Herb Di Gioia is an Italian, American
documentary film director who pioneered the field of "observational cinema" in his work and impacted
ethnographic film making through his contributions as a teacher at
Britain’s
National Film and Television School
The National Film and Television School (NFTS) is a film, television and games school established in 1971 and based at Beaconsfield Studios in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, England. It is featured in the 2021 ranking by ''The Hollywood Repor ...
. Di Gioia's films are recognized as a significant departure from the better-known works of other observational documentarians, like David and Judith MacDougall.
[Grimshaw, Anna. (Spring 2006]
Herb Di Gioia Abstract
Article published in ''Visual Anthropology Review'' Vol. 22, No. 1, pp. 46-59. Abstract accessed September 16, 2007.
Work
The
UCLA-educated Di Gioia was not an
anthropologist
An anthropologist is a person engaged in the practice of anthropology. Anthropology is the study of aspects of humans within past and present societies. Social anthropology, cultural anthropology and philosophical anthropology study the norms and ...
by profession, but was drawn to the field by an interest in exploring the lives of ordinary people. In the early 1970s, Di Gioia and his partner David Hancock became involved in the work of filmmaker Norman Miller, upon whom the
National Science Foundation had bestowed a grant to produce a film series examining global ecological zones. Di Gioia and Hancock produced several films in
Afghanistan which were incorporated into the ''Faces of Change'' Collection.
After the death of his partner, Di Gioia focused predominantly on teaching, training anthropologyand filmmaking students at the University of Illinois Chicago's Visual Anthropology MA program in the Anthropology Department in the mid to late 1970's, then at the National Film and Television School in ethnographic filmmaking.
See also
*
John Marshall
John Marshall (September 24, 1755July 6, 1835) was an American politician and lawyer who served as the fourth Chief Justice of the United States from 1801 until his death in 1835. He remains the longest-serving chief justice and fourth-longes ...
*
Robert Gardner
*
Tim Asch
Notes
Filmography
* ''Afghan Nomads'' (1974)
* ''Afghan Village'' (1974)
* ''Naim and Jabar'' (1974)
* ''Wheat Cycle'' (1975)
* ''Peter and Jane Flint'' (1981)
* ''Peter Murray'' (1981)
* ''Duwayne Masure'' (1981)
* ''Chester Grimes'' (1981)
Related links
''Faces of Change: Afghan Series''BFI Film & TV database: Di Gioia, Herbert
American documentary film directors
American anthropologists
Visual anthropologists
Living people
Year of birth missing (living people)
{{US-cultural-anthropologist-stub