B.A.T.A.M: An Ethnographic Film Produced by Johan Lindquist

Firstly, it is important to understand how the documentary form is best suited to illustrate the film’s theme. In order to do this, one must have an overview of the documentary style of filmmaking. Documentaries concern themselves with the “exploration of

To highlight this topic, Kristof and WuDunn relate the history of Meena Hasina, an Indian woman in her thirties as she walks down the street while adults stare at her, some even glowering – this reflects how bad gender inequality is in some developing countries, to the point of not even being able to walk on the street. Kristof explains that Meena was from a poor family that sold her to a brothel. Of all the possible ways to raise money like reaching out to a foreign non-government organization (which offers incentives to set up stalls so women can start their own business selling goods), or joining an activist group to promote education to young girls, her family simply saw no value in Meena and decided to sell her. Meena ended up in a brothel, but the authors also use this event to thoroughly develop on the abuse of women. Kristof clarifies that once women enter into the brothels business they feel worthless with no hope; in fact, society looks them as a sub-level of illiterate girls with the sole purpose of prostitution – which is absolutely false. The problem here is that women feel rejected by society and are psychologically traumatized as is the case of Ainul the family matriarch in Meena’s brothel. She had been herself a prostitute when she was young, and eventually her daughters were also forced into prostitution. Ainul was so shattered that eventually she became the woman in charge of beating up new girls and finally in charge of the brothel forcing the daughters of other women into prostitution. In this case, the authors pointed to the fact that society forces women into sexual slavery, and that they get punished when they try to escape, so in turn, women exploit more

The sex trade is not a choice; there many situational factors contributing as to how these women and children got into the sex trade. Most of the women and children who are bought and trafficked into this industry are vulnerable or have a background of abuse and neglect (4425 Hossain). Exploiters use the vulnerability to their advantage by making promises of stability and love to lure their victims in. Many

This study will employ ethnographic research methods for data collection and it will be comprised of:

In Jean-Louis Comolli and Jean Narboni’s essay “Cinema/Ideology/Criticism,” they put forward the central argument that film is a commercial product in the capitalist system and therefore also the unconscious instrument of the dominant ideology which produces it. In opposition to the classic film theory that applauds camera as an impartial device to reproduce reality, they argue that what the camera reproduces is merely a refraction of the prevailing ideology. Therefore, the primary and political task for filmmakers is to disrupt this replication of the world as self-evident and the function of film criticism is to identify and evaluate that politics. Comolli and Narboni then suggest seven categories of films confronting ideology in different ways, among which the second category resists the prevailing ideology on two levels. Films of this group not only overtly deal with political contents in order to “attack their ideological assimilation” (Comolli and Narboni 483), but also achieve their goal through breaking down the conventional way of depicting reality.

Ethnographic methodology provides rich and complex data (Brownlow, 2012). In the ethnographic approach a researcher joined the studied group in their natural environment, stayed as a part

Imagine leaving everyone and everything you have ever known to go to a new unknown world and make money to help your family. The amount of stress and anxiety might be too much to handle at first. This was the life of many young women from small villages in Nepal, looking to do whatever it takes to keep a roof on their family’s head. Desperate times call for desperate measures, but what these women expected in the work is not what they got. They were sold into sex slavery, unaware on the struggles they would have to endure in their lives.

The first section will explore the themes of culture and socialization through specific examples from the movie. The rest of the paper will explain the sociological significance of the movie and why a sociologist would find this movie interesting. This section of the paper will also

I commend Nettie Wild for the profound meaning she finds in her work. Her tenacity is lost on most people. While filming “A Place Called Chiapas,” Wild “began to realize that [her] camera was framing the gap between reality and rhetoric.” She breaks the boundaries of my previous analysis and bridges the disconnect between media talk and the reality of being in Chiapas during this revolutionary time period. So, while the start of this documentary may seem ineffective to a film critic, her images speak for themselves.

For the purpose of this study, male prostitutes and sexual acts such as pornography, stripping and erotic massages are excluded from the definition of prostitution. The terms ‘sex worker’ and ‘prostitute’ will be used interchangeably throughout the paper. The term ‘sex work’ was coined to circumvent the stigma that accompanies prostitution and to acknowledge that it generates income, like any other profession in our society (Sondhi, 2011).

According to Polit and Beck (2017), ethnography studies "involve the description and interpretation of cultural behavior, and seek to understand their world view" (p. 468). The strengths of ethnographic

This is a qualitative study with an ethnographic focus. An ethnographic comprehension is produced through investigation of a few bases of information. Ethnography permits the scholar

Of the six themes in the ethnography of prostitution presented by Sterk in the article, I believe that the impact of the AIDS epidemic on the women’s lives are most important. Society does not accept prostitutes and believe that they are open to the fact of having unprotected sex with numerous partners. This is not the case at all. These women are very careful and force their partners to use protection at all times. These women are sometimes forced into having unprotected sex by their partner. The costumers think that because they are paying for sex, they can do whatever they want. The men become violent and force certain acts upon these women. Although the prostitutes know the risks of their job, some do not take HIV tests because of the fear of it being positive. They’d rather not know.

Siri’s story illustrates the complicated dynamics of sex trafficking. Prostitution and sex work in general has become part of the global economy (Truong 1996). Some women choose to go into the sex industry while others are deceived or forced into it. Human trafficking networks usually use deception, coercion, or force to push women into sexual slavery. Some women migrate with the knowledge that they wil l be doing sex

Women made vulnerable by poverty are most susceptible to the sex industry because they lack the resources, the education, and the economic alternatives to pursue other work possibilities. The lack of education diminishes women’s potential to gain paid employment, and desperately consent to prostitution as their survival strategy.