Technological Advancement even Prevelant in Museums

I always looked to Museums as an archive of the past, especially the The Natural History Museum. I have done a study in ethnography on the Natural History Museum that reflect's the societie's constant technological gains and advancements that even an archive of History has to incoporate.



There are many massive television screens that people sit through and watch movies. I came across about fifteen of these massive screens. One is in the sea room or otherwise known as the "whale room". The biodiversity hall has many of these in which different movies play. The Dinosaur Wing has an entire movie explaining the history of the dinosaurs.


Most people seem to sit through the entire movie and settle down rather than manouver their way through the exhibit and learn the information and their own rather than just being told.


There are many different Computer stations that exist in almost every single wing, including the oldest, in the Dinosaur Wing. New technologies can be seen everywhere in this museum. There is even a thermal camera that you can walk by and it can read your body temperature. This reflects our culture and how we are constantly moving forward in the technological era. You can see it everywhere in the museum with new screen being placed in old halls every year.

The Underground Orchestra

This is a clip from The Underground Orchestra a film by Heddy Honnigman. It is a type of ethnography in that it explores the world of subway performers in Paris. Most of them are refugees forced to leave their country and start fresh in Paris. It is very much worth seeing!

Indigenous Media

Itam Hakim Hopi by filmmaker Victor Masayesva was a piece considered an Indigenous ethnography in other words a grassroots piece. It was allowing the director Victor Masayesva to turn the camera around on his own people. He had the chance to tell in a sense his story through the main character, Ross Macaya. This piece was original in that although in the native language of Hoopi there were no subtitles. He seemed to have on purpose, narrated over the main narration. His soothing voice and tone allowed to give a feel to the viewer this notion of oral storytelling.


The whole ethnography is in the narrative of Ross Macaya. He is telling stories of the Hoopi people and stories on how they came to be. What is also unique in this type of ethnography is that he seems to not necessarily make a direct connection with what is being seen and what is being told. Although symbolically and metaphorically there is some connection.

He draws many connections between the people and the natural enviornment, or their natural surroundings. He has a very poetic undertone in the way he cut and edited this film. With the words of Ross Macaya, he shows images of corn being collected and planted and as well in the beginning shows Ross himself weaving a type of traditional dress.

This ethnography was interesting in that it was the first look into "grassroots" media other than "Number Our Days".
"Number Our Days" was a very different approach in this look into indigenous film. "Number our Days" while not necessarily as poetic and metaphoric was still an interesting approach to indigneous media. She looked into a community that "one day she would be a part of".

It was revealing not only in the aspects of the culture but it was universal. Not only was it an insight into the Jewish culture but it was a revealing look into the world of the old. Sad and moving it was a compilement of different narratives from the different people in this Jewish Community Center.


She would cut to herself at times and put in her own two sense of her feelings and reactions to her findings. I think it was nice to see how she was reflecting on her own culture. Her being apart of this culture, or eventually to be a part of it, I found myself almost giving her the authority to iterject and give her own opinion because she herself is a pat of that community.


This film was also in a sense a means to communicate the social injustices that this community had to endure. With the scene of the people giving out free groceries and Meyerhoff explaining that there was not enough support of this center, it exposes the in-humane conditions that some of these older people have to go through. It opens the public's eye and shows how hard it is for some people to get by.

Both these films were unique in the ethnographic field in that it was coming from their side. Both these films reflected the film-maker's culture and where they come from or where they will go. I found myself listening to them more and trusting their input and opinions on the culture they were studying because in a sense they had an "in". They could both speak with authority on these cultures because they themselves are those cultures in a sense. I enjoyed both these films. They both offered very different insights into two very different cultures but were very telling, eye opening, and educational

The Museum of Natural History / Haraway

After reading the Haraway piece “Teddy Bear Patriarchy: Taxidermy in the Garden of Eden, New York City, 1908 – 1936" I was left with a lot of questions and thoughts on the museum. After having spent a lot of time there as a child, I never fully realized that the animals were in fact real at one point and taxidermed. I thought it was interesting when Haraway talks about Akley and his experience in collecting gorillas. She explains, "Akley and his party had killed or attempted to kill every ape that had seen since arriving in the area." (p.57) I thought it was interesting because Akley was trying to bring these Animals to the museum to preserve them however in doing so he had to kill them first. There is something ironic and troubling in the notion of killing off these animals just to put them behind glass in a museum.
Later Haraway tallks about how "Now it was time to hunt with the camera (p.57). I thought this was interesting in that he decided to start snapping a camera rather than shoot a gun to collect information and preserve animals forever in time.
And later on Haraway is explaining a photograph taken of a dead gorilla being photographed by a camera. She says "The contrast of this scene of death with the diorama framing the giant of Karisimbi mounted in New York is total; the animal came to life again, this time imortal." (p.58) I thought that this was interesting because through the epxierience of killing and then photgraphing, the animal was killed but born again. I thought this was a ironic and interesting concept she brought up that makes you question the museum itself and the way things were collected.
The hunting with the camera concept reminded me of Juan Downey's laughing alligator. Both seem to say that the camera is a tool, a weapon to be used. You can hunt with it and use it carefully as your weapon like a gun. However in the Haraway piece it was the alternative to a gun.
What is interesting as well is the dioramas in the museum and how the animals are dead but made re-born again. The scene set up is so forced but supposed to be made to look so real. After going there and re-examine what is being shown there was some sort of eerie presence. Espeically having know that these animals were killed for this purpose and then stuffed and placed in the position that they were in. There was a sad and creepy element to all these dioramas.
What I also noticed in one of the medicine man exhibits there were all these manicans of these men dressed in "taditional" costumes. There were a lot of maks, head pieces, and feathers. However what I noticed or realized was that on one of the manicans, their shoes were converse. It was a very updated shoe on these "traditional" constumes. I thought it was funny and intersting, and probably a slip-up considering none of the other manicans had antyhing like this on.
What also is interesting is the classification of the museum. We talked briefly in class about this and the names of some of the wings. "The African Wing" is just such a broad classification. I felt like i did not learn much because it was so largely sterotyped into one hall. Africa is made up of hundreds of countries so I found it bizarre that the wing was just titled Africa. As well one was titled "The Lure of Asia" which is also troubling and problematic because of how many different cultures and countries there are within Asia.
My favorite room in the museum is the sea room. It has changed since I remember it. There are a lot of new technologies incorporated into it. For example there are many computer stations set up, ones in which you can interact with, and ass well a huge new movie screen that plays a movie about an ocean. The cieling is lit up with blue lights to make it look as if one is underwater. The large wall is still a huge life-size length that makes the room so popular. One disturbing feature was that a lot of the maequins were faceless, and terrified me a little.

Our film...finally

We decided to play with the idea of identity... and when someone becomes a new yorker and why they consider themselves new yorkers....

"Art of Regret" and "The Birthday"

This film is about watermelons.

I found "Art of Regret" to be extremely interesting because it approached China's history through the medium of photography. It explored the difficult idea and elements of a city rapidly changing and modernizing. Through the progress of photography and what it has become in China, it was interesting to as well watch the progress of this city in China and its inhabitants. It was fascinating to watch how the Chineese inhabitants of the city of Kunming saw photography and their viewpoints reguarding this evoloving medium. It was a question of whether photography was a medium for which older tradtions and way of lvinging are preserved permanently and as evidence, or if photography in this country was a viewpoint of progress, trasnformation, and in a sense fantasy. Judith McDougall shows how photography in this city can be easily manipulated. Old people can become young again, and the plain and even less attractive can become beautiful.

After the Cultural Revolution in China, many pesonal photographs were seized by the government. Many people did not have their "personal histories" in a sense. They are lacking the physical proof or evidence of a world that was their personal world existing before the revolution. Because of this, the average person would think that a photograph in it's physical and original form is priceless and should not be tampered with. However you see quite the opposite in this movie. For example the translator goes to a photography store in which they re-store old photographs. She restors one of her aunt that has creases in it. It then become a whole new photograph, retouched and refinsihed. This further complicates the notion of a photography in it's pureset sense. You are combinng new age techonology with an old traditional photograph.

As well what was an interesting and complex issue in the movie was when they went to the photography exhibit and interviwed the photographer. He had shot the city years and years ago. He had black and white photos which were probably developed by himself in a dark room. It shows the city as smaller and quiet. However he shoots the city again years later, and all you see is buildings upon buildings. You see the small little market on the corner turned into a massive Supermarket. This part showed as well, that not only did the cty change, but the mode of photography as well. The pictures went from being black and white and probably manually developed to large color, which were probably taken on a digital camera.

Another opposing scene between traditional vs. modern was the photography studio in which family would go and get their portraits taken. What I found to be opposing was the use of the old wooden 4x5 camera. This is a very traditional camera used in which you must develop the film in a darkroom manually. However after this process this studio would use computer technology to re-touch the image, falsifying the reality.

Another powerful scene in this is when the old man tells Judith and her translator that he has preseved photographs from his grandfather. However they show up to find this man without photographs, but with a compelling story. His grandfather worked in a political realm, therefore the grandon never wanted to write a story about him based on the fact that he might get in trouble. But he did want his grandfather's memory and legacy to live on. So what else could he do? He told Judith and the camera about the life of his Grandfather. You could see how badly he wanted to preserved and embedd the history of his grandfather in some medium.
His photographs were gone, so there had to be another way to permanently preserve him. When Judith turned off the camera because the man started to cry, I thought as we have said in class, this was more powerful than leaving the camera on. It was acknowledging the pain of a man, but to a point where you had to realize it could not be represented through a camera. This was a very Susan Sontag approach. Recently I have read Regarding the Pain of Other, and Sontag believes that you can never convey a human's pain or suffering accurately through a photo. I guess Judith felt the same way, that you can not show the pain of a man crying without somehow exploiting him or doing it innacurrately.




"The Birthday" was fascinating in that it gave the viewers a look into a world of transexuals in Iran.
It revealed contradictions and bizarre ralities that this religion in Iran holds. Unlike sodomy and homosexuality, transsexuality is not mentioned in the Koran, and so is not prohibited. Therefore the transexuals in Iran do not have to worry about being executed. There is even a speicific law permitting sex change operations.

However this film was more about the complex notion of transexuals in Iran. It also was a film about the status of women in Iran. The mother of one of the transexuals did not necessarily have a problem with him being a transexual but the idea of giving up the freedom and rights of a man in Iran to become a woman. In another part, a brother of Afshin, was almost relieved because he explains that his sister is becoming a man, meaning he will have more rights and the brother will not have to worry as much about if he were a woman. Ashfin aslo at one point explains how unapphy he was as a woman. The stares and as well the liberties not expierienced as a woman.

This movie was powerful in so many scenes. There was one scene, where one of the transexuals Saye, feels so alone and abused in the world she lives, that she asks if she is even living. At one point someone says that Iran is a paradise for Transexuals, however it is hard to fully believe that. If such a paradise why do people still name call and why are parents still so against it? The way i see it being a paradise is the sensitivity and caring the doctors treat the transexuals. From my understanding the sex change operations were government or state paid. However this was the only real way i saw Iran to be a paradise for transexuals.

Jaguar

Jean Rocuh's "Jaguar" was a film like i have never seen before. Orignally I had wanted to simply place it not in etnography but in the genre of Journey documentary. The only reason I am so quick to want to place it into any category is the fact that I am currently enrolled in two different film classes, strictly titled Histories of Documentary in which we go over guidlines as to what exactly makes a documentary film
. As well obviously stating, that I am also enrolled in an Ethnographic film class. Because of this distinct seperation between the genres and what consittues each film, I always automatically want to be able to categorize a film as ethnographic or documentary. However, reguardless I realized that it can be both, or it is simply plain put, up to the viewer to determine what THEY themselves consider the movie, reguardless of literary work written on it. I think this is the best way to seperate movies, according to your own take on it,
...

Back to Jaguar, I thought it was extremely interesting how Jean Rouch showed he journey these different men took. It was the classic scenario of going away a boy and coming back a man. I thought it was unique in that Rouch showed each individual journey. This demonstrates Rouch's desire to focus on the individual rather than the whole tribe or clan.
Another complex and interesting approach Rouch took was the showing of the three men encountering an entirely new and different tribe. He shows the complications involved in trying to look at a tribe objectively. The three men kept yelling, "They are naked! They are naked!" This was an interesting because it showed how shocking and foreign a goup of people can be even to the people you yourself, as a film maker are studying.


I think what stood out the most in this film is that the three men were narrating. There was no overcasting shadow of the voice of the ethnographer. I thought it was interesting that we as viewers were allowed to hear the boys go over teh story, after the fact, almost as a reflection of their journey.

I think this is such an extremely and useful approach to ehtnographic film making because like the approach the McDougalls have taken in their films, its allowing the people to speak in the film. It allows the people to tell their stories without the editing or interpretation of it by the ethnographer. It gives those people their voice.

This film incorporated a lot of elements into it. It was a mixture of things in terms of what it represented and what it showed. It was a type of journey documentary, a reflexive docuemtnary, observational, and as well a genre that is fictional ethnography.