Realism Incorporated into Documentary

I am finding it hard to fully understand what realism is and how to define it and the part it plays in making documentaries and ethnographies. According to the dictionary definition realism in cinema or art is "the interest in or concern for the actual or real, as distinguished from the abstract, speculative".
However I feel is harder to define in just those amount of words. As well I found an entry in Wikiepedia for "Ethnograhic Realism" which is a style of ethnographic writing that narrates the author's experiences and observations as if the reader was witnessing or experiencing events first hand." Wikipedia is not exactly the best source to go by, but I found it interesting that there was an entry for this.

Realism is a hard concept to define however is an attempt to show as a culture or a person as is, in their enviornment by allowing the viewer to see the experience as is; untouched and un-altered.

In "The Fact of Realism and the Fiction of Objectivity" by Bill Nichols he explains that with realism in documentary, "We are moved to confront a topic, issue or situation, or event that bears the mark of the historically real. In igniting our interest, a documentary has a less incendinary effect on our erotic fantasies and sense of sexual identity but a stronger effect on our social imagination nd sense of cultural identity." (Nichols, p. 178) This passage explains how a realist documentary and I suppose we can also say a realist ethnogrpahy forces a viewer to look at certain social aspects of it. The components of the film whether it be an ethnography or "realist" documentary makes a viewer pay attention to larger issues ones more focused on human rights and less about fantasy and the "eroticization" of a film.

Nichols also speaks largely about the idea of Objectification and how hard and touchy it is to achieve this. He explains that the term objectivity as well changes from group to group. Different people define and try to obtain the concep of objectivitiy in different ways.
Nichols defines objectivity as "reporting what was said and done in the historical world, and if it was said by or done by other major institutional apparatuses, most notably the state, objectivity means passing on official accounts with a minimum of skepticism or doubt." (Nichols p. 188) I think he touched very closly on how I would explain objectification. Although it is hard to accomplish its important to be done as best as possible.

One point that Juagaribe brings up is that he explains how due to the over spectacularized images of other palces and other cultures it creates a demand for a "real." People grow tired of seeing the eroticization of a certain city or culture and want to see the city orforeign place for what it is.
As well Juagaribe talks about what he means by the shock of the real. He is talking about the showing of a culture or people in the real but with a certain element that is interferring or disrupting the normal way of things. Anne brought up in her blog the idea that Harlan presented in class. It was the description of showing the Yanomami using advanced technologies such as a motor boat and how it is showing the reality of a culture but with irregual means incorporated into the "real" of the Yanomami.

I asked myself what are other examples of this that we have seen but came up short. I feel it would be interesting to talk about what other ethnographies we have seen in which we are observing the real but with elements that disrupt the "real".

I also find it hard to understand why a "realist" documentary is so different than an ethnography. I supose we can say that many ethnographies try their best to show the real, (realism" as much as possible.