RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
A1 Harvey, Maxime
T1 Language Matters in the Geography of AI: French-Language Uses of Generative Artificial Intelligence in Filmmaking
JF Iluminace
YR 2026
VO 37
IS 3
SP 57
OP 76
DO 10.58193/ilu.1822
UL https://iluminace.cz/artkey/ilu-202503-0005.php
AB This paper examines how generative artificial intelligence (AI) reconfigures linguistic practices and labour in contemporary filmmaking. Building on relational-materialist approaches, it argues that recent controversies and transformations in the film industry, such as synthetic voice generation, AI-assisted dubbing, and prompt-based creative tools, are deeply entwined with issues of language. The case of French-language filmmaking serves to foreground the geopolitical and sociolinguistic specificities that are often flattened in global AI deployments. Through a critical analysis of discourse around AI voice technologies and ethnographic observations of Québecois filmmakers, the study explores how AI's integration into creative workflows reshapes voice, identity, and authorship in localized yet globally interconnected film cultures. The paper revisits foundational film theories on voice and language, connecting them to contemporary concerns over automation, labour precarity, and the platformization of cultural production. It highlights how dubbing practices, once tools of cultural domestication and resistance, are now battlegrounds for labour rights and identity politics in the age of AI. Moreover, the research situates prompt engineering as a sociocultural practice that redistributes agency between humans and machines, challenging deterministic narratives of AI innovation. By foregrounding language not merely as a medium but as a material condition of creation, this study calls for a situated, critical understanding of AI's role in media industries. It contributes to ongoing debates in film and media studies and critical AI studies by insisting on the importance of geography and language in shaping both the possibilities and perils of AI in filmmaking.