Documentary and its doubles

2019 ◽  
pp. 157-189
Author(s):  
David MacDougall
Keyword(s):  
Reality Television ◽  
Documentary Films ◽  
Social Advocacy ◽  
Public Issues ◽  
History Of ◽  
Lumiere Brothers ◽  
Didactic Texts ◽  
Post War ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
Robert Flaherty

This chapter provides a critical overview of the history of documentary cinema, arguing that it gradually lost sight of its early inspiration in the cinema of the Lumière brothers, adopting many of the features of fiction film production and modelling itself increasingly on didactic texts and journalism. In the sound era, British documentary films made under the aegis of John Grierson, despite his celebration of the ‘actual’, turned towards mass education and an idealised vision of collective humanity, and away from recording actual events in human lives. Italian Neorealist fiction films and changes to camera technology in the post-war period inspired a return to these objectives, but this found little space in television, which remained firmly fixed on journalism, entertainment, and public issues. Reactions took many forms, including experimental documentaries, social advocacy, biography and autobiography, and films exploring the relationship of film to reality, as in the work of Jean Rouch and Errol Morris. The rise of observational films gave promise of a return to the more modest aim of giving audiences shared access to what the filmmaker had witnessed, despite the challenges of manipulative ‘reality’ television and designer-packaged documentaries. The essay refers to a host of influences and commentaries, including those of Edward Said, Bill Nichols, Dai Vaughan, Robert Flaherty, Jean Rouch, Colin Young, and Grierson himself.

Internationalising Arts, Gaining Visibility: Internationalisation of the National Art Gallery through the Promulgation of the Malayan Identity and Commonwealth Ideals

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
Sarena Abdullah
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Art Gallery ◽  
Exhibition History ◽  
International Visibility ◽  
History Of ◽  
Commonwealth Institute ◽  
British Commonwealth ◽  
Post War ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
Different Sources

Abstract The early history of the Malaysian National Art Gallery has been thoroughly elucidated through many different sources but its role as promoter of Malaysia’s art in the first ten years of its early formation have never been critically examined. This paper will trace the transnational relationship of the National Art Gallery through its exhibitions co-organised with the Commonwealth Institute in London within the larger context of the post-World War II period and the British decolonisation in Malaya. This paper will situate and contextualise its research on Malaya’s early exhibition history on multiculturalism and the Malayan identity framework, and later draw the link and connection between the Commonwealth Institute and the context of its establishment in Britain and the establishment of the National Art Gallery in Malaya. Subsequently, this paper will trace and demonstrate the importance of these early exhibitions to be understood in the larger context of (a) the need to exert international visibility during the period of Confrontation and (b) the exhibition as a platform that mooted the Malayan identity that aligns with the core values and principles of the Commonwealth. As such, this paper demonstrates that the transnational relations between the National Art Gallery and the Commonwealth Institute in the realm of Malaysia’s exhibition history must be analysed in tandem with the issues that are faced by a new British Commonwealth country, i.e., Malaysia during the immediate post-war period.

The New Realism and a National Literature

PMLA ◽  
1941 ◽  
Vol 56 (4) ◽  
pp. 1116-1132 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin T. Spencer
Keyword(s):  
American Literature ◽  
National Literature ◽  
Leaves Of Grass ◽  
National Unity ◽  
New Realism ◽  
History Of ◽  
Pros And Cons ◽  
Post War ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

By the middle of the nineteenth century the controversy over the possibility and desirability of a national American literature had diminished to a somewhat feeble reiteration of old pros and cons. Moreover, Whitman's vigorous renewal of the demand for a distinctly national literature in his 1855 Preface to Leaves of Grass went virtually unnoticed by reason of his own obscurity and the disruption of national unity by sectional disputes. In the upsurge of nationalistic optimism following the Civil War, however, in the promises afforded by a strong and humanitarian Union, the sentiment for a literature distinct through its expression of the new national idealism was both widespread and ardent. But this post-war literary nationalism was short-lived. Before the skeptical attacks of many literary critics and the rising materialism of the Gilded Age, hope for a national literature once more gave way to indifference or despair. If the controversy was to be revived, some new literary stimulus, some new mode or approach toward the achievement of an American literature would have to be forthcoming. Such a stimulus was provided in the rise of realism. The conflict between the new realism and the old romanticism in the 1870's and 1880's is a well-known chapter in the history of American criticism, but the relationship of this new realism to the production of a national literature as it was viewed in the two decades before Whitman's death has not received adequate attention.

Oil spill, August 1944: the CULA expedition and the North Slope Inupiat

Polar Record ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 51 (2) ◽  
pp. 201-211
Author(s):  
Robert A. Perkins
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Oil Spill ◽  
North Slope ◽  
World War ◽  
The North ◽  
The Face ◽  
History Of ◽  
Post War ◽  
Navy Personnel ◽  
Relationship Of

ABSTRACTAn oil spill that occurred on 21 August 1944 near the Inupiat village of Barrow on Alaska's North Slope provides the focus for a brief history of activity in the face of extreme conditions and the evolving relationship of US Navy personnel and Inupiat natives of the region. The emotional recollections of an Inupiat elder are contrasted with the growing respect of the navy personnel for the Inupiat. The economic and social effects of oil explorations towards the end of World War II and the early post-war years are briefly discussed. These events form a part of the socio-economic background of current and proposed arctic oil development.

scholarly journals Polska Kronika Filmowa as a source for research on contemporary Polish architecture

2019 ◽  
Vol 22 (31) ◽  
pp. 21-28
Author(s):  
Piotr Marciniak
Keyword(s):  
Documentary Films ◽  
Special Significance ◽  
Archival Material ◽  
History Of ◽  
Materials Used ◽  
Post War ◽  
New Research ◽  
Visual Materials ◽  
Contemporary Architecture

The materials used by architectural historians to research the post-war period are very limited, and the available archive resources are incomplete and dispersed. In this context, of special significance are other forms of visual materials that documented the spatial reality of the communist period. Documentary films, and in particular the Polska Kronika Filmowa [Polish Film Chronicle] newsreel, can make an an important contribution to and a resource for historical research on contemporary Polish architecture. This text contains methodological reflections on the role of film studying the history of contemporary architecture. It describes the new research options, including the ability to recreate original spatial phenomena, and also the contemporary techniques and technology as well as the educational dimension of the Polish Film Chronicle. In this context, it is especially interesting to compare the documentary material from the Chronicle with other archival material, e.g. drawings, plans and photographs. This method provides an additional opportunity for a fuller and more objective recreation of space in 3D. This “reverse modelling” can be used to restore or preserve the original condition of structures, or even to rebuild ones no longer existing.

The relationship of the scleractinian corals to the rugose corals

Paleobiology ◽  
1980 ◽  
Vol 6 (02) ◽  
pp. 146-160 ◽  
Author(s):  
William A. Oliver
Keyword(s):  
Critical Points ◽  
Scleractinian Corals ◽  
Convincing Evidence ◽  
Early Triassic ◽  
Rugose Corals ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Biologic Factors

The Mesozoic-Cenozoic coral Order Scleractinia has been suggested to have originated or evolved (1) by direct descent from the Paleozoic Order Rugosa or (2) by the development of a skeleton in members of one of the anemone groups that probably have existed throughout Phanerozoic time. In spite of much work on the subject, advocates of the direct descent hypothesis have failed to find convincing evidence of this relationship. Critical points are:(1) Rugosan septal insertion is serial; Scleractinian insertion is cyclic; no intermediate stages have been demonstrated. Apparent intermediates are Scleractinia having bilateral cyclic insertion or teratological Rugosa.(2) There is convincing evidence that the skeletons of many Rugosa were calcitic and none are known to be or to have been aragonitic. In contrast, the skeletons of all living Scleractinia are aragonitic and there is evidence that fossil Scleractinia were aragonitic also. The mineralogic difference is almost certainly due to intrinsic biologic factors.(3) No early Triassic corals of either group are known. This fact is not compelling (by itself) but is important in connection with points 1 and 2, because, given direct descent, both changes took place during this only stage in the history of the two groups in which there are no known corals.

Meat without Animals: Outcast Objects and the Improvement of London

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ted Geier
Keyword(s):  
Animal Rights ◽  
Legal Reform ◽  
Meat Production ◽  
History Of ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

Covers the long history of the Smithfield animal market and legal reform in London. Shows the relationship of civic improvement tropes, including animal rights, to animal erasure in the form of new foodstuffs from distant meat production sites. The reduction of lives to commodities also informed public abasement of the butchers.

Short Films from a Small Nation

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Claire Thomson
Keyword(s):  
Public Information ◽  
Industrial Process ◽  
Actor Network Theory ◽  
Documentary Films ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Short Films ◽  
Post War ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Art And Architecture

The first book-length study in English of a national corpus of state-sponsored informational film, this book traces how Danish shorts on topics including social welfare, industry, art and architecture were commissioned, funded, produced and reviewed from the inter-war period to the 1960s. For three decades, state-sponsored short filmmaking educated Danish citizens, promoted Denmark to the world, and shaped the careers of renowned directors like Carl Th. Dreyer. Examining the life cycle of a representative selection of films, and discussing their preservation and mediation in the digital age, this book presents a detailed case study of how informational cinema is shaped by, and indeed shapes, its cultural, political and technological contexts.The book combines close textual analysis of a broad range of films with detailed accounts of their commissioning, production, distribution and reception in Denmark and abroad, drawing on Actor-Network Theory to emphasise the role of a wide range of entities in these processes. It considers a broad range of genres and sub-genres, including industrial process films, public information films, art films, the city symphony, the essay film, and many more. It also maps international networks of informational and documentary films in the post-war period, and explores the role of informational film in Danish cultural and political history.

Charles de Gaulle and European Community

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (10-3) ◽  
pp. 70-81
Author(s):  
David Ramiro Troitino ◽  
Tanel Kerikmae ◽  
Olga Shumilo
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
European Community ◽  
World War ◽  
Charles De Gaulle ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Common ◽  
Post War ◽  
De Gaulle

This article highlights the role of Charles de Gaulle in the history of united post-war Europe, his approaches to the internal and foreign French policies, also vetoing the membership of the United Kingdom in the European Community. The authors describe the emergence of De Gaulle as a politician, his uneasy relationship with Roosevelt and Churchill during World War II, also the roots of developing a “nationalistic” approach to regional policy after the end of the war. The article also considers the emergence of the Common Agricultural Policy (hereinafter - CAP), one of Charles de Gaulle’s biggest achievements in foreign policy, and the reasons for the Fouchet Plan defeat.

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