GSFF19 | Anti-Ethnography

For indigenous peoples the camera is a dangerous weapon. Anthropology's obsession with preserving images of 'vanishing' indigenous cultures through ethnographic films has long been a tool used to colonise and oppress indigenous peoples. The anthropologist's encapsulating gaze ignores the fact that for indigenous communities tradition is not an immutable set of truths handed down by revelation, but a set of ever-evolving social practices whose continuity cannot be repaired by preservation, only elaborated through struggle, and finally achieved under conditions of genuine self-­determination. This selection of video works examines the violence inherent in the ethnographic impulse, and unveils the absurd fetishism underpinning the discipline.

Introduced by co-curator Adam Khalil (Ojibway).

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Various languages, English subtitles