I found this video – Visual Ethnography. It is a brief overview of using film as a way to construct and present ethnographies. About 3.30 minutes in, there is a film of an interview with a documentary maker, Jean Rouch, talking about how he decided to avoid using music [...]]]>

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I found this video – Visual Ethnography. It is a brief overview of using film as a way to construct and present ethnographies. About 3.30 minutes in, there is a film of an interview with a documentary maker, Jean Rouch, talking about how he decided to avoid using music in his films. This has made me think about the different tools visual ethnographers can use to manipulate the message of their products -  zoom, use of web cams, editing, use of music, and voiceover, and how this might affect the messages that we are receiving and how we might ’encounter’ them.    The availability of such tools makes me ponder the validity of digital media as a way of presenting ethnographies. However, different tools which nevertheless have the save manipulative capacities are also available to the writer; I am referring to such tools as the use of hedging, selection of area to investigate, selection of quote to use, selection of source to validate a view or with which to construct a view, ordering of ideas.  All of these can be and are used as persuaders – as ways to persuade the reader to adopt the line of argument.

This line of thinking has led me to seeing the ‘author’ of an ethnography, especially if that ethnography is produced with the use of film and visuals, as  writer, producer, editor and director all at the same time. All of these labels, excepting the last in the list, can be used to describe text based and visual products, but, depending on the product, the definition will vary. It is a case of wearing several hats and once, or making a quick switch between performances. It is also a case of the viewer/reader/consumer -a  person encountering the ethnography – being aware that all of these hats are available to the person making the ethnography and that at any one time, they are being used as ways to persuade the viewer. The result may be that it makes not only producting such artefacts but also critically encountering them a rather complex endeavour.

At 4.45 minutes, we have Dr. M. Wesch giving a lecture in which he refers to a Moldovan pop song the ‘Nu Nu’ song and how it spread like a virus around the world via YouTube.  Apart from being very engaging to watch, this part of the video shows how social networking has affected his lecturing style. As we might anticipate, as he is lecturing on new media, he includes YouTube videos in his talk. However, I was struck by the fact that at one point he segues his own talk into the voice of one of the people on a YouTube video. More DJ than academic, but it works, for me, at least and it shows how new media can influence that place so called ‘RL’.