Contemporary ‘Peripheral’ Spaces of the Moving Image (deadline: 15 June 2025)
In conceptual terms, the periphery refers to the space at the margins of a center, an area that exists on the fringes of focus and importance. In other words, it constitutes a secondary zone within a specific structure, defined by its separation from the center through a symbolic or physical boundary. As such, the periphery is inherently a relational concept, one that invites critical reflection on the dynamics of hegemonic power that shape and sustain the center configuration.
In cinema and television, the tension and polarity between the periphery and the center can be understood through the various stages of a work:
- The dimension related to production includes creative industries operating outside the dominant central axes (structures outside mainstream Hollywood cinema, for example, such as national filmographies belonging to the Global South). It also includes those who occupy secondary positions in those large structures, such as precarious workers or volunteers.
- Narrative and thematic dimensions, focus on characters, spaces, or themes operating on the margins of society. Here, the periphery manifests itself in film or television, invoking geography or topography (physical borders, deserts, and rural areas) or addressing metaphorical borders (marginalized identities dealing with systems of power);
- Stylistic and aesthetic dimensions that consider less commercial or conventional styles and genres. The periphery in this context may be expressed through experimental aesthetics and formal innovations in film and television that are often more culturally specific to the contexts in which the works are produced;
- A dimension associated with the reception of films and television series, including alternative distribution and exhibition circuits, as well as the reception by audiences and critics. It includes considerations of the cinema under current conditions of mass streaming distribution, as well as the limited presence of women, racialized individuals, and LGBTQIA+ voices in specialized criticism in Portugal and Latin American countries.
This special section aims to examine Contemporary ‘Peripheral’ Spaces and to map the various conceptualizations of the periphery materialized in 21st-century cinema and television. The focus is on dimensions most closely aligned with textual analysis: narrative and thematic, as well as stylistic and aesthetic. More specifically, it aims to analyze transnational audiovisual practices, cultural discourses, and ideological and artistic references that invoke or represent the margins.
From this perspective, this special section sets out to look at the geography of the margins, encompassing ‘peripheral’ identities, (new) methods of production and distribution, aesthetic concerns, and experimental visions. It seeks, above all, to shed light on what exists beyond the boundaries of convention and conceptual limitation.
Furthermore, based on the concept of landscape—its dialogical nature and its capacity to evoke borders, whether physical, psychological, or abstract—we are interested in exploring the tensions between center and periphery. In particular, the territorial borders between different countries, primarily within Europe and the Americas, though not exclusively. We aim to examine how cinema and television images activate these spaces—their landscapes, mobilities, and points of permanence—and, in doing so, shape diverse aesthetic and gender perspectives within their discourse.
In short, this special section intends to critically question the concepts of margin and periphery. It represents a political gesture to shift the focus away from what traditionally occupies the center, thereby exposing disparities and tensions while amplifying the voices, aesthetics, and spaces emerging within the context of 21st-century audiovisual media. Grounded in film and television studies, the special section invites comparative approaches to understanding the periphery as both a relational and structural category within audiovisual works produced in the 21st century.
The articles may focus, although not exclusively, on the following lines of research:
- The aesthetics of the border: cinematographic representations of the geopolitical margins;
- The desert and the countryside as allegorical landscapes of experiences of transition, exile, or the threshold;
- ‘Peripheral’ crimes: the dark side of rural crime in television and cinema;
- Urban peripheries and dystopia: from the suburbs to the slums;
- Peripheral spaces and the climate crisis: landscapes in decline;
- Effects of globalization on ‘peripheral’ regions/countries: the landscape as a place of resistance or criticism;
- Landscapes of post-industrial ruins;
- Landscapes of transition or exclusion: experiences of migration and mobility;
- Narratives of the Global South;
- Metaphorical borders: marginalized communities on screen: narratives of resistance in contemporary television and cinema;
- Dreamlike, magical, and marvelous landscapes;
- Peripheral aesthetics and productions: experimental cinema, sound in the evocation of the periphery, marginal means of production and distribution.
- Marginal voices: women, racialized and LGBTQIA+ people, people with disabilities, among others in specialized criticism and the creative industry.
This special section is guest-edited by Filipa Rosário (CEComp / Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the University of Lisbon), André Francisco (ULICES / Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the University of Lisbon), and Fran Rebelatto (Federal University of Latin American Integration, Foz do Iguaçu).
Filipa Rosário is an Assistant Researcher at the Centre for Comparative Studies at the University of Lisbon, where she teaches Portuguese Cinema and develops the project “The Times of Landscape in Portuguese Cinema (1960-Present)”. She coordinates the Landscape and Cinema Work Group of AIM - Association of Moving Image Researchers. She co-edited Um Olhar Português: Cinema e Natureza no Século XXI (Sistema Solar, 2024), Archives In 'Lusophone' Film (Húmus, 2023), O Quarto Perdido do MoteLX: Os Filmes do Terror Português (1911-2006) (CTLX, 2022), REFOCUS: The Films of João Pedro Rodrigues and João Rui Guerra da Mata (Edinburgh University Press, 2022) and New Approaches to Cinematic Spaces (Routledge, 2019). she is also the author of The Work of the Actor in the Cinema of John Cassavetes (Sistema Solar, 2017).
André Francisco is a researcher at ULICES (University of Lisbon Centre for English Studies); he has a master’s degree in Comparative Studies, and he is a PhD student in Modern Literatures, Arts and Cultures at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the University of Lisbon. He coordinates the Landscape and Cinema WG of AIM - Association of Moving Image Researchers. He is currently developing an FCT-funded project on film noir and landscape in contemporary television series. His main areas of research are film noir, landscape and audiovisual narratives, particularly North American cinema and television series.
Fran Rebelatto is a lecturer and researcher in Cinema and Audiovisuals at the Federal University of Latin American Integration (UNILA) in Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil. She has a PhD in Cinema and Audiovisuals from the Fluminense Federal University (UFF), where she developed her thesis on contemporary Latin American cinema and its relationship with border territories, their landscapes, and female characters in the cinematographic frame. She is a researcher in the Cinematography, Expression and Thought research group, dedicated to studies in cinematography, and in the Southern Architecture and Urbanism Research Group (Maloca). She contributes to the coordination of the Landscape and Cinema WG of AIM - Association of Moving Image Researchers. At UNILA, she coordinates the research project The Work of/in Images based on the analysis of films made in the border regions of the South of the Latin American continent.
The deadline for submitting full and original articles is 15 June 2025.
All submissions received within the deadline will undergo a selection process (by the editors), followed by blind peer review (by external reviewers). The texts should not be longer than 8 000 words, and must include, in English and Portuguese (and also Spanish, if that is the language used): a title, an abstract of up to 300 words and a maximum of 6 keywords.
Before submitting your complete article, please read the full instructions here: https://aim.org.pt/ojs/index.php/revista/submit-paper
If you have any questions, please contact: aniki@aim.org.pt