ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the representation in films of issues of race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, and class, alongside concepts of national, regional, cultural, and religious identity. It explains the term, ideology, and considers the extent to which any film might need to be considered as in some way political. The concept of race is a means of categorising people according to supposed biological characteristics such as skin colour or hair texture. Race is generally associated biology and ethnicity with culture. Certainly, race is to do with physical appearance. It is essentially about how film studies students are perceived by others, and is often related to skin colour. Ideology is strongly associated with Marxism which considers one particular way of seeing the world, that of capitalism, as having been imposed on members of society. The literary theorist, Terry Eagleton, has defined ideology as those systems of representation which shape the individual’s mental picture of lived experience.
