Empathetic and affective circuits in marcela zamora chamorro’s maría en tierra de nadie and tin dirdamal’s de nadie

Abstract

Using Roger Rouse’s (2002) theoretical conceptualization of migration as circuits and border, this essay analyzes two documentary Central American-Mexican films on migration, Tin Dirdamal’s De nadie (2005) and Marcela Zamora Chamorro’s María en tierra de nadie (2011). The films represent and engender circuits rooted in basic humanity and seek to recuperate a humanitarian model that establishes an ethics of relationality grounded in human rights as opposed to a necropolitical one derived from violence and consumption. Both documentaries become a form of resistance against a necropolitical system that consumes and destroys human life, through their ability to prompt viewers to recognize and apprehend the migrants’ situations. By employing testimonial and affective strategies, the films attempt emotional identification and affective transmission between the viewer and the films’ subjects, at the risk of replicating the very notion they are fighting. The films challenge viewers to comprehend the humanity shared by self and Other. Such a demand threatens the gore capitalist model of power that enables the violence, precarity, and vulnerability that migrants face during their journey.