[csaa-forum] Consenting to and Co-ordinating Intimacy in Normal People (2020) - a talk by Prof Catherine Fowler

[Rosemary Overell]

Mōrena,

Please join us for a research talk by Prof Catherine Fowler<https://www.otago.ac.nz/mfco/staff/professor-catherine-fowler> (Media, Film & Communication Programme, The University of Otago) on Tuesday 27th August at 10am in Burns 4 and via Zoom (register here<https://forms.gle/NCGaH4HqzCDod4qP9>)

Consenting to and Co-ordinating Intimacy in Normal People (2020)
Note: this presentation will discuss scenes including content of a sexual nature
In Sex and the Series Iris Brey points out that whilst the online movements #MeToo and Times Up have opened up a public space to talk about scarring sexual encounters, too frequently the stories told are ones where in private women did not have the words to express how they felt. Adapting Brey’s premise, this paper adds the TV series Normal People into studies of intimacy on screen. Adapted from the acclaimed novel of the same name by Sally Rooney, Normal People tells the story of two awkward school leavers, Marianne and Connell, who enter into a secret relationship, hidden because of Connell’s paranoia for peer approval. Crucially, becoming intimate overcomes their individual problems since, as Lauren Berlant puts it, ‘to be intimate is to communicate with the sparest of signs and gestures, and at its root intimacy has the quality of eloquence and brevity’ (1998/2000, 281).
Berlant’s words reveal the paradox of intimacy: that it feels incredibly meaningful and fulfilling yet that it escapes description; so how can it be conveyed on screen? Through close textual analysis of Normal People I argue that two strategies are adopted to (audio)visualise intimacy in the adaption: first, it is verbalised through key scenes in which consent is foregrounded; second it is expertly choreographed by ‘intimacy co-ordinator’ Ita O’Brien. Both these strategies have earnt the sex scenes in Normal People much praise for their portrayal of a relationship grounded in equality, therefore adding nuances to Brey’s discussion of Sex and the Series.

Catherine Fowler is Professor in Film and Media at Otago University. Her research has focused on women filmmakers and artists’ filmmaking. This talk is part of a developing project on how complex television has dealt with sex, including the performance of intimacy and of sexual violence in the wake of #Metoo. See the video essay ‘The Responsive Eye, or, the Morning Show May Destroy You’<https://mediacommons.org/intransition/responsive-eye-or-morning-show-may-destroy-you>.

Ngā mihi
Rosie.


Rosemary Overell<https://www.otago.ac.nz/mfco/staff/rosemaryoverell.html>
Senior Lecturer
Media, Film & Communication Programme
The University of Otago
Dunedin
New Zealand
9054

Latest publications:
Overell, R. (2024). ‘Don’t Worry Darling: The anxious question of what women want after #MeToo’. Psychoanalysis, Culture & Society https://doi.org/10.1057/s41282-024-00461-5
Millar, I., Nicholls, B., Overell, R., & Tutt, D. (2023). Power and politics in Adam Curtis' Can't get you out of my head: An emotional history of the modern world. In C. Owens & S. Meehan O'Callaghan (Eds.), Psychoanalysis and the small screen: The year the cinemas closed<https://www.routledge.com/Psychoanalysis-and-the-Small-Screen-The-Year-the-Cinemas-Closed/Owens-OCallaghan/p/book/9781032223223>. (pp. 163-189). Abingdon, UK: Routledge.
Overell, R. (2022). Methodological Masturbation<https://lackorg.com/2022/08/26/methodological-masturbation/>. LACK: punctual musings. 26th August.

Google Scholar<https://scholar.google.co.nz/citations?user=ZW7oyEAAAAAJ&hl=en>
LinkedIn<http://www.linkedin.com/in/rosemary-overell-047786222>

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