Ambiguities & epistemology (ways to know and produce knowledge)

1. Ambiguities & epistemology(ways to know and produce knowledge) SM4134 Visual Ethnography & Creative Intervention September 21, 2007 Linda C.H. LAI

2. What matters with the term “documentary”? Truth claims > method The term ‘documentary’ properly describes NOT a style or a method or a genre of filmmaking BUT an assumed MODE OF RESPONSE to film material: a mode of response founded upon the acknowledgment that every photograph is a portrait signed by its sitter. Anticipated documentary response: A documentary film is one which seeks, by whatever means, to elicit the idea that ‘the image is perceived as signifying what it appears to record.’ Viewers’ perception

3. Ethnographic filmmaking Documentation + Documentary Jean Rouch…(1940s…) use of documentary editorial devices + making “documentary fictions” Play with boundaries of fact Vs fiction, observer Vs the observed…, and tradition Vs modernity 1950s… Popularization of TV broadcasting

4. Ethnographic filmmakingPaul Henley, 46 Documentation + Documentary Dziga Vertov…(1920s…) kinopravda = “camera truth” Camera NOT from one fixed angle, but everywhere “Eye-on-the-wall”? What “truth”? Truth the camera is capable of: the camera should be constantly moving, entering where it please, “catching life unawares.” Camera is a means of insight beyond the surface features of everyday observable reality. 1950s… Popularization of TV broadcasting

5. TWO modes of PRESENCE Ethnographic filmmaker as… A quiet observer (observational approach) Objective reality is observable, as long as we minimize interruption. The camera is a telescope or microscope – neutral, impersonal, distant. An interpreter (interpretive approach) **implicit theory of knowledge: “true social reality is not to be found in the superficial observable details of everyday life but rather in the underlying relationships, sentiments and attitudes which sustain them.” (Paul Henley, p. 43, in Jon Prosser, 1998)

6. Epistemology: different positions Realist / Representationalist view Certain degree of certainty of knowledge produced about a real world is possible with awareness of the methodology itself (reflexivity). Post-structuralist/Postmodern view “Sentences are the only things that can be true or false.” (Chris Barker interpreting Nietzsche) Knowledge is a matter of the construction of interpretations about the world. *When we say something is true, we mean certain construction is taken to be true. *An idea of truth is also taken so within a historical context, and as the consequence of certain power function and power structure.

7. Post-structuralist/Postmodern view Production of knowledge occurs within the language-games of such activities.

8. Post-structuralist/Postmodern view Reflexivity is a key feature…

9. Ethnography: what kind of knowledge production? Between… numbers   meanings Counting   interpreting Lived experience ↓ Intensive field work ↓ Thick descriptions (detailed holistic description)

10. Ethnography: what kind of knowledge production? Thick description (Clifford Geertz) Details……………..…………….social processes (multiplicity of complex conceptual structures) (whole way of life) (life-worlds and identities)

11. Ethno-methodologies A mixed range of qualitative methods… Interviews, participant observation, focus groups, textual analysis…