Observational cinema ; anthropology, film, and the exploration of social life
By: Anna Grimshaw and Amanda Ravetz.
Contributors: Ravetz, Amanda.
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Published: 2009
Place of publication: Bloomington, Ind
Language: eng
Number of pages: 198
ISBN-13: 9780253354242; 9780253221582
Subjects: Motion pictures in ethnology; Visual anthropology; Art and anthropology
Description: Once hailed as a radical breakthrough in documentary and ethnographic filmmaking, observational cinema has been criticized for a supposedly detached camera that objectifies and dehumanizes the subjects of its gaze. Anna Grimshaw and Amanda Ravetz provide the first critical history and in-depth appraisal of this movement, examining key works, filmmakers, and theorists, from André Bazin and the Italian neorealists, to American documentary films of the 1960s, to extended discussions of the ethnographic films of Herb Di Gioia, David Hancock, and David MacDougall. The authors make a new case for the importance of observational work in an emerging experimental anthropology, arguing that this medium exemplifies a nontextual anthropology that is both analytically rigorous and epistemologically challenging.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.