UCLA Center for the Study of Women

In the past decade, a higher percentage of women have worked as editors than as directors, writers, cinematographers, and executive producers,1 yet they are rarely represented in histories by film historians and feminist film scholars. The purpose of this paper is not to reveal the “reality” of female editors, but to understand what challenges arise in constructing them as historical subjects. In what frameworks have female editors been permitted or omitted from historicization? What counts as historical knowledge and evidence? It is important to consider the author, and what impact their politics of location have on the historical knowledge they are presenting. I will also consider what challenges my interviews with female editors have posed in historicizing them from a feminist perspective.