The screenplay (creative production component) follows Sunny, a young South African Indian woman, who relocates to Cape Town to study fine art. She sets her eyes on a significant award, but makes the critical mistake of falling for her greatest rival. Despite facing crippling cultural expectations and biases, Sunny discovers that being different - and loving who she wants to love - is not a crime, but an imperfect truth. The screenplay explores the protagonist's first year at university, complicated by questions of identity, race, gender, sexuality and their intersection with tradition and culture in contemporary South Africa. Taking the form of a coming-of-age Indie drama (with an artistic twist), the main character embarks on a journey of self-discovery and learning, as she confronts these challenges. The reflective creative explication serves as an accompaniment to the screenplay. It is used to expound upon the creative process of writing the screenplay: highlighting key scenes, beats and decisions whilst interrogating the theoretical frameworks surrounding representations of ‘othered' groups - specifically queer womxn of colour - and their perception in society, aided by the lens of personal lived experience. This is followed by a review of the Indie and coming-of-age genres, in which the screenplay operates. The piece acts as a critical reflection intended to contextualise and justify the creative decisions made in the screenplay, so as to provide a means of accessing the larger themes and concerns at hand.

Representations of the Muslim female are value-laden synonymous with the act of veiling. Veiling has fuelled political, social and academic debates and this study contributes to the ongoing conversation alongside identity formation by examining the image of the Muslim female on-screen with due attention given to animation. The image of the Muslim female is drawn in all manner of directions from that of the belly-dancing beauty to the 'bundle in black', the latter often associated with terrorism, particularly post-9/11 and the consequent 'War on Terror'. There is another direction that proffers an idealised image of the good daughter and dutiful wife against that of the fallen woman. Such constructs I argue tend to rid the Muslim female of her agency. This thesis examines how and why various representations of the Muslim female have emerged and changed, whilst some aspects have remained stagnant over time, thus positioning on-screen representations within their historical context. This project goes beyond traditional academic methods of critical analysis in reading film. The hybridised role of the researcher-animator enables the study to offer a critique from that of the spectator, but with the added vantage point of the practitioner with a set focus on the making of meaning. The interdisciplinary approach incorporates film theory, specifically concerned with representations of race and gender. The work of Muslim women scholar-activists informs and inspires the practice in reclaiming the status of the Muslim woman. Their approach lies within three trajectories being gender-sensitive interpretations of the Qur'an, a recovery of Muslim women's history and a critique on representation. Their approaches fall in line with the aim of this project to reclaim the historical Muslim figure on screen, whereas animation provides an attractive yet versatile mode of production to carry out such a task. Key questions guiding this study are: why are current and existing portrayals of the historical Muslim female problematic? Why do these portrayals need to be addressed? Why does an alternative approach to the portrayal of the historical Muslim female need to be devised and put into practice? Finding the answers to these questions lie in the undertaking of the practice. The practice consists of the first two episodes of a five-part series titled 'Sultan Razia', and as the title suggests the animation is based upon a legendary historical Muslim female figure, who ruled the Sultanate of Delhi between 634-638 Hejira/1236-1240CE. This project is an example of how theory works in practice and vice-versa to determine an audio-visual practice that re-inserts the Muslim female into a history that breaks away from established cliches.