Terra Femme

“What does the narrative of exploration offer women?” This question frames Courtney Stephens’s study of women’s amateur travelogues, which comes to fruition, following live lecture-performances. Composed entirely of archival material and home movies from the 1920s to the 1940s, Terra Femme explores the emancipatory power women found in newly available personal cameras, and the association this self-expression had with gender roles, the rise of a leisured, white middle class, and imperialism.