Repository for the Network Analysis project within the MA course of "Digital Humanities and Digital Knowledge".
The general field in which our research can be situated is Film Studies, a sector concerned with exploring the narrative, artistic, cultural, economic, and political implications of the cinema. In particular we are interested in adopting a postcolonial perspective as a critical approach to the analysis of production, theoretical frameworks, contexts and creation of films. To do so, our study will consider the history of films and the reciprocal influence between USA and East Asian cinema production, hence adopting the tools and methods of citation analysis studies.
The problem we aspire to address within this study is the power asymmetries underlying the ever present vision of history of Cinema as Hollywood-centered, as well as how eastern cinema has been incorporated in western cinema, often without fully acknowledging the sources, hence undermining the role of the foreign artistic influence; or how it affected the representation of the Other, shaping the perception and history of foreign identities. As a compass to better navigate this field of studies we draw knowledge from two main texts:
● Postcolonial Cinema Studies, edited by Sandra Ponzanesi, and Marguerite Waller,
Taylor & Francis Group, 2011. ProQuest Ebook Central
● East Asian Cinemas, Exploring Transnational Connections on Film, edited by Leon Hunt & Leung Wing-Fai, I.B Tauris & Co Ltd, New York, 2008 Moreover, we are taking inspiration from Spitz and Horvàt’s Network Analysis study Unraveling Cinematic Citation1 where light is shed «on the potential of a systematic quantitative investigation based on cinematic influences in identifying the most inspiring creations in world cinema». 2 Their main contribution was to create for the first time a movie rank based on the historical importance of movies, beyond traditional measures of success, such as box-office revenue and critical acclaim, which are external to the craft of the movie itself.
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