Ethnofiction refers to a subfield of

ethnography Ethnography (from Greek ''ethnos'' "folk, people, nation" and ''grapho'' "I write") is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures. Ethnography explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject o ...

which produces works that introduces art, in the form of storytelling, "thick descriptions and conversational narratives", and even first-person autobiographical accounts, into peer-reviewed academic works. In addition to written texts, the term has also been used in the context of filmmaking, where it refers to ethnographic

docufiction Docufiction (or docu-fiction) is the cinematographic combination of documentary and fiction, this term often meaning narrative film. It is a film genre which attempts to capture reality such as it is (as direct cinema or cinéma vérité) a ...

, a blend of documentary and

fictional film Narrative film, fictional film or fiction film is a motion picture that tells a fictional or fictionalized story, event or narrative. Commercial narrative films with running times of over an hour are often referred to as feature films, or feature ...

in the area of

visual anthropology Visual anthropology is a subfield of social anthropology that is concerned, in part, with the study and production of ethnographic photography, film and, since the mid-1990s, new media. More recently it has been used by historians of science an ...

. It is a film type in which, by means of

fictional Fiction is any creative work, chiefly any narrative work, portraying individuals, events, or places Place may refer to: Geography * Place (United States Census Bureau), defined as any concentration of population ** Census-designated place, ...

narrative A narrative, story, or tale is any account of a series of related events or experiences, whether nonfictional (memoir, biography, news report, documentary, travel literature, travelogue, etc.) or fictional (fairy tale, fable, legend, thriller (ge ...

or creative

imagination Imagination is the production or simulation of novel objects, sensations, and ideas in the mind without any immediate input of the senses. Stefan Szczelkun characterises it as the forming of experiences in one's mind, which can be re-creations ...

, often improvising, the portrayed characters (

natives Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...

) play their own roles as members of an

ethnic An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...

or social group.

Jean Rouch Jean Rouch (; 31 May 1917 – 18 February 2004) was a French filmmaker and anthropologist. He is considered one of the founders of cinéma vérité in France. Rouch's practice as a filmmaker, for over 60 years in Africa, was characterized b ...

is considered to be the father of ethnofiction. An

ethnologist Ethnology (from the grc-gre, ἔθνος, meaning 'nation') is an academic field that compares and analyzes the characteristics of different peoples and the relationships between them (compare cultural, social, or sociocultural anthropology) ...

, he discovered that a filmmaker interferes with the event he registers. His camera is never a ''candid camera''. The behavior of the portrayed individuals, the natives, will be affected by its presence. Contrary to the principles of

Marcel Griaule Marcel Griaule (16 May 1898 – 23 February 1956) was a French author and anthropologist known for his studies of the Dogon people of West Africa, and for pioneering ethnographic field studies in France. He worked together with Germaine Die ...

, his mentor, for Rouch a non-participating camera registering "pure" events in ethnographic research (like filming a

ritual A ritual is a sequence of activities involving gestures, words, actions, or objects, performed according to a set sequence. Rituals may be prescribed by the traditions of a community, including a religious community. Rituals are characterized, b ...

without interfering with it) is a preconception denied by practice. 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 Rhythm (from Greek , ''rhythmos'', "any regular recurring motion, symmetry") generally means a " movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions". This general meaning of regular recu ...

of dancers during a ritual celebration and induced in a state of ''cine-

trance Trance is a state of semi-consciousness in which a person is not self-aware and is either altogether unresponsive to external stimuli (but nevertheless capable of pursuing and realizing an aim) or is selectively responsive in following the dir ...

''. Going further than his predecessors,

introduces the

actor An actor or actress is a person who portrays a character in a performance. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and television. The analogous Greek term is (), li ...

as a tool in research. A new genre was born.

Robert Flaherty Robert Joseph Flaherty, (; February 16, 1884 – July 23, 1951) was an American filmmaker who directed and produced the first commercially successful feature-length documentary film, ''Nanook of the North'' (1922). The film made his reputatio ...

, a main reference for Rouch, may be seen as the grandfather of this

genre Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other for ...

, although he was a pure documentary maker and not an ethnographer. Being mainly used to refer to ethnographic films as an object of visual anthropology, the term ethnofiction is as well adequate to refer to experimental documentaries preceding and following Rouch's oeuvre and to any fictional creation in human communication, arts or literature, having an ethnographic or social background.

History

Parallel to those of Flaherty or Rouch, ethnic portraits of hard local realities are often drawn in Portuguese films since the thirties, with particular incidence from the sixties to the eighties, and again in the early 21st century. The remote Trás-os-Montes region (see:

Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro Province Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro () is a historical province of Portugal located in the northeastern corner of the country. Vast plateaus, river valleys, mountains, and castles abound in Trás os Montes e Alto Douro. History A first attempt to regis ...

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...

Guinea-Bissau Guinea-Bissau ( ; pt, Guiné-Bissau; ff, italic=no, 𞤘𞤭𞤲𞤫 𞤄𞤭𞤧𞤢𞥄𞤱𞤮, Gine-Bisaawo, script=Adlm; Mandinka: ''Gine-Bisawo''), officially the Republic of Guinea-Bissau ( pt, República da Guiné-Bissau, links=no ) ...

or the

Cape Verde , national_anthem = () , official_languages = Portuguese , national_languages = Cape Verdean Creole , capital = Praia , coordinates = , largest_city = capital , demonym ...

islands (ancient Portuguese colonies), which step in the limelights from the eighties on thanks to the work of certain directors (

Flora Gomes Flora Gomes is a Bissau-Guinean film director. He was born in Cadique, Guinea-Bissau on 31 December 1949 and after high school in Cuba, he decided to study film at the Instituto Cubano del Arte y la Industria Cinematográficos in Havana. Shot fou ...

Pedro Costa Pedro Costa (born 30 December 1958) is a Portuguese film director. He is best known for his sequence of films set in Lisbon, which focuses on the lives of the impoverished residents of a slum in the Fontainhas neighbourhood. Biography After com ...

, or Daniel E. Thorbecke, the unknown author of

Terra Longe Terra may often refer to: * Terra (mythology), primeval Roman goddess * An alternate name for planet Earth, as well as the Latin name for the planet Terra may also refer to: Geography Astronomy * Terra (satellite), a multi-national NASA scienti ...

) are themes for pioneering films of this genre, important landmarks in film history. Arousing fiction in the heart of

ethnicity An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...

is something current in the Portuguese popular narrative (

oral literature Oral literature, orature or folk literature is a genre of literature that is spoken or sung as opposed to that which is written, though much oral literature has been transcribed. There is no standard definition, as anthropologists have used vary ...

): in other words, the traditional attraction for

legend A legend is a Folklore genre, genre of folklore that consists of a narrative featuring human actions, believed or perceived, both by teller and listeners, to have taken place in human history. Narratives in this genre may demonstrate human valu ...

and

surrealistic Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to ...

imagery in popular arts inspires certain Portuguese films to strip off realistic predicates and become poetical fiction. This practice is common to many fictional films by Manoel de Oliveira and

João César Monteiro João César Monteiro Santos (2 February 1939, in Figueira da Foz – 3 February 2003, in Lisbon) was a Portuguese film director, actor, writer and film critic. Life and career João César Monteiro was born into a family with anti-clerical ...

and to several

hybrids by

António Campos António Campos (29 May 1922 – 8 March 1999) was one of the pioneer filmmakers of visual anthropology in Portugal. Mainly using pure documentary techniques, he shot ethnographic films and tried docufiction. As well as in fictional films, he u ...

António Reis António Ferreira Gonçalves dos Reis, known as António Reis (27 August 1927 – 10 September 1991), was a Portuguese film director, screenwriter and producer, poet, sculptor and ethnographer. He was married to Margarida Cordeiro, co-director ...

and others. Since the 1960s, ethnofiction (local real life and fantasy in one) is a distinctive mark of Portuguese cinema.

Chronology

1910s

* 1914 – '' In the Land of the Head Hunters'' by

Edward S. Curtis Edward Sherriff Curtis (February 19, 1868 – October 19, 1952) was an American photographer and ethnologist whose work focused on the American West and on Native American people. Sometimes referred to as the "Shadow Catcher", Curtis travele ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

1920s

* 1926 – '' Moana'' by

, US

1930s

* 1930 – '' Maria do Mar'' by

José Leitão de Barros José Leitão de Barros (22 October 1896 – 29 June 1967) was a Portuguese film director and playwright. Among his most famous films are '' Maria do Mar'' (1930), the second docufiction after '' Moana'' (1926) by Robert Flaherty, the first ...

* 1931 – ''

Tabu Tabu may refer to: Cultural and legal concepts *Taboo (spelled ''tabu'' in earlier historical records), something that is unacceptable in society *Tapu (Polynesian culture) (also spelled ''tabu''), a Polynesian cultural concept from which the wor ...

'' written by

and directed by

F. W. Murnau Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau (born Friedrich Wilhelm Plumpe; December 28, 1888March 11, 1931) was a German film director, producer and screenwriter. He was greatly influenced by Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Shakespeare and Ibsen plays he had seen at t ...

, US * 1932 – ''L'or des mers'' by Jean Epstein,

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

* 1933 – '' Las Hurdes: Tierra Sin Pan'' by

Luis Buñuel Luis Buñuel Portolés (; 22 February 1900 – 29 July 1983) was a Spanish-Mexican filmmaker who worked in France, Mexico, and Spain. He has been widely considered by many film critics, historians, and directors to be one of the greatest and m ...

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

* 1934 – ''

Man of Aran ''Man of Aran'' is a 1934 Irish fictional documentary (ethnofiction) film shot, written and directed by Robert J. Flaherty about life on the Aran Islands off the western coast of Ireland. It portrays characters living in premodern conditions, ...

'' by

, UK

1940s

* 1942 – '' Ala-Arriba!'' by

* 1948 – ''

Louisiana Story ''Louisiana Story'' is a 1948 American black-and-white drama film directed by Robert J. Flaherty. Although it has historically been represented as a documentary film, the events and characters depicted are fictional and the film was commissioned ...

'' by

, US

1950s

* 1955 – ''

Les maîtres fous ''Les maîtres fous'' (; "The Mad Masters") is a 1955 short film directed by Jean Rouch, a well-known French film director and ethnologist. It is a docufiction, his first ethnofiction, a genre he is considered to have created. Historical backg ...

'' (The Mad Masters) by

* 1958 – ''

Moi, un noir ''Moi, un noir'' (, "Me, a Black erson; also released as ''I, a Negro'') is a 1958 French ethnofiction film directed by Jean Rouch. The film is set in Abidjan, Ivory Coast. Synopsis The film depicts young Nigerien immigrants who left their c ...

'' (Me a Black) by

1960s

* 1961 – '' La pyramide humaine'' by

* 1962 – ''Acto da Primavera'' (Act of Spring) by Manoel de Oliveira,

* 1963 – ''

Pour la suite du monde ''Pour la suite du monde'' (also known as ''For Those Who Will Follow''; ''Of Whales, the Moon, and Men'', or ''The Moontrap'' in English) is a 1963 Canadian documentary film directed by Michel Brault, Marcel Carrière and Pierre Perrault. It wa ...

'' (Of Whales, the Moon and Men) by

Pierre Perrault Pierre Perrault (29 June 1927 – 24 June 1999) was a Québécois documentary film director. He directed 20 films between 1963 and 1996. He was one of the most important filmmakers in Canada, although largely unknown outside of Québec. In ...

and

Michel Brault Michel Brault, OQ (25 June 1928 – 21 September 2013) was a Canadian cinematographer, cameraman, film director, screenwriter, and film producer. He was a leading figure of Direct Cinema, characteristic of the French branch of the Na ...

* 1967 – ''Jaguar'', by

1970s

* 1976 – '' People from Praia da Vieira'' (Gente da Praia da Vieira) by

* 1976 – '' Trás-os-Montes'' by

and

Margarida Cordeiro Margarida Cordeiro (born 1939) is a Portuguese psychiatrist and film director from Mogadouro. The art concepts developed by her and her husband António Reis are called The School of Reis. Filmography * Jaime Jaime is a common Spanish and Por ...

1980s

* 1982 �
''Nelisita'': narrativas nyaneka
by

Ruy Duarte de Carvalho Ruy Alberto Duarte Gomes de Carvalho (22 April 1941 – 12 August 2010) was an Angolan author and filmmaker, whose work, which over more than three decades spanned poetry, metafiction, and anthropology, focused on the Kuvale people of the Geograp ...

Angola , national_anthem = " Angola Avante"() , image_map = , map_caption = , capital = Luanda , religion = , religion_year = 2020 , religion_ref = , coordina ...

* 1988 – '' Mortu Nega'' (Death Denied) by

, Guiné-Bissau

1990s

* 1997 – ''

Ossos ''Ossos'' (English: "Bones") is a 1997 Portuguese film directed by Pedro Costa. The film was shot in the Fontainhas district of Lisbon (also known as "Estrela d'Africa"), where disadvantaged dwellers and immigrants from former Portuguese colonie ...

'' by

2000s

* 2000 – '' No Quarto da Vanda'' (In Vanda's Room) by

* 2003 – ''

'' (Remote Land) by Daniel E. ThorbeckeTerra LongeDavid & Golias
/ref> * 2006 – ''

Colossal Youth ''Colossal Youth'' is the only studio album by Welsh post-punk band Young Marble Giants, released in February 1980 on Rough Trade Records. Young Marble Giants were offered the opportunity to record the album after Rough Trade heard just two son ...

'' by

* 2007 – ''Transfiction'' by Johannes Sjöberg

2010s

* 2011 – '' Toomelah'' by

Ivan Sen Ivan Sen (born 1972) is an Indigenous Australian filmmaker. He is a director, screenwriter and cinematographer, as well as an editor, composer and sound designer. He is co-founder and director of Bunya Productions. Early life Ivan Sen was born ...

* 2012 – '' The Act of Killing'' by

Joshua Oppenheimer Joshua Lincoln Oppenheimer (born September 23, 1974) is an American-British film director based in Copenhagen, Denmark. He is known for his Oscar-nominated films ''The Act of Killing'' (2012) and ''The Look of Silence'' (2014), Oppenheimer was ...

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

* 2014 – '' Cavalo Dinheiro'' (Horse Money) by

* 2014 – '' La creazione di significato'' (The Creation of Meaning) by Simone Rapisarda Casanova,

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

* 2015 – '' Dead Slow Ahead'' by Mauro Herce * 2018 – '' Zanj Hegel la'' (Hegel's Angel) by Simone Rapisarda Casanova,

Haiti Haiti (; ht, Ayiti ; French: ), officially the Republic of Haiti (); ) and formerly known as Hayti, is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean Sea, east of Cuba and Jamaica, and ...

* 2018 – '' The Dead and the Others'' by

João Salaviza João Salaviza (born João Salaviza Manso Feldman da Silva; 19 February 1984) is a Portuguese film director, screenwriter, editor, producer, and former actor. He is the recipient of several accolades, including the Short Film Golden Bear, the ...

* 2019 – ''

Vitalina Varela ''Vitalina Varela'' is a 2019 Portuguese drama directed by acclaimed director Pedro Costa. It won the Golden Leopard and Best Actress Award at the 2019 Locarno Film Festival. The film follows Vitalina Varela, a character who previously appeare ...

'' by

* 2019 �
Work, or To Whom Does the World Belong
by Elisa Cepedal, Spain

Footnotes

External links

Ethnofition
at The University of Manchester (watch video)
Ethnofiction and Beyond: The Legacy of Projective Improvisation in Ethnographic Filmmaking
by Johannes Sjöberg

– Article (French) by Gaetano Ciarcia a
Université Montpellier III

Rouch & Cie. – un quintette
– Article (French) by Andrea Paganini at École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales
Ethnic Portraits and Ethnofiction
a
Mubi

The war of dreams: exercises in ethno-fiction
by Marc Augé (google books)
Ethnofiction : drama as a creative research practice in ethnographic film
a
Mendley
– Paper by Bloom, Elizabeth A., Ed.D., STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK AT BINGHAMTON, 2006
Language description and "the new paradigm": What linguists may learn from ethnocinematographers
– Article by Gerrit J. Dimmendaal, University of Cologne, a
University of Hawai'i at Manoa

Ethnofiction and the Work of Jean Rouch
a
UK Visual Anthropology
* {{Film genres Ethnography Visual anthropology Anthropology documentary films Film genres Cinematic techniques Drama genres Documentary film genres Fiction by genre Fiction forms Television genres

History

Chronology

1910s

1920s

1930s

1940s

1950s

1960s

1970s

1980s

1990s

2000s

2010s

See also

Footnotes

External links