Document details

Save Us from Saviours: Disrupting Development Narratives of the Rescue and Uplift of the ‘Third World Woman’

In: Voice & Matter: Communication, Development and the Cultural Return
Oscar Hemer; Thomas Tufte (eds.)
Göteborg: Nordicom (2016), pp. 139-154

ISBN 978-91-87957-31-4 (print); 978-91-87957-32-1 (pdf)

"The images used to market development often feature women, as victims of terrible traditions and disempowering situations, or – more commonly these days – as enterprising agents of change, poised to ‘lift’ economies and their families and communities. These images tell a story of victims and heroines, representing development as a project of uplift and rescue. This chapter explores the politics of these representations. It takes as its point of entry a film project that sought to disrupt these narratives, producing a short film called Save us from Saviours. Engaging with those often represented as tragic victims and left out of the story of enterprising entrepreneurs to tell a story about sex work, collective action and social change, the film speaks to a set of larger questions about development intervention. Juxtaposing Save us from Saviours with another film, made at the same time about some of the same people, which gave rise to a third film, made by the sex workers in response, the chapter reflects on the complexities of development communications in an age of global connectivity." (Abstract)