Here is a short video presenting the film screening series curated for the Gezi – 10Years After event series at the Maxim Gorki Theatre, Berlin, Germany. 

Listen: Bursted hopes: the Turkish film scene after the election

My interview with Christian Berndt, on Turkey’s election results and its possible impact on the film scene in Turkey. Listen on Deutschlandfunk (in German):https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/geplatzte-hoffnungen-tuerkische-filmemacher-nach-der-stichwahl-dlf-4234841e-100.html

Communication Activity: Panel Workshop: Claiming History: Activism through Digital Video Archiving

Telling our own stories through images, recordings and videos, has never been easier. Anyone with a smartphone is now able to share their account of events and counter mainstream media narratives, which too often silence the voices that challenge its ideological positioning. In a fast-paced digital world, a video shared on twitter might be seen in a fleeting moment. As rapidly as it appeared, the same video may disappear into the internet’s bottomless pit of information. This opens questions for organizers, observers and academics: How can we collect these recorded moments of oppression and resistance, provide them with context and an identity, and use them as a resource for organizing, activism and research/reflection?

To answer this question, the “Claiming History” workshop will host activists engaged in collecting, archiving, and disseminating digital media, to discuss how these can be used to support popular struggles around the world and help create a counter history that empowers its subjects in the process.

Speakers:

Moderator: Dr. Şirin Fulya Erensoy

Gezi Park, Tahrir Square, Video Archives

For some decades now, the documentation of social protests via video footage has become widespread. A lot of this footage never reached a broader audience. The video archives bak.ma and 858.ma are initiatives to gather activist video footage and make this accessible to the public. This is a valuable source for researchers and historians alike, but what impact do these hours of unedited material have to the social struggles themselves?

Participants: 

Moderator:
Dr. Şirin Fulya Erensoy

This panel was held at the Radical Film Network Meeting in Berlin, 26.08.2021

Dissemination: Watch Visible Evidence Conference Presentation

Here is a recording of my presentation at the Visible Evidence Conference, held in Gdansk 10-14 August, 2022. My presentation was titled “Experiences of Migration from Turkey to Germany: The Female Guest Worker in Contemporary Documentaries”. It was part of the panel “Claiming History through the Voices of Women: Documentary and Archival Practices by Women in Turkey”. 

Video Activism:

Podcast: Video Activism: From Images of Protest to Protesting Images

How does video activism challenge dominant power structures? 

The latest episode of the podcast Dritte Klappe looks at the use of video as an activist tool by practitioners from Turkey who moved to Germany after the Gezi Park protests. Dr. Şirin Fulya Erensoy, Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellow at the Film University Babelsberg KONRAD WOLF since September 2021 explores the use of video as a tool of social protest in her research. In conversation with Özlem Sarıyıldız, Video Activist from Turkey, Artist, Filmmaker, Editor, and co-founder of the first web-based video-activist collective from Turkey, KaraHaber, this episode highlights the importance of generating content outside the conventions of mainstream media, creating a collective memory for future generations, as well as the performativity of the practitioners, and its implications for the prospects of social protest.

To listen to the episode, please click here:

Şirin spoke on the podcast [not that] original hosted by Yas Sekkat regarding the important work of video activists in Turkey. (October 2018): https://notthatoriginal.podbean.com/e/episode-7-the-good-fight-of-a-video-activist/

Sorry, this content is only available in Turkish:
Şirin Erensoy on Sinemasalı, hosted by İlknur Bilir, talking about the evolution of Video Activism in Turkey (Broadcast date: 5 July, 2017, Medyascope TV)

Şirin Erensoy’s presentation titled The Evolution of Video Activism in Turkey, given at The Power of Activist Video conference, held at the ICI Berlin, May 2017.