Is an Ethnographic Film a Filmic Ethnography?

Abstract

Original pagination has been kept so for citation purposes. The article may be downloaded and used for scholarly purposes by anyone interested.

8. Margaret Mead and the Shift from “Visual Anthropology” to the “Anthropology of Visual Communication”

“…On one level the photo is an aide-memoire to the scientist, equ~l to his pencil, notebook, or typewriter. It is not-as we now know, from recent work by Chalfen (1975), Ruby (1975), and others-merely a bunch of 17 snapshots or home movies made by an anthropologist. In the hands of well-trained observers it has become a tool for recording, not the truth of what is out there but the truth of what is in there, in the anthropologist's mind as a trained observer puts observations of "out there" on record.…”

“…Those of us who are involved in using photos and films as new technologies through which we can record cultural artifacts and events, and those of us who are involved in studying how pictures are put together to make statements about this world, are equally concerned with how this particular symbol form-the picture-can be of use in the study of culture. We include scholars such as Richard Sorenson (1976) and Jay Ruby (1975Ruby ( , 1976, who are struggling to delineate theories of the photograph as evidence, as well as those who are following up on the work that John Adair and I (Worth and Adair 1972) did when we gave movie cameras to Navajo Indians to see how their patterns of structuring differed from or resembled ours. Most recently, Studies in the Anthropology of Visual Communication devoted a complete issue to a study by Erving Gottman of values and social attitudes about gender that can be derived from an analysis of some 500 advertising photographs (Gottman 1976).…”

Orientalism in the Documentary Representation of Culture

“…To borrow the words of Merleau-Ponty [1964], the process of filmmaking reveals the rich phenomenology of the ''flesh of the world'' through a complex and performative event. This is perhaps one of the reasons why MacDougall rejects the adjustment of ethnographic film to a codified filmic lexicon corresponding to the epistemological standards of anthropology proposed by Ruby [1975]. 9 An emplaced ethnography uses visual media to research the materiality of cultural environments, and to evoke the sensory perceptions of experiencing bodies.…”

Anthropologists Working “at Home”: On the Range of Subjects and Forms of Representation in Film, and What Makes These Ethnographic

“…Perhaps the simplest definition of ethnographicness in film is the participation of a trained anthropologist as the director or as consultant in realizing the project [Ruby 1975]. Banks [1992: 117] considers there to be three factors to consider in defining which films are ethnographic.…”

“…In terms of reaction, such as reviews, film festivals and so on, it is problematic to use this as a factor in defining ethnographic film because of subjectivity and potential bias. Other theorists are more clear-cut in defining which films are ethnographic, as is illustrated by Ruby [1975], who emphasizes holism or at least exploration of definable aspects of cultures, in keeping with the anthropological perspective more generally. Purists such as Fuchs [1988] are more scientific, highlighting the need for unity of place, time, group and action, with no artificial manipulation or staged scenes.…”