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Paper short abstract:

The former Portuguese colony of Macau observes the 25th anniversary of its Handover to China in 2024. Blending film analysis, postcolonial history, and ethnographic fieldwork spanning a decade, the author introduces methods to decolonize the ethnographic gaze in cinema studies and anthropology.

Paper long abstract:

The fields of cinema studies and anthropology intersect in complex ways. In anthropology, films and videos often double as ethnographic documentation, especially of non-Western societies and communities of color. However, as Rey Chow argues in her classic work _Primitive Passions_, such audiovisual media tends to reinforce the ethnographic gaze in the process. Whereas Chow concludes with the call to reclaim the ethnographic gaze for cinematic self-representation, I proceed differently by analyzing how ethnographic fieldwork can be repurposed as a tool in the study of film and space.

This paper introduces a decolonial approach to ethnographic research, focusing on the former Portuguese colony of Macau as a case study. Observing the 25th anniversary of its Handover to China in 2024, Macau has seen an acceleration in urban and infrastructural development in recent years, from the reclaimed landmass known as the “Cotai Strip” to plans integrating it into an economic zone called the Greater Bay Area (Yue Gang Ao Dawanqu). This drastic transformation of Macau’s social and spatial fabric was reflected in Pang Ho-cheung’s award-winning film _Isabella_, which won a Silver Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival. In the paper, I explain how I blend film interpretation, postcolonial history, and ethnographic fieldwork in Macau spanning over a decade. I will introduce the “ethnographic drift” as a novel method to decolonize the ethnographic gaze in cinema studies and anthropology.