The Fifth Wall

In collaboration with Department of German and Department of Civics and Politics, University of Mumbai 

The Fifth Wall
Navina Sundaram: 
An Outsider’s Inside View or An Insider’s Outside View

“Moving People”: Political Filmmaking on Migration and Discrimination
By Merle Kröger and Rubaica Jaliwala

11:00     Introduction to the digital archive The Fifth Wall by Merle Kröger

11:30    Thematic walk on the axis of Migration and Discrimination by Rubaica Jaliwala

12:45    Q&A   

  

About the project

Tonight, as the two astronauts land on the moon, millions of television viewers will be watching, and actually, it is as far as Vietnam, which is across the room: the fifth wall.’ (Navina Sundaram, letter to her parents, 21.7.1969)

The digital archive The Fifth Wall gathers films, reportages, moderations, texts, letters and photos by the filmmaker and editor Navina Sundaram (1945–2022) from over 40 years of her work in television. Focusing on Sundaram's point of view and concentrating on her reports, contributions and moderations the archive looks at the history of German television from the inside and the outside at the same time. Through her work one discovers Sundaram as an author who takes a journalistic stance: on internationalism and decolonization, the class question, racism, immigration, on Indian and German politics. Extracted from archives of the ARD as well as from Sundaram's private archive, The Fifth Wall is a curated look at German migration and media history. What does it mean to look at this material from today? And what view do they cast back on us?

Sundaram grew up in New Delhi, India before going to Hamburg in 1964 for an internship at Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR). From 1970, she worked as a political editor for the broadcasting company. She has worked as a filmmaker, reporter and presenter for the programmes Weltspiegel, Gesichter Asiens, Panorama and extra drei, among others. From 1992–93, she was ARD correspondent and head of South Asia television in New Delhi. On leaving NDR, Navina Sundaram continued her work as an independent director of documentaries. Her research and reportage on international affairs and political histories reflect her vantage position at the crossroads of critical postcolonial voices emerging from the global South and the post-war reorganization of western Europe, specifically Germany. She has also authored numerous texts and lectures.

As the doors of the public broadcasting services in Germany open to a diverse public, new models of future archival practice have to be devised to make an immense treasure trove of educational and historical content accessible.

The Fifth Wall was conceptualized and developed by Merle Kröger and Mareike Bernien (pong film) in collaboration with Navina Sundaram within the framework of Archive außer sich. Archive außer sich is a project of the Arsenal – Institute for Film and Video Art e.V. in cooperation with the Haus der Kulturen der Welt, funded by the BKM (Federal Agency for Culture and the Media).

The Fifth Wall was funded by Federal Agency for Civic Education (German version), Goethe Institute and the Sher-Gil Sundaram Arts Foundation (English version).

Translation: Rubaica Jaliwala
Subtitling: anticlock films
 

About the Speakers:

Merle Kröger, novelist and film author, lives in Berlin. Together with the filmmaker Philip Scheffner, she has been making feature documentary films since 2007. In her novels, Kröger combines historical research, personal history and political analysis with elements of crime literature. As a curator of the transnational cultural project Import Export: Cultural Transfer between India and Germany, Austria (2005), she began a long-term collaboration with Navina Sundaram.

Rubaica Jaliwala, freelance editor and translator of literary, art and cultural texts and books, lives in Mumbai and Berlin. As trainer and educational advisor, she has led workshops on intercultural learning and diversity, anti-racism and gender on four continents. She has collaborated with pong film since 2005 on the German–English translation of film subtitles, essays, novels and the entirety of The Fifth Wall, including its films, reportages and commentaries. She has also voiced excerpts of Navina Sundaram’s letters for audio recordings.