When a filmmaker makes a film with herself as a subject, she is already divided as both the subject matter of the film and the subject making the film. The two senses of the word are immediately in play - the matter and the maker--thus the two ways of being subjectified as both subject and object. Subjectivity finds its filmic expression, not surprisingly, in very personal ways, yet it is nonetheless shaped by and in relation to collective expressions of identity that can transform the cinema of 'me' into the cinema of 'we'. Leading scholars and practitioners of first-person film are brought together in this groundbreaking collection to consider the theoretical, ideological, and aesthetic challenges wrought by this form of filmmaking in its diverse cultural, geographical, and political contexts.

Una antigua leyenda cuenta la historia de un lugar llamado Cámara Averna, situada en las entrañas de la tierra, cientos de metros por debajo de una iglesia. La leyenda cuenta que dicha cámara está llena de tesoros, uno de los cuales, la Llave del Averno, sirve para abrir una de las puertas del infierno hacia la tierra. La mayoría de quienes conocían la historia creían que se trataba sólo de un mito, hasta que una serie de extraños decesos empieza a llamar la atención de la Policía de Investigaciones y de miembros del arzobispado de Santiago. "Cámara Averna" es una nivola (novela breve) en que los protagonistas luchan desde sus trincheras para acabar con un enemigo que en un principio parecía estar radicado en una comunidad ecológica que ocultaba en sus filas a un grupo de seguidores del demonio, pero que luego revela su verdadero trasfondo.

A pioneering examination of the impact of new communications technologies and media practices on the religious life of American Jewry Engaging media has been an ongoing issue for American Jews, as it has been for other religious communities in the United States, for several generations. Shandler’s examples range from early recordings of cantorial music to Hasidic outreach on the Internet. In between he explores mid-twentieth-century ecumenical radio and television broadcasting, video documentation of life cycle rituals, museum displays and tourist practices as means for engaging the Holocaust as a moral touchstone, and the role of mass-produced material culture in Jews’ responses to the American celebration of Christmas. Shandler argues that the impact of these and other media on American Judaism is varied and extensive: they have challenged the role of clergy and transformed the nature of ritual; facilitated innovations in religious practice and scholarship, as well as efforts to maintain traditional observance and teachings; created venues for outreach, both to enhance relationships with non-Jewish neighbors and to promote greater religiosity among Jews; even redefined the notion of what might constitute a Jewish religious community or spiritual experience. As Jews, God, and Videotape demonstrates, American Jews’ experiences are emblematic of how religious communities’ engagements with new media have become central to defining religiosity in the modern age.