Ethnofiction

Ethnofiction is a subfield of ethnography which produces works that introduce art, in the form of storytelling, "thick descriptions and conversational narratives", and even first-person autobiographical accounts, into academic works.{{Cite journal|last=VanSlyke-Briggs|first=Kjersti|date=2009-09-01|title=Consider ethnofiction|url=https://doi.org/10.1080/17457820903170143|journal=Ethnography and Education|volume=4|issue=3|pages=335–345|doi=10.1080/17457820903170143|s2cid=217531370 |issn=1745-7823|url-access=subscription}}{{Cite journal|last=McNamara|first=Patricia|date=2009-06-01|title=Feminist Ethnography: Storytelling that Makes a Difference|url=https://doi.org/10.1177/1473325009103373|journal=Qualitative Social Work|language=en|volume=8|issue=2|pages=161–177|doi=10.1177/1473325009103373|s2cid=145116084 |issn=1473-3250|url-access=subscription}}{{Cite journal|last=Bochner|first=Arthur P.|date=2012-01-01|title=On first-person narrative scholarship: Autoethnography as acts of meaning|url=https://www.jbe-platform.com/content/journals/10.1075/ni.22.1.10boc|journal=Narrative Inquiry|language=en|volume=22|issue=1|pages=155–164|doi=10.1075/ni.22.1.10boc|issn=1387-6740|url-access=subscription}}

In addition to written texts, the term has also been used in the context of filmmaking, where it refers to ethnographic docufiction, a blend of documentary and fictional film. It is a film type in which, by means of fictional narrative or creative imagination, often improvised, the portrayed characters (natives) play their own roles as members of an ethnic or social group.

History

Ethnologist Jean Rouch is considered to be the father of ethnofiction,[https://www.maitres-fous.net/glossary.html Glossary] at MAITRES_FOUS.NET with Robert Flaherty as an ancestor.{{cite book |last1=Henley |first1=Paul |title=The Adventure of the Real: Jean Rouch and the Craft of Ethnographic Cinema |date=2010 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |isbn=978-0-226-32716-7 |pages=252-253 |language=en}} Rouch discovered that a filmmaker interferes with the event he registers: the behavior of the portrayed individuals, the natives, will be affected by the camera's presence. Contrary to the principles of Marcel Griaule,[http://articles.sybilamber.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&catid=10:history-of-social-and-cultural-anthropology&id=43:marcel-griaule-1898-1956 Marcel Griaule (1898–1956)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120402130647/http://articles.sybilamber.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&catid=10:history-of-social-and-cultural-anthropology&id=43:marcel-griaule-1898-1956 |date=2012-04-02 }} – Article by Sybil Amber[http://elnil.org/Pictorializing.htm From Pictorializing to Visual Anthropology1] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150626010134/http://elnil.org/Pictorializing.htm |date=2015-06-26 }} – Chapter from "Handbook of Methods in Cultural Anthropology"{{cite journal |last1=Nannicelli |first1=Ted |title=From Representation to Evocation: Tracing a Progression in Jean Rouch's Les magiciens de Wanzerbé, Les maîtres fous, and Jaguar |journal=Visual Anthropology |date=July 2006 |volume=19 |issue=2 |pages=123–143 |doi=10.1080/08949460600596558 |s2cid=144385606 }}{{cite journal |last1=Ciarcia |first1=Gaetano |title=L'ethnofiction à l'œuvre. Prisme et images de l'entité dogon |trans-title=Ethnofiction at work. Prism and images of the dogon entity |language=French |journal=Ethnologies Comparées |date=2002 |issue=5 |pages=20 p. http://alor.univ |url=https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-00506023 }} his mentor, Rouch considers it impossible for a non-participating camera to record "pure" events in ethnographic research.[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3504425.stm Father of 'cinema verite' dies] – BBC news[http://www.indiana.edu/~wanthro/theory_pages/Rouch.htm BIOGRAPHIES: Jean Rouch] – Article by Ben Michaels at [http://www.indiana.edu/ Indiana University][http://www.rouge.com.au/3/rouch_tribute.html A Tribute to Jean Rouch] by Paul Stoller at [http://www.rouge.com.au/ Rouge]Ethnographic Film (origines)[http://www.maitres-fous.net/Cooper.html Knowing Images: Jean Rouch's Ethnography] <- Chapter from Sarah Cooper's monograph "Selfless Cinema?: Ethics and French Documentary" (Oxford: Legenda, 2006) at [http://www.maitres-fous.net/home.html MAITRES-FOUS.net]

An ethnographer cameraman, in this view, will be accepted as a natural partner by the actors who play their roles. The cameraman will be one of them, and may even be possessed by the rhythm of dancers during a ritual celebration and induced in a state of cine-trance.{{Cite web |url=http://www.cinetrance.com/cine-trance.htm |title=Cine-trance |access-date=2012-10-06 |archive-date=2012-01-03 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120103220904/http://www.cinetrance.com/cine-trance.htm |url-status=dead }}[http://der.org/jean-rouch/pdf/American_Anthropologist_Tribute.pdf Cine-trance: a Tribute to Jean Rouch](Visual Anthropology, American Anthropologist) Rouch thus introduced the actor as a tool in research.[https://ukvisualanthropology.com/2010/11/09/ethnofiction-and-the-work-of-jean-rouch/ Ethnofiction and the Work of Jean Rouch], article by [https://ukvisualanthropology.com/2010/10/27/reuben-ross/ Reuben Ross], UK Visual Anthropology, November 9, 2010[https://vimeo.com/tag:ethnofiction Videos about ethnofiction on Vimeo]{{cite journal |last1=Coates |first1=Jennifer |title=Blurred Boundaries: Ethnofiction and Its Impact on Postwar Japanese Cinema |journal=Arts |date=2 February 2019 |volume=8 |issue=1 |pages=20 |doi=10.3390/arts8010020 |doi-access=free }}[https://cinea.be/coming-of-age-as-other-indigenous-people-in-the-ethnofiction-film-the-dead-and-the-others/ Coming of Age as Other: Indigenous People in the Ethnofiction Film 'The Dead and The Others'] – article at [https://cinea.be/ CINEA], 14 december 2018

Ethnofiction has also been developed in Portuguese cinema. Ethnic films have been common in Portugal since the 1930s, particularly from the 1960s to the 1980s[http://www.comite-film-ethno.net/colloque-2006/pdf/constructions-identitaires/alves-costa.pdf Imagining Rurality: Portuguese Documentary and Ethnographic Film in the 1960s and 1990s] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120319141138/http://www.comite-film-ethno.net/colloque-2006/pdf/constructions-identitaires/alves-costa.pdf |date=2012-03-19 }} – Abstract for a conference by Catarina Alves Costa at [http://www.comite-film-ethno.net/ Comité du Film Ethnographique] and in the early 21st century. The remote Trás-os-Montes region in Portugal and the former Portuguese colonies of Guinea-Bissau and the Cape Verde islands are common subjects of such films. These films depict local realities along with legends and surreal imagery, producing works of ethnofiction.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

Chronology

=1910s=

1914 – In the Land of the Head Hunters by Edward S. Curtis, Canada

=1920s=

1926 – Moana by Robert Flaherty, US

=1930s=

1930 – Maria do Mar by José Leitão de Barros, Portugal
1931 – Tabu written by Robert Flaherty and directed by F. W. Murnau, US
1932 – L'or des mers by Jean Epstein, France
1933 – Las Hurdes: Tierra Sin Pan by Luis Buñuel, Spain
1934 – Man of Aran by Robert Flaherty, UK

=1940s=

1942 – Ala-Arriba! by José Leitão de Barros, Portugal
1948 – Louisiana Story by Robert Flaherty, US

=1950s=

1955 – Les maîtres fous (The Mad Masters) by Jean Rouch, France
1958 – Moi, un noir (Me a Black) by Jean Rouch, France

=1960s=

1961 – La pyramide humaine by Jean Rouch, France
1962 – Acto da Primavera (Act of Spring) by Manoel de Oliveira, Portugal
1963 – Pour la suite du monde (Of Whales, the Moon and Men) by Pierre Perrault and Michel Brault, Canada
1967 – Jaguar, by Jean Rouch, France

=1970s=

1976 – People from Praia da Vieira (Gente da Praia da Vieira) by António Campos, Portugal
1976 – Trás-os-Montes by António Reis and Margarida Cordeiro, Portugal

=1980s=

1982 – [https://vimeo.com/154832740 Nelisita: narrativas nyaneka] by Ruy Duarte de Carvalho, Angola
1988 – Mortu Nega (Death Denied) by Flora Gomes, Guiné-Bissau

=1990s=

1997 – Ossos by Pedro Costa, Portugal

=2000s=

2000 – No Quarto da Vanda (In Vanda's Room) by Pedro Costa, Portugal
2003 – Terra Longe (Remote Land) by Daniel E. Thorbecke[http://www.david-golias.com/cinema/documentarios/terra-longe/ Terra Longe], [http://www.david-golias.com/ David & Golias]
2006 – Colossal Youth by Pedro Costa, Portugal
2007 – Transfiction by Johannes Sjöberg

=2010s=

2011 – Toomelah by Ivan Sen
2012 – The Act of Killing by Joshua Oppenheimer, Indonesia
2014 – Cavalo Dinheiro (Horse Money) by Pedro Costa, Portugal
2014 – La creazione di significato (The Creation of Meaning) by Simone Rapisarda Casanova, Italy
2015 – Dead Slow Ahead by Mauro Herce
2018 – Zanj Hegel la (Hegel's Angel) by Simone Rapisarda Casanova, Haiti
2018 – The Dead and the Others by João Salaviza, Portugal
2019 – Vitalina Varela by Pedro Costa, Portugal
2019 – Work, or To Whom Does the World Belong, by Elisa Cepedal, Spain{{cite web|url=https://cineuropa.org/en/newsdetail/381839/|title=

Review: Work, or to Whom Does the World Belong|date=2019-11-22|author=David González|work=Cineuropa}}

2024 – Anime galleggianti by Maria Giménez Cavallo, Sardinia

Footnotes

External links

[http://www.artsmethods.manchester.ac.uk/resources/workshopresources/ethnofiction/ Ethnofition] at The University of Manchester (watch video)
[http://antoine.chech.free.fr/textes-colloque-JR/Sjoberg.pdf Ethnofiction and Beyond: The Legacy of Projective Improvisation in Ethnographic Filmmaking] by Johannes Sjöberg
[https://web.archive.org/web/20130615035659/http://recherche.univ-montp3.fr/cerce/r5/g.c.htm L'ETHNOFICTION A L'ŒUVRE: prisme et images de l'entité dogon] – Article (French) by Gaetano Ciarcia at [http://alor.univ-montp3.fr/ Université Montpellier III]
[http://www.doc.ubi.pt/07/artigos_andrea_paganini.pdf Rouch & Cie. – un quintette] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304090340/http://www.doc.ubi.pt/07/artigos_andrea_paganini.pdf |date=2016-03-04 }} – Article (French) by Andrea Paganini at École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales
[http://mubi.com/lists/ethnic-portraits-and-ethnofiction Ethnic Portraits and Ethnofiction] at [http://mubi.com/ Mubi]
[https://books.google.com/books?id=6u2LIhk9BxEC The war of dreams: exercises in ethno-fiction] by Marc Augé (google books)
[https://web.archive.org/web/20120324115211/http://www.mendeley.com/research/ethnofiction-drama-creative-research-practice-ethnographic-film-5/ Ethnofiction : drama as a creative research practice in ethnographic film] at [http://www.mendeley.com/ Mendley] – Paper by Bloom, Elizabeth A., Ed.D., STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK AT BINGHAMTON, 2006
[http://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/bitstream/handle/10125/4475/dimmendaal.pdf;jsessionid=2CED67C453A8B16AE92D691AFFBFFDCD?sequence=7 Language description and "the new paradigm": What linguists may learn from ethnocinematographers] – Article by Gerrit J. Dimmendaal, University of Cologne, at [http://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/ University of Hawai'i at Manoa]
[http://ukvisualanthropology.com/2010/11/09/ethnofiction-and-the-work-of-jean-rouch/ Ethnofiction and the Work of Jean Rouch] at [http://ukvisualanthropology.com/ UK Visual Anthropology]
{{cite journal |last1=VanSlyke-Briggs |first1=Kjersti |title=Consider ethnofiction |journal=Ethnography and Education |date=September 2009 |volume=4 |issue=3 |pages=335–345 |doi=10.1080/17457820903170143 |s2cid=217531370 }}