Send message to Author

Paper short abstract

Drawing on my fieldwork as a woman with a camera, this research interrogates Kerala’s wedding filmography through a feminist visual ethnographic lens, examining how male videographers shape wedding aesthetics and intimacy, reinforcing a gendered gaze in the visual representation of brides.

Paper long abstract

This study explores the intersections of gender, visual ethnography, and the politics of representation in Kerala’s wedding filmography. As a woman ethnographer with a camera in a male-dominated field, my research critically examines how wedding videographers—predominantly men—act as both visual storytellers and choreographers, shaping the aesthetics and social narratives of marriage. Drawing from my ethnographic fieldwork, I reflect on my presence in the field, interrogating how my role as a female researcher with a camera influenced my interactions and the credibility accorded to me.

Kerala’s wedding films, historically shaped by a male gaze, construct a visual grammar that influences how love and intimacy are performed and remembered. Through an analysis of wedding videos, the paper investigates how videographers actively direct and frame brides, reinforcing gendered aesthetics and idealized notions of conjugality. Despite weddings being marketed as the "bride’s day," visual authorship remains overwhelmingly male, shaping not just documentation but the enactment of wedding rituals.

I have employed the camera throughout my fieldwork not merely to confirm events but to question them. In this framework, “photography becomes the process rather than the product of fieldwork” (Larsen, 1998). By bridging visual anthropology with feminist critique, this research challenges the assumed neutrality of the camera, positioning wedding videography as a sociocultural practice that both reflects and reinforces dominant gendered hierarchies. It also aims to make meaningful contributions to the fields of Feminist ethnography and South Asian studies, exploring how wedding films serve as a medium for storytelling and cultural representation.