Plato uses a cave as an allegory in his eminent work The Republic (360 B.C.E.). In the piece, he illustrates a dark cave where prisoners are chained to a wall unable to turn their heads; all they can see is the wall of the cave directly before them.

Behind them burns a fire and between the fire and the prisoners there is a parapet, which puppeteers walk. The puppeteers hold up puppets that cast shadows on the wall in front of the prisoners. Because they are unable to see these puppets, the prisoners mistake appearance (the shadows on the wall) for reality.

But when they are released, they can turn their heads, leave the cave and see the real objects; they realize that the shadows were merely an illusion.

I considered this parable while watching films for a class I will be co-teaching in the fall with English Chair Dr. Adrienne McCormick titled Women and Visual Culture. Spending a recent day off from work watching several films that deal with women and their image/role in the music industry, art world and the media – in society – I realized that the ideal figure of women in society holds many similarities to Plato’s piece: she is an illusion.

I began to think about a woman filmmaker who has been working to illuminate that illusion in her own society: the female Palestinian filmmaker Buthina Canaan Khoury.

Buthina worked as the first Palestinian camerawoman, producer and coordinator covering special events in the Middle East for the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). She is an independent filmmaker and established the Majd Production Company in Palestine in 2000, which produces documentaries about Palestinian issues.

Traveling to the Fredonia State University last fall to show her new film “Maria’s Grotto” as part of the women’s studies 2007 Women Take Aim Film Series, she discussed the historical background of the film’s content: honor killings.

The film explains that an honor killing is when a Muslim male family member, typically a father or brother, murders his daughter/sister in order to defend the family’s honor. Acts that lead to these killings include: if the female does not wear a hijab (headscarf), has non-Muslim boyfriends and male friends, is sexually active, rejects (an) arranged marriage(s), aggressively seeks employment/education or any other act that will assimilate them into a different culture.

I received the privilege of driving Buthina back to the airport the next morning and took the opportunity to ask her about her inspiration for “Maria’s Grotto” (“grotto” being another name for a cave). Her dark eyes were filled with emotions that I will never forget: great sorrow, passion and determination.

She explained that Maria was a woman who was wrongly accused of having premarital relations with a man. This rumor dishonored her family and she was forced by her brothers to drink poison. After, her body was buried in the cave.

This story had been discussed in the documentary, but after hearing the story from the lips of one who witnessed the event, I was speechless. I thought of the closing clip in the documentary when Buthina stepped into the Maria’s grotto and focused the camera on the lid of her caved coffin. The lid shut and the screen went dark.

Processing this chilling imagery, she explained that women’s lives in Palestine are dictated by a moral code and defined as honorable or dishonorable, as culture dictates her by what she is allowed and not allowed to do. This is defined by manliness of men and sexual purity of women.

As Maria’s story proves, even if a woman is incorrectly charged with dishonoring her family, she can still be punished by death.

“Now that you’ve become admired on an international level, why don’t you leave Palestine so that you will be safe?” I timidly asked, hoping not to offend her with my ignorance.

“How can I make a change if I leave?” she asked. “To modify a wrongful cultural act, one must be in that culture to understand the victims she is trying to help. She must be able to look around and see the cultural wrong.”

Driving back to Fredonia that day, I thought about my own life: from the way I dress to the words I unconsciously speak and the roads I drive on to the distance I am allowed to go; I remember thinking that these are freedoms that I rarely reflect on.

However, after watching several movies by American filmmakers, I considered that women in America are also faced with a metaphorical or societal death if they do not live up to cultural standards of “womanly behavior.” I thought: do I really have these freedoms?

I turned off my television early the next morning and sat in my living room considering all that I had watched. I could not help but feel that I had been sitting in my own grotto watching shadows on the wall and I had finally turned my head.

Originally Published Sunday, Oct. 7, 2008