like “giving voice to the voiceless,” a sentiment I’ve always found repugnant and paternalistic. Mita’s art, not to mention her politics—the aliveness of both—has no patience for that sort of white savior torpor, or for the notion that any of the people she puts onscreen have ever been voiceless. The decolonial point here is not to give voice to the voiceless, but to recognize the voices that have always been there—to recognize
...more
