A Guy A Camera A Journey - Centre for Communication, Media and
Essay: A critique on the video
A Guy, A Camera, A Journey
Name: Timothy Reinhardt
Student Number: 961092150
Lecturer: Professor Keyan Tomaselli
Abstract
This essay is an accompaniment to my video, A Guy, A Camera, A Journey – a short documentary that focuses on three different San / Bushmen communities of southern
Africa, those of Ngwatle, Witdraai and Blinkwater. A video that centres on the questions of ‘Who, Where and Why?’ It forms part on my BAHons degree, as an independent project for the Cultural Communication and Media Studies (CCMS) of the University of
Natal Durban (UND). It is a story told, as experienced by myself and witnessed through
‘the eye’ of my video camera. This essay is a critique on the video and further theoretically relates the video and the processes and experiences behind its production to ethnographic film and other film / video theories. The essay therefore includes my personal experiences behind my participation in the July 2002 CCMS Kalahari field excursion, interpreted from my view as a documentary video maker and student.
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Table of Contents
Narrated by Timothy Reinhardt:
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Introduction
Although many, and possibly most of the great ethnographic videos are, and have been made without either a formal background in film production, ethnographic film theory or anthropology, they have not been made without an extensive knowledge of the subjects they filmed. Film knowledge is also crucial, but knowledge and passion are in my opinion, prerequisites to producing good ethnographic films
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. The former, to some degree, can be supplemented via the experience of others, learned from books, and/or passed down through lectures. Passion is something that one must have. I have a lot to learn, and in creating this video, I was subjected to a great learning curve and hopefully a step forward in producing informative, ethical and entertaining documentaries.
Ultimately the video tries to allow for the audience to induce their own hypotheses on
‘Why’ the Bushmen live where they do.
Point of Entry
As part of the Cultural, Communication and Media Studies (CCMS) of the University of
Natal Durban research field trip in July 2002, my fellow researchers and I visited the
Kalahari. Our destination, the ≠Khomani Bushmen communities of Witdraai, Blinkwater and Welkom, situated in the Northern Cape South Africa, and the displaced Bushman settlement of Ngwatle, Botswana. Professor Keyan Tomaselli headed this and previous research field excursions. Both Tomaselli and his students, have written a number of publications and/or dissertations that contextualise this and past trips
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.
1 Filmmakers and ethnographic filmmakers, to the likes of Robert Flaherty and Jean Rouch, are both widely acknowledged as contributing greatly to ethnographic film; both pioneers in their field of work. Both
Flaherty and Rouch, however, began their careers, as engineers, and not ethnographic filmmakers. Both had limited formal training in the arena of film production. Flaherty acknowledges the strain that this put on his initial work, even considering the accidental destruction of his first work as a blessing in disguise
(Rotha & Wright, 1980: 33-60). Rouch, however, unlike Flaherty, did his PhD in Anthropology. Their knowledge grew mostly from first hand experience, time and a passion for their work.
2 Tomaselli’s article, Blue is Hot, Red is Cold: Doing Reverse Cultural studies in Africa (2001a: 283-318), is a theorized diary from his field experiences. This and his follow up article, “Dit is die Here se Asem”:
The Wind, its Messages, and Issues of Auto-Ethnographic Methodology in the Kalahari (2003 forthcoming), provide an in-depth account of the Ngwatle community with whom we stayed in Botswana, and subsequent researcher-subject interactions. In fact a whole source of published articles, dissertations, and other essays are available, via some navigation, from the CCMS web site at http://www.nu.ac.za/ccms , and more directly http://www.nu.ac.za/ccms/publications/publications_default.asp
.
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With the field trip came past dissertations, theories, memos and checklists to read, understand and comply with (admittedly, with time restraints, my readings remained less thorough than I would have liked, some theories understood better than others). Having completed the video production course the previous semester, and proved that under a mostly controlled environment I was able to manipulate and capture a fictitious event, I was given the green light to shoot a documentary. This formed the backdrop to my independent video project, A Guy, A Camera, A Journey ; a half hour documentary.
Mary Lange had further expressed interest in a video for schools to accompany the curriculum of Human Social Science, for grade 7. A curriculum that includes issues of who, where and why people live where they do. The various Bushmen communities of the Kalahari, those that we visited, seemed ideal for this analysis, and the pitch was accepted. Knowledge is primarily found in print and generally, where attacked by the media, a distorted and often romanticised view of the Bushmen is presented. Television and film
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reinforce this anthropological stereotype, a myth created in the 1950s
(Tomaselli 1996:43). An educational video, depicting the Bushmen of present day, is thus a resource clearly lacking in the school curriculum. It could further provide an audiovisual background to anyone wishing to witness, at least at some level, my interpretation of this ‘Other’. Having said that, there is a definite move towards interactive multimedia education – e.g. School TV and the web- a medium that suits the
Bushman’s oral culture, which tends to visually expressive. It is also a medium that has the potential to be far reaching.
The ultimate direction, and focus of the video was, however, only finally concluded well into the field trip itself. Up until that point, no particular focus was taken. Instead, everything was a potential point of interest, and everything came under the scrutiny of the camera. This freedom proved both a hindrance and a blessing. Ultimately lots of footage
3 Television advertisements, such as the web based company Khalahari.net, and that of Spoornet’s television advertising campaign, are two such examples where this 1950s anthropological stereotype is perpetuated, albeit in a parody form. Jamie Uys’s film, The Gods Must Be Crazy (1980), is also such an example.
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was captured, that will no doubt be useful in days or years to come, an important historical reference. I still had initial focus though, in that I captured video footage for others students - I captured interviews for Linje and researcher-subject interactions for
Marit. For myself, however, everything was a possibility, which meant that I never stopped thinking, and never stopped questioning, my camera never far from reach 4 . It also proved a hindrance though, in that specific interviews were not carried out. Feeling my way through different methodologies, different communities, and different events, I created new directions, new focuses, and captured lots of footage.
The Field Trip
The CCMS July Kalahari field excursion lasted three weeks. Initially we camped at
Molopo Lodge, opposite the Bushman community of Witdraai - a farm transferred back to the community in 1999 after a successful legal battle, and ancestral lands claim. This was to be our home for a week before continuing on with our journey. We travelled north, through the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, a two-day adventure, into south-central
Botswana. Here we were hosted by, and camped on the outskirts of the Ngwatle community. A community of a hundred or so displaced San, Bakgagadi, Balal and
Botswanan’ people (Tomaselli 2001a: 284). This was our second base camp, our second home, for another week.
From both Molopo and Ngwatle, our base camps, we made some day excursions. From
Molopo, this included visiting the Bushmen communities of Blinkwater and Welkom, the latter a small desert town. Blinkwater is home to Bushman artist Vetkat Kruiper 5 , his wife Belinda, stepbrother Yuri, community friend, Oom Hansie, and their five dogs
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. In
4 Admittedly, over the three-week excursion, I did on one or two occasions forget or purposely leave my camera behind. I was, however, later to regret this carelessness and/or idleness in my initial assumptions that there was no need for the camera. I was initially limited by tape requirements, and until Tomaselli arrived, my videoing remained highly selective.
5 Keyan Tomaselli introduced Vetkat and his artwork at the 2001 and 2002 opening of the Bergtheil
Museum exhibitions; his speeches viewable from the web (2001b & 2002). The 2002 exhibition included a photographic exhibition by Sian Dunn and my short video Vetkat (Reinhardt, 2002). These further provide an interesting view on life in the Kalahari, and Blinkwater in particular.
6 Their Dogs are considered part of the family and are instrumental in hunting.
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a newspaper article, Elana Bregin eloquently, and somewhat poetically, describes
Vetkat’s home:
Home is a grass hut on a wild and beautiful Kalahari dune top. There is no water, no electricity and transport is generally by donkey cart. But to Vetkat, everything he needs is here.
(2002)
From the somewhat more isolated and remote community of Ngwatle, our excursions included visiting Maselteng pan, the settlement of Monong, and the town of Hukunsi.
The latter being less for research purposes than for our need to replenish supplies, from water to petrol, a ‘luxury’ we take for granted 7 .
The Target Audience
In a land of eleven official languages, I knew from the start that I could not practically cater for our diverse cultural heritage. I chose to focus on the English language and to a lesser extent on Afrikaans - the language we (the researchers) used to communicate with the Bushman communities we visited. The video, therefore, incorporates two of the most common languages in the country. The target audience is primarily English speaking school pupils, between 12 and 16 years of age, young adults. It also, however, targets people of all ages with the capacity to enjoy its intended audiovisual nature. A basic knowledge of Afrikaans would further be helpful to fully appreciate the video, though is not necessary for its understanding. Grade 7 English speaking pupils, would already have an adequate grasp of Afrikaans to understand at least part of what is said in the background conversations of the video, and thus subtitling was not considered essential.
The exception being for certain extracts that I deemed beyond a basic understanding of
Afrikaans and/or to be of particular importance.
7 All food and water had to taken with us on our journey, each researcher limited to 5l of water a day, for washing drinking and cooking. A petrol / diesel service station was last encountered at Nassob, within the
Kgalagadi Transfrontier park, and the nearest subsequent station being at Hukunsi.
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The video’s focus would be to convey to Grade 7 and 8 school pupils, ‘Why’ the
Bushmen studied, live where they do. This is an issue included in the Human Social
Sciences curriculum as developed by Westville Senior Primary School. This curriculum includes investigation and thoughts on social issues from the past, the present, and those that will affect the future. Themes included in the Grade 7 HSS curriculum include:
Sources of Information; Ecosystems and the food chain; the Relationship between natural resources and man; Where do people live?; Who lives where and why?; and Contrasts in urban and rural lifestyles.
All of the above are applicable to the lives of the Kalahari Bushmen and are in some way reflected in the video and relate to ‘Why’ these Bushmen live where they do.
Aims & Goals of the Video
We make documentaries to communicate meaning from film makers to audience members, […]. The goal, not always realised, is for the film maker and the audience to share the same thought about a reality independent of either.
(Breitros 2002: 9)
Although I do not wish to impose my thoughts and understanding on ‘Why’ the Bushman communities studied live where they do onto the audience, it is to a large extent inevitable. The video is, however, structured to allow the audience to explore the audio and video material presented, and identify for themselves, a greater meaning behind the
‘Why’. Although generally a passive medium, the video wishes to invoke a more participatory relationship between the video, the audience, the pupils and the teacher.
The aim is for the video to allow for a critical discussion of the video’s contents afterwards, and even during. The goal is to invoke an argumentative exchange of ideas.
The video’s aim is not to simply present the answers, but to allow for the audience to induce their own hypotheses on ‘Why’ the Bushmen live where they do.
The video’s objectives can quite simply be summed up by three adjectives: to be
‘Entertaining’, ‘Informative’ and ‘Ethical’. Primarily, the main goal is to be informative, the other two being subsidiary, but essential elements in achieving this goal.
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Entertainment is the driving force behind the information flows ultimate reception, and therefore utility. In addition, unless the research and execution behind the videos production remains ethically and morally sincere, this information will cease to be just that.
The Video
The documentary video, A Guy, A Camera, A Journey , is approximately 30 minutes in length. Although the vast majority of footage utilised was capture by myself during the
CCMS July 2002 Kalahari field trip, additional audiovisual material captured by fellow students during this and previous expeditions, has also been utilized. Via structured absences and indexical coding built into the video through framing and editing, to the special effects and narratives utilised, the video tries to answer ‘The Who’, ‘The Where’, and in particular, ‘The Why’. Not an easy question to answer when the reasons are complex, and occur on a number of different levels.
The video, however, wishes the audience to arrive at their own conclusions, and is on its own admittance, a construct and inevitably guides the audience to some preconceived conclusions. Although I cannot answer the question of ‘Why’, in totality, I identified seven fundamental elements in my argument, and used these as the framework behind the video:
1. Political & Bureaucratic 2. Economic
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3. Food & Water
4. Spiritual
5. The Land / Environment 6. The Animals
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7. Ancestral & Historical
The video is broken down into three stages
, the ‘Introduction’, the ‘Analysis’ and
‘Conclusion’. The ‘Introduction’ provides a visual contrast of my own home of Durban, a tropical lush coastal city in Kwa-Zulu Natal, to that of the Bushman’s home, the arid
Kalahari Desert. This denies my omniscience, and foregrounds my unfamiliarity in the subject of approach. This does not, however, take away from the video itself, but merely points out that it is simply a subjective construct. This is constantly reaffirmed throughout the video via my use of reflexivity, and video effects.
The ‘Analysis’ is broken down into two parts, each focusing on a different area of the
Kalahari. Part one focuses on the Bushman communities of Witdraai and Blinkwater, in the Northern Cape, South Africa. Part two, the Ngwatle settlement of Botswana. Both are experienced by myself and witnessed through the ‘Cine-Eye’ (Vertov as cited by
Sauzier 1985: 30) of my video camera. Each utilises the key points identified above. No audiovisual insert remains unaccounted for, but all build towards a diverse matrix of reasons.
Poetic Licence
A Guy, A Camera, A Journey , is an attempt to soak up the atmosphere of what is was like to witness these communities at work, or backstage, doing their day-to-day activities.
Writing ‘simply does not have the dramatic capacity to represent such noumena’
(Tomaselli 1996:17), and nor can the camera capture this abstract quality. I, however, felt that in film / video, a poetic approach in editing would best reveal its essence. In the film, How the Myth was Made , George Stoney argued for the justification of poetic
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manipulations in documentary film / video. Stoller advocated the use of creativity in anthropology, and called for the use of an ‘indirect language’, like that ‘expressed in the painter’s style or in the writer’s voice’ (1984: 108). For him, anthropology must be characterized by the ‘
Representation-of’
, an act ‘which is fundamentally creative’ (1984:
104). This poetic approach was utilised to its fullest by my video Vetkat (Reinhardt
2002). A video that steered away from the conventional authoritative techniques of omniscient narration and further limited the direct information flow to captions. A video that is in many ways incorporated into this documentary. The same footage is utilised, although told in a different way
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, and A Guy, A Camera, A Journey borrows from its poetic style and narrative techniques.
Narrative Style
David Bordwell and Kirsten Thompson point out that audience postulate casual connections between the disparate images, and even montage attains narrative status.
(Breitros 2002:10)
A Guy, A Camera, A Journey borrows from Vetkat (Reinhardt 2002) in its narrative style.
Both are largely told via the narrative of the image and the caption . The captions guide the audience through the journey of the brief Kalahari encounter, whilst the audience is left to observe against the background of either natural sounds, and/or a soundtrack.
These captions also often provide a connection between seemingly unrelated, and disparate images. It further adds a dry humour to the experience, and enhances its entertaining quality.
Although intentionally minimised, A Guy, A Camera, A Journey , utilises the voice-over
(see Appendix for script). Here the narration dictates the image shown. It is used, not only to explicitly provide facts and details about the communities studied, but also for a
8 In Vetkat , the interview is kept separate from the Blinkwater experience, whereas in this video, the interview dictates the video footage shown. The same source is utilised and the shots selection is mostly the same but reorganised to tell the same story in a different way. Vetkat focuses on the experience, whereas A Guy, A Camera, A Journey draws on the interview to obtain the ‘Who, Where and Why’ aspect of their lives at Blinkwater.
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variation in it style. It focuses on the ‘Who’ and the ‘Where’. The key points I have identified as being associated with the ‘Why’, are also included. It, however, does not go into detail but allows the audiovisual material presented to be the videos ultimate argument.
A fourth narrative style incorporated into this video, is the interview . Interviews provide a means for the people to speak on their own account, but unfortunately due to a language barrier, these were minimal in this production. As already mentioned, Afrikaans was the bridging ‘taal’ (language). My Afrikaans remains relatively poor, and although communication was possible, it remained inadequate to conduct video interviews. The exception being the Belinda and Keyan Tomaselli interview, both are in English. I have used the term interview loosely here, as there were no formal questions asked, nor interviewer-interviewee relationship established. I simply listened
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.
Sound
With the exception of the voice-overs, captured in the sound studio, the audio was the biggest problem in the making of this video. On location, all the audio was captured via highly portable video cameras, and although this provided flexibility in the field, it also proved to be an injustice to the sound. The whirl and drone of the camera provided a constant source of noise in the background, and is particularly noticeable in the quiet of the Kalahari. This proved a hindrance to ‘render faithfully the natural sounds’
(MacDougall on Observational Cinema 1975:116) of the events. The background sounds captured remained a poor representation of the human ear. The sound capture of the video cameras were further highly susceptible to wind noise. When covered too closely, however, to protect it from the wind, this created feedback noise. This resulted in a highly unpleasant electronic tone being generated. This comes through in the video at the beginning of Tomaselli’s interview.
9 For the Belinda interview, I explained informally to her, what I wanted to know, but did not direct, nor intentionally influence the outcome. In the Keyan Tomaselli ‘interview’, he simply spoke whilst I videoed.
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The soundtracks used, due to an issue of copyright laws and authenticity, are limited to the music captured on this and past field trips, produced by the Bushmen themselves –
Yuri, Lena Malgas and Vetkat Kruiper. Their music is very pleasant, authentic and true to the experience, a source highly appropriate to the video. The sound captured was, however, marred by poor audio quality of the camera, its ‘unclean’ source and generally short play duration. The soundtrack thus had to be looped, and would be noticeable if any distinguishing noise was present. For an ‘unclean’ source, this was an inevitability faced. Noise, in certain instances, could be reduced, but was never removed. It was further disguised within chaotic scenes, which already had many background sounds, thus diluting the ‘unclean’ source.
Theories & Methodologies
In his article, There is Nothing more Practical than a Good Film Theory , Henry Breitros argues that although there is a plethora of theories about theory, we lack helpful theories about practical problems (2002: 9). He elaborates by stating that most ‘film theories are not particularly useful as predictors, nor do they spawn useful ways for documentary film makers to make sense of the world’ (2002: 9). He further goes on to argue that film theories, those that are informed by practice, are, however, useful to all film students. In the production of A Guy, A Camera, A Journey , I tried to keep this in mind, but was open to all theories and methodologies I had encountered.
The video is ultimately a post-modern text that draws on a multiple of styles and methodologies. Various ethnographic film theories provide the base behind the video’s structuring and production, from the video capture, to the ethical practices behind our involvement and subsequent subject-researcher interactions and the final edit. The video, like the early David MacDougall’s observational cinema (1975), was born out of the need to observe. In videoing, it followed Karl Heider’s holism
, of capturing ‘whole people in whole acts’ (as cited Tomaselli 1996:190), and Andre Bazin’s point of view as a realist (1974:36), before falling victim to the fragmentation of montage in editing. My
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videoing experience
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, gave me a greater insight into Rouch’s shared anthropology , cine-trance and cinema verite (cited by Tomaselli, 1996: 165, 196). It borrows parts of each, and disregards others, but the method held constant throughout is Jay Ruby’s reflexivity .
Reflexivity
Filmic positivism (Tomaselli 1996) assumes that the truth can be found, but the
‘magical fallacy of the camera parallels the fallacy of omniscient observation’
(MacDougall 1975:123). Through selection, the ethnographic film becomes a ‘reflection of thought’ (MacDougall 1975:124). It can therefore be seen why Ruby criticises contemporary ethnographic filmmakers for their lack of explicit methodology. Ruby believes that filmmakers and anthropologists ‘ have the ethical, political, aesthetic, and scientific obligation to be reflexive and self-critical about their work
’ (1977:3).
The basis of Ruby’s philosophy is the dialectical unity between producer-processproduct
, a concept developed from Fabian’s producer-production-product:
Being reflexive means that the producer deliberately and intentionally reveals to his audience the underlying epistemological assumptions which caused him to formulate a set of questions in a particular way, to seek answers to these questions in a particular way and finally to present his findings in a particular way.
(1977:4)
Via reflexivity , A Guy, A Camera, A Journey reveals the self, of both the researchers and
I, and builds our presence into the video. The introduction contexualises my presence, my part in the video’s construction and goals. The audience is reminded that the ‘Truth’ is not something that can be found. In my brief voice-over, I state: “But these are questions, in Totality, I cannot answer.” Here, my own voice is replaced via captions, and used to reflect our presence throughout the video. The voice-over, as narrated by
10 In film, Rouch was a pioneer in ethnographic surrealism. Rouch’s theories apply, in particular, to the shooting of The Fire Dance (Saetre & Reinhardt, 2002). A video essay that is incorporated, in part, into A
Guy, A Camera, A Journey .
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Tamryn Taylor, is further dismissed as a mere construct, her presence is revealed in the sound studio – no longer an omniscient voice, but someone reading a script.
No attempt was made to exclude our presence in framing, or editing. The researchers influences and interactions were included into the shots. The people of Ngwatle visited our camp and sold us much of their crafts, our presence no doubt having an impact on their lives, is conveyed in the video. Keyan converses with Belinda at Blinkwater, and we all have ‘a job to do’ at Witdraai. Reflexivity, here, reintroduces Heider’s ethnographic presence
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(Tomaselli 1996:199) back into the video. More subtle techniques are further employed to constantly remind the audience that they are watching a construct. Whilst videoing at Maselteng pan, the old hunting ground of the Ngwatle community, my shadow is included. Similarly at our camp, my presence is again highlighted via my shadow. Our informal dialogue, normally excluded from conventional documentary interviews, was also included. Background audio further included, at times, the researchers conversations. The video breaks from its still frames when, at Witdraai, I walk to David Kruiper’s house. The footage is not a smooth transition, but it brings back the cameraman, ‘the I’, into the video. A number of similar shots exist where as cameraman, I forefront myself by acknowledging my existence in some form, either by asking a question or shaking someone’s hand. . At the very end of
11 Heider contends that many ethnographic observers fail to examine the effects of their presence in encounters with different communities. People being observed by filmmakers and/or researchers often act and react for the camera rather than behaving as if it was not present. Heider refers to two levels of distortion in this respect; the first concerning the intentional or inadvertent alterations filmmakers make in the behaviour of their subjects, the second occurring with regard to selection during the production process
(Tomaselli and Shepperson 1997). This effect, which the film crew may have on the behaviour being observed, has been referred to as the ethnographic presence
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the video, I step out from behind the camera, to thank Belinda and Vetkat for their comments and hospitality. I return and replace the lens cap on the camera, the audio continuing for moment until I power the camera down. This reinforces that what the spectator has just witnessed is a construction, and by replacing the lens cap, that construction is now over.
Video effects are used to further highlight the construct as being just that. ‘Page peels’ separate sections between the communities’ studied, and between the introduction and conclusion. An image of myself videoing, ‘morphs’ into a stylistic artwork, coinciding with my narration, and caption text. In fact, the entire video remains a highly constructed text, particularly in the ‘Introduction’. Cars blur and leave behind trails, images morph, texts flash across the screen, and montage is evident.
Ruby further states:
To be reflexive is to be not only self-aware, but to be sufficiently self-aware to know what aspects of self are necessary to reveal […] and not merely narcissistic or accidentally revealing.
(1977:4)
The reflexive elements of A Guy, A Camera, A Journey are far from being self indulgent, or narcissistic. They are generally subtle and many will be missed by the audience. They hopefully never refer the focus away from the content but are incorporated to reveal methodology. The video is simply sufficiently self-aware to reveal process, and self.
To reflect on its importance, Tomaselli sums up reflexivity, and it merits: “Reflexivity reconstitutes ethnographic film in itself as a process towards producing knowledge – both ethnographic and semiotic” (1996:207).
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Structured Absences
Flaherty’s ideology served as a filtering device that systematically excluded aspects of the life of the islanders while at the same time creating the need to produce an image of life as it might have been, not how it was lived.
(Ruby 1980: 4)
For Robert Gordon, Myburg’s film,
People of the Great Sandface (1985), can be discussed on two fronts: ‘What it says (and how it is said) and that which it does not say’ and that what is does not say, being of more relevance (1991: 3-4). The scenes and profilmic events excluded from edited films are defined by Tomaselli and Homiak as structured absences (1999:158). They are, however, quick to point out that unless propaganda is intended by the filmmaker, they should not be regarded as a deliberate deception (Tomaselli and Homiak 1991: 160). Tomaselli and Homiak further argue that absences can be structured implicitly or explicitly , unconsciously or consciously
(1999:160). Whereas the former is seen to reproduce common sense and myth, the latter is guided by the prevailing interpretive paradigm - an example of that which motivated the Marshall Expeditions (Tomaselli and Homiak 1991:160).
Such a dilemma was presented to us on our expeditions. ‘Structured absences’ is a question of ethical representation
12 , ‘Othering’ and methodology. This came in both videoing – shot selection and the subsequent framing - and in editing via the downsizing of the many hours of footage captured, to a mere thirty minute fraction. In the field, in videoing, framing and shot selection, I tried to capture what was happening, and not be lead by a romantic ‘image’ of what I thought the shot should be. In framing, both ‘rules’ and aesthetics played a role, but I tried to diminish its importance to that of context.
12 Gordon argues, that these absences of Myburgh’s film are a denial of History in its contextualising of the
Bushmen, and the harsh realities of the injustices they were subjected to. He goes on to cite the film as being a cinematographic cousin of Leni Riefenstahl’s Last of the Nuba (a filmmaker known by her nazi associations). A work described by its ‘primitivist ideal’ (Gordon 1991:6) of a people without time, without history and uncivilized. In N!ai: The Story of a Kung Woman (1980), a film by John Marshall, he, however describes absence as making history. Here though, it is Marshall’s physical absence from
Namibia, and the people he filmed, that made him confront history. In comparison, Gordon applauded
Marshall for his work with the community, and his genuine fight for their well-being. Marshall’s the
Hunters , via structured absences, was also a romanticised image of an isolated people, but for Gordon it was ‘not so much creating a myth as reflecting one’ (1991: 8) – the prevailing paradigm of the time.
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Framing rules and aesthetics have functionality, and ignoring them outright is arrogant at least, but they did not dictate my shots. Being aware of videoing rules is enough to break them. I was also cautious not to be lead on a path of indifference in capturing the ‘antimyth’, the ‘anti-stereotype’. My impartiality is nothing less than a myth, but in its awareness, acceptance and presentation, my structured absences are not deceptive.
Conclusion
In conclusion, in my attempt to create a good ethical documentary, I have tried to make certain that a critical audience can create their own hypotheses and conclusions. I presented many different paths and possible arguments as to why the bushman studied live where they do. I have utilised many different methodologies and theories in the construction of A Guy, A Camera, A Journey . In particular, I assumed the ethical methodology of reflexivity, thus allowing for the subject matter to be open to debate.
This video may have it shortfalls, but I feel that I have achieved my goal of making it informative, entertaining and ethical.
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Tomaselli, Keyan. 2003. “Dit is die Here se Asem”: The Wind, its Messages, and Issues of Auto-Ethnographic Methodology in the Kalahari, Cultural Studies – Critical
Methodologies, Forthcoming.
Tomaselli, K and Shepperson, A. 1997. Course film for “Documentary film,
Visual Anthropology, and Visual Sociology”. Journal of Film and Video . 49 (4), 44-57.
Tomaselli, K and Homiak, J. 1999. ‘Powering Popular Conceptions: The !Kung in the
Marshall Family Expedition Films of the 1950s.’ Visual Anthropology .
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Film- and Videography
Marshall, John. 1980. N!ai: The Story of a Kung Woman . 59 mins. Documentary
Educational Resources.
Myburgh, J. 1985. People of the Great Sandface . 60mins & 120mins. Anglia TV
Survival Series.
Riefenstahl, Leni. 1976. The Last of the Nuba
Saetre, Marit and Reinhardt, Timothy. 2002. The Fire Dance . 6 mins. South Africa:
Cultural, Communication & Media Studies of the University of Natal Durban.
Stoney, George. 1978. How the Myth was Made . 58 mins.
Reinhardt, Timothy. 2002. Vetkat . 11mins. Cultural, Communication & Media
Studies of the University of Natal Durban.
Uys, J. 1980. The Gods Must be Crazy . 109 mins. Mimosa Films.
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Appendix: Voice-Over Script
Narrated by Timothy Reinhardt:
In July 2002, as part of a university field excursion, I left for the Kalahari. Over the next three week we the researchers, visited two Bushmen communities: those in the Northern
Cape, South Africa, and the people of Ngwatle, Botswana. It was both a journey of exploration and enlightenment.
This Video, this text, this construct is my attempt to answer the ‘Who’, the ‘Where’ and the ‘Why’. But these are questions, in Totality, I cannot answer.
Narrated by Tamryn Taylor:
1.
Part 1
The Southern Kalahari in the Northern Cape, South Africa, is home to the ≠Khomani
Bushmen. Many of whom moved back to these ancestral lands in 1999 after a successful legal battle, and lands claim. Witdraai and Blinkwater are two such Bushmen settlements, located on farms transferred to the community by this lands claim. A number of families have relocated to these farms from different desert towns, Welkom is such a town. Many people, however, still remain. The relocation process is currently uncertain….
Witdraai, Blinkwater & Welkom remain relatively close to the main road, a road that leads to both the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park and the town of Askham. For many people of this area, Eco-tourism is one of their chief sources of income…
2.
The Stalls
The community of Witdraai have set up stalls, along the roadside, displaying their arts, crafts, culture and tradition. An expectation and necessary fro their survival, yet also a proud heritage.
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3.
Witdraai
In the Bushman relocation to Witdraai, the community have either moved into existing farm dwellings or have built their own homes. Some are isolated, others less so. Some have electricity, but, most do not.
4.
Part 2
Ngwatle is an impoverished community of approximately 100 displaced people, located in the controlled hunting area, KD/1. It borders the Kgalagadi Transfrontier park, on the
Botswanian side and the only vehicle that can get through the soft sand roads are 4x4s.
Primarily a Bushman community, relocated from Maselteng, they were forced to resettle on the outskirts of the Ngwatle Pan.
5.
Concluding Notes
The communities re-represented here, those of Witdraai, Blinkwater & Ngwatle, live a hybrid lifestyle, exhibiting both traditional and modern elements. The Bushman culture, constantly redefined, is characterised by a combination of new influences. Their reasons for living where they do are many and varied, but politics and bureaucracy no doubt enforce much control over a marginalized and impoverished people. Economics plays a role, and so does water and food. The Why is also something intangible, an amalgamation of influences from a historical and traditional sense, to the land itself, the animals & a spiritual connection.
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