- Convenors:
-
Mike Poltorak
(University of Kent)
Eda Elif Tibet (University of Bern)
Send message to Convenors
- Format:
- Panel
- Sessions:
- Wednesday 8 March, -
Time zone: Europe/London
Short Abstract
It is clear that to address climate change we need to live differently. This panel explores the distinctiveness of a/v productions with a prime commitment to and responsibility to communities and community concerns.
Long Abstract
It is clear that to address climate change we need to live differently, in ways that reverse the results of consumptive capitalism. Living more community based lives, sharing resources and benefitting from increased social care and interactivity are in tune with arguments presenting Degrowth as a key strategy to imagine a better future. How then can we as filmmakers and multi-modal anthropologists actively contribute to more responsible futures? This panel explores the distinctiveness of a/v productions with a prime commitment to, and responsibility to communities, and community concerns and secondarily as a contribution to visual or multi-modal anthropology. We ask where does responsibility lie and how can it be shared or divided to mobilise our use of media for most benefit and impact.
Accepted papers
Session 1 Wednesday 8 March, 2023, -Paper short abstract
Through a discussion of the striking images in Japanese director Akira Kurosawa’s Dreams’ stories, in this presentation I reflect on how artistic engagements can allow us to craft collaboratively sustainable futures.
Paper long abstract
Post-apocalyptic scenarios, radioactive flowers and deformed bodies, orange powders coming out of nuclear stations, post-war scenes of destruction and madness, disappearing cherry blossoms, a village that has found the perfect synergy between culture and nature. These are only some of the striking images in Japanese director Akira Kurosawa’s Dreams’ stories. While these are presented to the viewer as dreams, they are clear reflections on the future, with recurrent references to historical events, such as Japan’s involvement in the Second World War and the chemical war against Vietnam. In one of the dreams, the director meets Van Gogh and walks with him within one of his painting, ticking the eye to the viewer and bringing them to reflect on the role of artists in ‘creating’ the world. Starting from a discussion of Kurosawa’s work, its messages and its resonance, this presentation invites to reflect on the role of artists in shaping local imaginaries and promote sustainability. It will consider collaborative artistic methodologies to express local imagination, the role of the past in articulating ideas of future, and how local media (whether in institutional or alternative forms) shape emic imaginaries. Ultimately, we will reflect on how artistic engagements can allow us to craft collaboratively sustainable futures.
Paper short abstract
The Wanchos are farmers and storytellers. Residing in the most remote corner of India the society is on the cusp of monumental change. In a rapidly transforming environment how do we interpret the stories and reflect on the integrative meanings of moderation and restraint, sharing and resilience?
Paper long abstract
The Wancho people are a community residing at the periphery, where India meets the international border with Myanmar. It is an area that is mostly unknown to the outside world. The oral storytelling traditions are recollected and transmitted by the elder people in the upper Wancho villages: these are myths, folktales and remembered histories that speak of humankind’s relationships to a more-than-human world. The pre-Christian Wancho tradition was the communion in rituals and sacrifice. In this sense, the entire landscape is vital and generative; geographical features are stories, and it was said that the violation of a sacred bamboo grove in Nyinu village would have severe environmental consequences.
The Wancho Story of the Gourd is the narrative that has been chosen to be adapted as a short animated film by a mixed group of students, artists and storytellers in India. The project is the entry for younger people to become interested and take part in the cultural heritage of the Wancho traditions. The story is the imagined space of supernatural origins, that then outlines the history of the Wanchos from livelihoods as hunters and gatherers to agriculturalists, inscribing the political and social order of the Wangham who was the Chief, who it was said had emerged from a gourd in the garden. The stories have kept the community together and safeguarded its wellbeing. The traditional way of life in the Wancho village is at the cusp of monumental change and the younger people are paying attention to new narratives that introduce the ambitions for modern education and employment. In the rapidly transforming environment, how do we read the stories and reflect on the integrative meanings of moderation and restraint, sharing and resilience?
Paper short abstract
An examination of a hill community's response to the influx of climate refugees into their homelands which has been under military control since the 1970s. The paper refers to a PhD thesis on cultural identity and the film "To Be A Marma" which captures perspectives directly from the community.
Paper long abstract
The paper describes the Marma group’s challenges in negotiating their continued existence in a region where landless refugees from the delta regions of Bangladesh move to the higher grounds of the hill tracts. The centre - the nation state - no longer recognizes the ethnic groups in these peripheries as separate ethnic entities, and there is a drive to force cultural assimilation to the majority culture.
The paper draws upon the findings from the author's PhD thesis. This anthropological research project at UCL illuminated the different ways of exploring identity processes for one minority ethnic group in the complex environment of the borderlands. More significantly, the project grapples with a community that has not assimilated with other groups and the nation state, but worked instead to do the exact opposite. Through constant cultural reinvention, the Marma have continued to differentiate and demarcate themselves in the hill tracts, in order to achieve legitimacy and some freedom in an otherwise highly politicized zone.
Whilst making the film, To Be A Marma, both film maker and anthropologist tried to empower the community to express their concerns for their future in the region whilst keeping the respondents safe in a highly watchful militarized zone.
Paper short abstract
This paper will talk about the process and challenges when academics work with non-academic artists, and how we can support collaborative, feminist, green, and ethical filmmaking.
Paper long abstract
sava saheli singh worked with filmmaker Lesley Marshall to produce #tresdancing (https://www.surveillance-studies.ca/projects/screening-surveillance/tresdancing), the fourth short near future fiction film in the Screening Surveillance series (https://www.screeningsurveillance.com/). singh was keen to hire a poc and queer cast and crew, and approached Marshall because of her approach and commitment to diverse, green, and feminist filmmaking. in this presentation, we will discuss how we approached the filmmaking process, how we created a compassionate and supportive film set, how we tried to be as green as possible, and the challenges we faced given institutional limits and expectations, while trying to be fair to cast and crew. We will offer guidance to those in academic institutions on how to ensure fair and safe working conditions for collaborations outside of the academy.