We hope that by
paying attention we’ll deepen awareness and increase familiarity with where we
are, and train our eyes to notice what counts toward
making where we live stronger in the face of climatic changes. Finding visual artifacts (scenes from outside the classroom) will help us
keep that world in mind, and bring the place we live into our discussions.
This project makes us archaeologists of
our present, and ethnographers, too. Humans create material culture and we
leave it behind. These traces have long informed our self-study – what and
where our species has been. Now we wonder, are we leaving so much behind that
we are entering a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene? Might a forum like
this one, which allows for the caching of images, ideas, and discourse, do more
than log our passage?
We are guided by the principles of
Visual Anthropology to focus on visual culture – its creation, form, and
function, and the notion that everything
is interesting.
"The Society encourages the use of
media, including still photography, film, video and non-camera generated
images, in the recording of ethnographic, archaeological and other
anthropological genres. Members examine how aspects of culture can be pictorially/visually
interpreted and expressed, and how images can be understood as artifacts of
culture. Historical photographs, in particular, are seen as a source of
ethnographic data, expanding our horizons beyond the reach of memory culture.
The society also supports the study of indigenous media and their grounding in
personal, social, cultural and ideological contexts, and how anthropological
productions can be exhibited and used more effectively in classrooms, museums
and television.”
This blog is facilitated by the course instructor. Students submit their visual artifacts by email to be
posted with a short description or context (date, place, etc.) by the
facilitator. Public comments are encouraged and (again) students and course instructors may invite posts from community members or anyone not enrolled in the course.
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