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Visual Anthropology





HISTORY

Even before the emergence of anthropology as an academic discipline in the ) Harald E.L. Prins, "Visual Anthropology." Pp.506-525, In T.Biolsi. ed. ''A Companion to the Anthropology of American Indians.'' Oxford: Blackwell Publishing].

The history of anthropological filmmaking is intertwined with that of non-fiction and documentary filmmaking. Some of the first motion pictures of the ethnographic other were made with , probably best known for his films chronicling the lives of Arctic peoples ('' Nanook Of The North '', 1922), became a filmmaker in 1913 when his supervisor suggested that he take a camera and equipment with him on an expedition north. Flaherty focused on “traditional” Eskimo ways of life, omitting to that end any signs of modernity among his film subjects (even to the point of refusing to use a rifle to help kill a walrus his informants had harpooned as he filmed them, according to Barnouw; this scene made it into ''Nanook'' where it served as evidence of their "pristine" culture). This pattern would persist in many ethnographic films to follow (see as an example Robert Gardner's '' Dead Birds '').

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By the 1940s, anthropologists such as , John Marshall , Robert Gardner , and Tim Asch . By focusing on these four, we can see the shape of ethnographic film" (15).

Visual anthropology first found purchase in an academic setting in 1958 with the creation of the Film Study Center at Harvard 's Peabody Museum Of Archaeology And Ethnology .Jay Ruby. " The Professionalization of Visual Anthropology in the United States - The 1960s and 1970s ." To be published in the selected proceedings of ''Origins of Visual Anthropology: Putting the Past Together Conference'', June, 20 - 25 in Göttingen, Germany, 2001.

At present, the Society for Visual Anthropology (SVA) represents the subfield in the United States as a section of the American Anthropological Association .

Ethnographic films are shown each year at the Margaret Mead Film Festival .


ETHNOGRAPHIC AND ANTHROPOLOGICAL FILMS

A few well known anthropologically-minded films and filmmakers include:



  • Jean Rouch

  • ---''Jaguar'', 1954-1967

  • ---''Les maîtres fous'' (''The Mad Masters''), 1954

  • ---''Chronique d'un été'' (''Chronicle of a Summer''), 1961


  • John Marshall

  • ---''A Kalahari Family'', 1951-2000

  • ---''The Hunters'', 1958




  • Bob Connolly and Robin Anderson

  • ---''First Contact'', 1983

  • ---''Joe Leahy's Neighbors'', 1988

  • ---''Black Harvest'', 1991


  • Dennis O'Rourke

  • ---'' Cannibal Tours '', 1988

  • ---''The Good Woman of Bangkok'', 1991

  • ---''Cunnamulla'', 2000

  • ---''Landmines—A Love Story'', 2004


  • Anne Zeller

  • ---''Five Species'' (1997)

  • ---''Images From the Field: Baboons'' (1997)

  • ---''Lemurs of Madagascar'' (1997)

  • ---''Primate-Human Interaction'' (1997)

  • ---''Primate Patterns II'' (1997)

  • ---''Sifakas of Madagascar'' (1997)

  • ---''What Do Primatologists Do?'' (1997)

  • ---''Chimpanzees Today'' (2001)

  • ---'' Hominid Evolution 1 : The Early Stages'' (2001)

  • ---'' Hominid Evolution 2 : The Genus Homo'' (2001)

  • ---''New World Monkeys'' (2003)


  • John Bishop

  • ---''YoYo Man'' (1978)

  • ---''New England Fiddles'' (1983)

  • ---''Last Window'' (1987)

  • ---''Himalayan Herders'' (1997)

  • ---''Hosay Trinidad'' (1999)

  • ---''Oh What A Blow That Phantom Gave Me'' (2003, with Harald E.L. Prins)


  • Sarah Elder (films co-directed by Leonard Kamerling)

  • ---''Tununeremiut'' (1972)

  • ---''At the Time of Whaling'' (1974)

  • ---''On the Spring Ice'' (1975)

  • ---''From the First People'' (1977)

  • ---''The Drums of Winter'' (1988)

  • ---''In Iirgus Time'' (1988)

  • ---''Joe Sun'' (1988)

  • ---''Reindeer Thief'' (1988)


  • Jayasinhji Jahla

  • ---''Forgotten Headhunters and Apatani Sacrifice'' (1978)

  • ---''Tragada Bhavai: A Rural Theater Troupe of Gujarat'' (1981)

  • ---''Journey with Ganapati'' (1982)

  • ---''Bharvad Predicament'' (1987)

  • ---''Morning With Asch'' (1995)

  • ---''Whose Paintings?'' (1995)

  • ---''Conversation with a Collector: Dialogue with a Docent'' (1997)

  • ---''Letter to My Nieces'' (2000)

  • ---''Close Encounters of No Kind'' (2002)

  • ---''A Zenana: Scenes and Recollections'' (2005)

  • ---''ShaktiMa no Veh'' (2006)




  • Harald E.L. Prins

  • ---''Our Lives in Our Hands'' (1985)

  • ---''Oh, What a Blow that Phantom Gave Me!'' (2003, with John Bishop)




POPULAR CULTURE

Visual anthropology (and ethnographic films made by anthropologists) have also influenced films in popular culture such as:



VISUAL ANTHROPOLOGY PROGRAMS



SEE ALSO



REFERENCES






FURTHER READING

  • Barbash, Ilisa and Lucien Taylor. ''Cross-cultural Filmmaking: A Handbook for Making Documentary and Ethnographic Films and Videos.'' Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997.

  • Engelbrecht, Beate (ed.). ''Memories of the Origins of Ethnographic Film.'' Frankfurt am Main et al.: Peter Lang Verlag, 2007.

  • Grimshaw, Anna. ''The Ethnographer's Eye: Ways of Seeing in Modern Anthropology.'' Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.

  • Heider, Karl G. ''Ethnographic Film (Revised Edition).'' Austin: University of Texas Press, 2006.

  • Ruby, Jay . ''Picturing Culture: Essays on Film and Anthropology.'' Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000.

  • MacDougall, David. ''Transcultural Cinema.'' Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998.

  • Prins, Harald E.L. . "Visual Anthropology." Pp.506-525. In ''A Companion to the Anthropology of American Indians.'' Ed. T. Biolsi. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2004.

  • Prins, Harald E.L. , and Ruby, Jay eds. "The Origins of Visual Anthropology." ''Visual Anthropology Review''. Vol. 17 (2), 2001-2002.



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