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Paper short abstract:

Through the presentation of the elaboration process of my films "Two Brothers" (2021) and "I Make My Own Time" (in progress), I intend to discuss the possibility of approaching the speculative practice of the Brazilian cook and composer Julio Valverde through both ethnobiography and filmmaking.

Paper long abstract:

When using the biographical approach in fieldwork, it is common to consider the biographied individual as someone who remembers (or recreates) his/her past experiences and externalises them through a narrative capable of making him/her construct a "self" (Gonçalves 2012). However, the ethnographer who engages in a long-term ethnobiographical work soon realises that his/her interlocutor not only focuses on what has been lived, but also speculates about what could have been done differently in his/her life or what the future will be like. In the case of the Brazilian cook and composer Julio Valverde, whose life story and music making are subjects of my postdoctoral research, his speculative practice became especially intense during the lockdown caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, a period in which he was unable to "make his own time". Through the presentation of the elaboration process of my films "Two Brothers" (2021) and "I Make My Own Time" (in progress), I intend to discuss the possibility of approaching Julio Valverde's speculative practice through both ethnobiography and filmmaking.