Ruby

Ruby’s article “Speaking For, Speaking About, Speaking With, or Speaking Alongside- An Anthropological and Documentary Dilemma” addressed key issues within the realm of ethnographic film, but also with today’s media industries. The article outlines what our class has been discussing the entire semester- how can you fairly and objectively represent a culture? Ruby seems to think that it is not completely possible to represent a cultural identity without influence, even if the filmmaker is part of that community. Ruby discusses that documentaries used to be something that were taken as a fact, even though filmmakers have control of what to film, what to edit, what angle to shoot from, and who to portray. Every film has a statement whether it is intentional or not. Criticism soon made it clear that ethnographic films are not reality but are making a statement about something or someone. Morality in filmmaking turned from objectivity to openly making others aware of their point of view. The argument I found interesting was about television today. Television shapes culture, but television is dominated by upper class white men. While there is a small effort to make controlled diversity in the media, television forces other races to fit into a mold that the largest audience will accept. While TV is culturally shaping, it is also an industry focused on making money and therefore being least objectionable to those watching.