Ethnographic Film Series

GENDER & CITY

Organised by the Royal Anthropological Institute’s Film Committee and the SOAS Department of Anthropology & Sociology

Wednesday 4 February 1-3pm, Khalili Lecture Theatre, SOAS Main Building

Final Fitting, OT: Prov Akhar

Reza Haeri, Niloofar Haeri, 2008, 30 mins

Mr. Arabpour is the master tailor and craftsman, and the proprietor of the most famous tailor shop in Qom, Iran. He is in his eighties and for the last several decades has been the official tailor to the most important religious leaders of the country, starting with the late Ayatollah Khomeini to the current Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, as well as for the former president, Mohammad Khatami. His international clientele have included such prominent figures as Imam Musa Sadr of Lebanon.  He speaks to us of the different styles and the many variations on the traditional aba and ammameh (the turban and the robe).  Mr. Arabpour shows us how he cuts and creates the garments and how he adapts them for different men with different needs.  The newer styles, more sculpted, more tailored, with defined seams and pockets, are designed for a new kind of Ayatollah: the more “reform-minded”. 

Unravel

Meghna Gupta, 2012, 14 mins.  Followed by Q & A with director.

Unravel follows the Western world’s least wanted clothes, on a journey across Northern India, from sea to industrial interior.  They get sent to Panipat, a sleepy town that recycles them back into yarn.  Reshma  is a bright, inquisitive woman who dreams of travelling the vast distances the clothes she recycles have.  While Reshma shows us how these garments get transformed, she and other women workers reflect on these clothes.  They construct a picture of how the West is, using both their imagination and the rumours that travel with the cast-offs.

For further information on the films please contact: RAI Film Officer, Susanne Hammacher, film@therai.org.uk, or Mahnaz Marashi, SOAS Anthropology Department, mm97@soas.ac.uk