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- Convenors:
-
Lígia Dabul
(Universidade Federal Fluminense)
Angela Torresan (University of Manchester)
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- Location:
- ATB G207
- Start time:
- 11 April, 2013 at
Time zone: Europe/London
- Session slots:
- 2
Short Abstract:
The diversity of experiences evolved from the widespread use of audio-visual resources in social sciences related research in Latin America has motivated people to reflect on the boundaries between artistic practices and scientific discourse, and on the social situations in fieldwork research.
Long Abstract:
The practice of audio-visual based research is expanding greatly in Latin America. An evident sign of such expansion is the growing number of audio-visual based research centres in academic institutions dedicated to the practice, study, reflection, and teaching of audio-visual means of knowledge production. One set of questions that seems to permeate such initiatives is how the process of recording with audio-visual instruments and creating a discursive narrative with sounds and images provokes a "sensorial opening" or an "opening of the senses" both in the various interchanges that happen in the course of research and in the interlocution that audio-video outputs instigate. This panel aims to bring together researchers working on Latin America who have confronted these questions in their specific projects. They will explore how the use of non-textual means have, or not, provoked a different kind of opening to objects and people, a special form of relatedness in the field, and a variety of engagements with different audiences. The panellists will be invited to reflect on whether the use of audio-visual media was especially suitable to their research themes and why. We will welcome papers focused on a wide range of themes and will ask panellists to present a discussion of the implications of the non-textual ethnographic recording in challenging the persistent boundaries between art and science. We hope that one of the outcomes from this panel is to create connections between researchers who share a common interest on the use of audio-visual media in social research.
Accepted papers:
Session 1Paper short abstract:
In this paper I address the issue of depiction and audio-visual descriptions in ethnographic research, asking what work audio-visualizations do.The paper is based on a study that follow ethnographically the processes of tranformation of woolen fibre on the South American Pampas.
Paper long abstract:
In this paper I address the issue of depiction and audio-visual descriptions in ethnographic research, asking what work audio-visualizations do. TThe paper is based on a study where woolen fiber is followed through different sites: for instance in sheep shearing and a spinning facility on the South American Pampas; in a scientific laboratory; and an art collection in Buenos Aires, where it appears as a work of art. By looking ethnographically into processes of transformation of woolen fiber, the paper explores how fiber helps figure and reconfigure modes of doing ethnography. I draw on ANT/STS approaches that hold that descriptions are never mere illustrations (cf. Fyfe and Law 1988) and that ethnographic witnessing, story-telling and visualizations, are never 'innocent mirroring' (Haraway 1994). I suggest that a combining of multiple modes or technologies for doing ethnography - including the textual, the tangible, audio (between noise and silence) and visual (also engaging invisibility) - offers possibilities to cut across ontological realms of subject, object, language and being (Latour) allowing for a 'spilling over' between artistic and scientific practices and discourses. This, in turn, not only has implications for the onto-political value of the knowledge we produce, but also opens up for a discussion about the interference, selection and 'versioning' of the fields we both construct and convey.
References: Fyfe & Law (1988) Picturing Power: Visual depictions and social relations. London and New York: Routledge
Haraway (1994) A game of cat's cradle: science studies, feminist theory, cultural studies. Configurations 2.1 59-71
Paper short abstract:
This paper analyses the making of a film with Bororo people. Taking filmmaking as a distinctive form of insertion in the field, it discusses how the process led Bororo people to inquire about the boundaries between ‘reality’ and ‘fiction’ and the ethical implications of filmmaking in their villages.
Paper long abstract:
During my fieldwork in Bororo villages I noticed the enduring relevance of a classical theme in Bororo ethnography: moiety exogamy. Despite contemporary tolerance to feelings of 'love' as the main motivator to intra-moiety marriage alliances, the classical taboo prohibiting intra-moiety marriage still deeply affects people's lives. This paper analyses my attempt to use filmmaking as a means to explore this issue ethnographically. With this purpose, I invited two young women to travel to another village in search of a potential partner from the 'appropriate' clan and moiety. As the filmmaking process started it was necessary to make it clear that the film was a 'fiction' film (it was important to stress that the girls were not actually chasing a husband to get married). The 'artists' also wanted to warn the whole village that the film was 'fiction': 'just like a soap opera'. Many Bororo people got involved in the film. Placing the film as 'fiction' opened an interesting space for dialogue between participants. It also raised practical problems related to how some of the Bororo wanted to portray marriage. They suggested a film about marriage as 'it was before' to serve as a model for future generations. For the film's sake, however, portraying marriage as 'it was before' was not a good idea (it would need good actors, rehearsals, appropriate artifacts and costumes, etc.). This paper uses the ethnographic dialogue initiated through this filmmaking process to discuss conceptions of 'reality' and 'fiction' in relation to ethical dilemmas in anthropological filmmaking.
Paper short abstract:
My film is a poetic and artistic analysis of a "pace with the size of the world," which is the Sertão in Ceará, Brazil. It captures how this desertified space builds the associability of its people and their relationship with flora and fauna
Paper long abstract:
The film "Where the stones are born" is a narrative that came out of an ethnographic research on survival strategies in areas affected by desertification in Ceará, Brazil. I used several artistic aesthetics, such as photography, cinema and literature in an attempt to explore the subjective experiences of people who live in a semi-arid and desertified area of Brazil. I will focus on the complex process of bringing together a poetic narrative and ethnographic methodologies to create a product that attempts to bridge the boundaries between art and science.
Paper short abstract:
For my research, I have conducted a collaborative filmmaking project with female insurgents in prison. At the threshold between art and science this work has led to debates over its legitimacy for having a “humanizing agenda”. This paper will discuss thoughts on representation, identity and agency.
Paper long abstract:
Since the official end of the internal conflict in the year 2000, Peru has entered a period of transition from conflict to post-conflict. Aftermath narratives dominate the scene of public discourses that engage with different perceptions of the past. However, as one of my informants explained, the struggle for establishing "truths" has not come to an end, but the language has shifted from guns and grenades to words and images. Nonetheless, it is the place given to certain memories and their representations that has nurtured polemic debates over the right to be represented.
For my research, I have conducted a collaborative filmmaking project with women imprisoned for their affiliation with the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary movement. Following their creative engagement in the making of (self) representation, my aim was to understand specific aspects of their lived experiences. At the threshold between art and science its "humanising agenda", as critically referred to, has led to interesting debates over the legitimacy of such work. In addition, the recently discussed "negation" law, which foresees to prohibit any form of public approval, justification and minimisation of crimes committed by insurgents to "avoid the distortion of a historic reality", leaving extensive grounds for (mis)interpretations. This has created concern among artists, filmmakers and academics like myself, who run the risk for being accused to support militant ideologies. Taking these aspects into consideration, I shall discuss how audio-visual representations relate to the creation of truth, identity and agency in the context of Peruvian aftermaths.
Paper short abstract:
What happens if a professional photographer embarks on intense fieldwork, trying to investigate a complex issue of visual representations of Indigenous identities in Colombia? Where is the balance between artistic measures and the scientific research? A new quality emerges, serving both needs
Paper long abstract:
Practical side of the audio-visual academic fieldwork, conducted by a profession photographer/filmmaker, implicates a complex consequences. Direct research experience becomes translated into a medium, which simplifies a complex set of impulses from all the senses (including not only vision and sound, but also sense of touch, smell, taste, and emotions accompanying it), into a two-dimensional representation.
Nevertheless, in some cases, the audio-visual media, proves to be the much more appropriate than the textual one. Like in case of negotiating the visual representation of the identity of selected Indigenous communities in Colombia, which is my research area. Because the research topic is VISUAL representation, it seems much more sensible to give it justice in some form of visual medium. It obviously creates a constant tension between artistic and scientific aspects of the research, especially if the researcher is a professional art photographer at the same time. And the outcome of such work will inevitably be placed on the boundary of the scientific research and artistic production, potentially appealing to two different types of the audiences. It also raises a question about new standards of such research, and possibility of using different art forms in pursue of the research question.
Paper short abstract:
In this paper we wish to reflect upon common ways that Social Science have of conceiving and evaluating research-linked films, especially the ways which consider them as vehicles to present results and/or research data.
Paper long abstract:
Brazil is living an institutionalisation process where audiovisual subjects are becoming an area where Social Science reflects upon and a fertile knowledge production procedure, which contributes to disclose, stimulate and also regulate the audiovisual production related to researches. There are different ways of conceiving and evaluating films that were born as part of researches, and they coexist and act. Based on an experience of an audiovisual production linked to researches about art and social life, we wish to reflect upon some of these ways, such as the one that consider these audiovisual products as scientific communication tools, consequently to be treated and evaluated as vehicles to present results and/or research data. We would like to consider in what degree we can find only a restrict number of people who closely follow what is being researched and propounded concerning the subject about which the images and sounds were created, alongside an expectation (also from the creators) for a wide circulation and comprehension of these films. So, maybe the embed theory and the nature of data can only be minded and assessed by spectators who control the researches that exist on the subject of these films. We will consider other dimensions about the predominance of treating social scientists' films as scientific communication, as well as the fact that these audiovisual products do not usually register/communicate in what degree creating them interfered in the objectives of the researches within which they were created.