Film & Talk for World Suicide Prevention Day: Her Name Was Sita

Content Warning (16+)*.

A screening on World Suicide Prevention Day of ‘Her Name Was Sita’, a short documentary film exploring the concept of a virtuous woman and how shame and honour can lead to self-harm and suicide in Nepal. Followed by a discussion with the filmmaker, Heshani Sothiraj Eddleston. Tickets include refreshments.

*Content Warning: Not suitable for under-16s. This event will discuss suicide and self-harm that some people may find upsetting. If you have questions on self-harm or feel suicidal, find an international helpline here: www.findahelpline.com. Anyone, no matter your faith or background, is also welcome to speak confidentially to any of the cathedral’s priests; contact details are here.

About the film

Watch the trailer here. Who is a good woman? A young Nepali woman asks this question to herself, school children, university students, sociologists, anthropologists and medical doctors. Her exploration leads her to understand that in some situations, female suicide is believed to be a response to socially accepted oppression and abuse, which women are subjected to in their families and communities. She discovers that, in low and middle-income countries particularly, suicide is not always a mental health problem. It is a layered issue that can overlap between mental distress caused by stressful situations, conflict, grief, and mental health problems. In Nepal, suicide is the single leading cause of death among women of reproductive age. It is a serious but neglected public health problem. Research shows that adolescents, youths, and females are the most vulnerable population to die by suicide. Her Name Was Sita is dedicated to a 16-year-old girl who died trying to prove she was worthy of love.

About the filmmaker

Heshani Sothiraj Eddleston is an Edinburgh-based, Sri Lankan-born, visual storyteller. Grounded in her own experience of enforced migration to India after the 1983 Sri Lankan riots, she uses photography and filmmaking to tell stories about our shared humanity with migrants and ‘others’. Her work in South Asia has focused on refugees, militant groups, and women who have experienced self-harm and abuse. She currently works with the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Pesticide Suicide Prevention to translate academic work on South Asian self-harm to broader audiences. In Scotland, she has worked with migrant women groups, women coming to terms with cancer and their loss of identity, and institutions such as the Scottish Prison Service, Glasgow Modern Art Gallery, and Historic Scotland. She creates collaborative art through exhibitions and workshops that question anger, shame, and identity, drawing out hidden and visible scars. Find out more about her work here and here.