Research: Topics

Research: Topics

This post consists of different topics I came across on different YouTube videos and forums online regarding women in Islam. There are many questions asked by Muslims and non-Muslim communities to expand their knowledge on Muslim women, their roles in the religion and their purpose. The very few questions I will be including into my mini-series/documentary are: 

1) Who or what is Allah? 

2) Who is Muhammed (PBUH) and what is his role? 

3) Who do Muslims look up to? 

4) What is Islam? 

Many non-Muslims do not understand who is Allah, mostly think that Allah is one of the Gods we believe (polytheistic). Many believe Muhammed is the one Muslims look up to, as his name is used in many passages however I want to explain the differences between Muhammed and Allah, as Allah is the one and only God in Islam and Muhammed (pbuh) is the prophet and messenger of God. Islam comes from the word 'peace' as it promotes peace in the religion Islam, although many sensitive articles and media have portrayed all Muslims as extremists and terrorists. 

My goal is to portray Muslim girls in this generation and in this western world as peaceful and open-minded girls. The purpose of these topics is not Islamic beliefs and facts but in fact it is about Muslim girl's opinion how Islam portrays Muslim women and explain what their purposes are. I want to go more in depth and touch on topics that the majority of non-Muslim people think how Islam promotes women. 

1) Islam limits a woman's education and knowledge

2) Islamic dress code

3) Gender equality in Islam

As we live in a virtual reality most of us receive news and shocking articles about Muslim girls in third world countries. There can be articles on how women in third world countries do not need education and should become a house wife for her future husband. However, Islam does promote us women to seek for knowledge and there are no limitations and I want to erase these stereotypical assumptions by presenting Muslims girls that are representing Kingston University as undergraduates that are currently seeking for knowledge and achieving a degree. In the western world, people do not understand how a woman in Islam should dress. Going back in centuries, women back in the day whether they were Christian or Jewish would cover themselves as they should appear modest (i.e Virgin Mary). In this generation, women around 20's can define modesty differently in the way they speak or how they carry themselves. People could identify a Muslim woman's dress code (hijab) links with 'terrorist' or an 'extremist' however I want to clarify that a dress code is used to define modesty in Islam.

   

Research: Documentary/Social Experiments Inspirations

Research: Documentary & Social Experiment Inspiration

In this post, I will be analysing my favourite social experiments that are on YouTube and paint a picture of how I want my documentary to be like with the help of analysing some of the documentary pieces that apply to the style I want. 

Firstly, I would like to produce guidelines that can help me analyse these pieces easily. 

1) Analyse the subject and what issues they are addressing
2) Analyse the camera work and transitions from volunteer to the public
3) Explain what I liked and disliked, and how can I make it better? 
4) What inspired me and how can I apply that technique into my product?

This is a social experiment by OCKTV that produce many prank videos and recently have been producing social experiments. This particular social experiment is based on two different races abusing their child in public and seeking whether the public will speak up and do something. 

The first race is a family of light skin complexion with an angry mother and father physically and vocally abusing their son over his "new lifestyle" becoming more 'hood' and a rebel. As it starts off, immediately people have started to react and help the boy and physically abuse the father. 

On the other hand, the comparison to the dark skin complexion family is the direct opposite of the first family. The second family consists of the same abuse to their child and the public have not helped however only a few reacted. The issue tackles human behaviour and standing up for other's rights. The issue is to portray wrong activities happening everyday, some behind closed doors and in public. The social experiment illustrates the child abuse and not speaking up issues in America. What I disliked in this social experiment is that they used two different locations which to me is very biased. The first family's location was in a big open space in between a park and in front of a large audience sitting on benches or walking past. Whereas the second family's location was more on the quiet streets and lower class people in comparisons to the first location with different sorts of race, cultures and class. In my social experiment, I do not want it to be biased, I want it to be in the same location to get the same or different reactions without manipulating location desires to be sure to get the reaction I expect. 

This is one of my favorite social experiments of all time as it tackles equality. This social experiment is based on the women's movement against sexism and rights to women. However, ever since the women's movement occurred, men have not been treated the way women promoted equality to both genders. Instead, it seems to me that men have traded a woman's position. However, I am against violence towards both genders and I am all about equality. As you can see in the beginning of the experiment, the man is very abusive to his girlfriend and in one second men rush to her rescue as it is wrong to abuse a girl, well because a girl is a girl. Sadly, the second part of this experiment does not get the same treatment once the girl physically abuses her boyfriend in public. Society have started to think that a man being hit by a woman is funny and something to laugh about because they are not aware that more than 40% of domestic violence victims are men. Just because men are portrayed as masculine and rough in the media, so the public shouldn't take it seriously as a woman is weaker than a man. Moving on to the camera work, I have noticed that OCKTV have been using the same camera technique which is hand held. To me, it seems like they used relatively the same location for both gender roles. The only thing I do not like in this social experiment is more on the technical side, the camera work. I will not be using the same technique but in the next social experiment it links more to my issue that I am tackling and the camera work that has inspired me. 


 '10 hours of walking in NYC' is based on women being sexually harassed by men and promoting that women should be left alone. I am using this as one of my inspirations for the camera work and the issue they were 'attempting' to portray. It was so hard for me to watch this as they have labeled every man in this video as a person harassing however I really disagree as most of the comments directed at her were compliments or simply telling her to have a good day and god bless. Although women are entitled to have the freedom of wearing whatever they please, but again this has to be a biased social experiment that angers me. First of all, let me emphasis that women are entitled to wear what they want but the volunteer must realise that she would get these comments from guys as she is wearing skin tight clothes that accentuate her curvy figure that attracts men. Most men have been focusing on her body rather than her face, however a bunch of people have also been focusing on her face and received compliments such as beautiful. Moving onto the camera shots and angles, it seems to me that there is a person walking in front of her, heading the same direction while holding a camera (which seems to me) in a handbag. I will experiment with the camera in a bag, and see if it can capture the image, if it shakes a lot or not and present it to some of my class mates to comment whether it is viewable or not.     

     

Proposal

Media Research Project:Proposal

1. What is your topic and/or area of production?
2. What problem / issue are you addressing /tackling?
3. What questions are you trying to answer?
4. Why is this topic significant and worthy of study?
5. Who else has studied it? What similar work has been done?
6. How will you go about researching it?

The final major project that has been chosen for this module is a documentary about Islam in general. I have been interested in directing and presenting a YouTube series with information, public opinions and filming the public’s reactions. Many YouTube stars have inspired me to produce pieces that can help the community understand more about Islam (especially women in Islam).

At the moment, I am still trying to figure out what my YouTube documentary/social experiments will be called. The first episode of this documentary will be based on Muslim girls. The first scene will be based in the studio and a series of different Muslim girls talking about their religion, mostly aimed about women in Islam and how they should be perceived. The next scenes will be out in public, hopefully stopping people that are not familiar with the religion Islam. Ask them questions what they think Islam is and to figure out if people think of Muslims in a stereotypical way. I will give them the opportunity to ask one of the Muslim girls that will be volunteering to shed some light about women in Islam or just the religion in general. The third scene will consist of different social experiments of a Muslim girl wearing the full Hijab in a town that lacks diversity to experience what other people think of the Islamic traditional dress code. Finally, the last scene will be of the girls back in the studio reacting to the public’s reactions on Muslim girls.

Overall, I do not want to produce something serious however I want to produce something that is entertaining and at the same time educating the public. This will be aimed for 13 years to 25 years as most of these viral social experiments are mostly viewed by this group of ages. The different multi-media applications that will be used to distribute my final product will be on YouTube and shared through Facebook, Insta gram and Twitter. Facebook will be used to share the final project by clicking on the ‘share’ button for all friends to see and helping to re-share the product. Instagram will be used to give a little taste of what will happen in the documentary and will provide the link to the full video. Finally, Twitter is going to be used to start a hash tag trend to attract users and the audience. The reason for that is to reach as many audiences as possible to view the product and try and get it viral. In the future, this can evolve into a YouTube series about Islam.

I am tackling the stereotype thoughts of Islam and fighting the unnecessary moral panic and hate towards Muslim citizens after terrorist attacks that have happened over the years. Most of all, I will be tackling the News as they portray Islam in a negative light. My research will consist of other YouTube videos and how they are styled (if it is quirky, serious, effects being used) and research over the Internet by analysing some users’ comments towards Muslims. Today, most people from London have accepted Islamic beliefs and ignore negativity towards Muslims. I want to reach out to other people around the world who are not familiar with different cultures. Once the produced piece is distributed and given time to gain followers and viewers, some of my friends are very interested taking part in future documentaries and social experiments. This could be the start of directing pieces like this and sharing it around the world.