Oh, What A Blow That Phantom Gave Me!

Tue, 28 Aug 2018 13:51:00 GMT

Oh, What A Blow That Phantom Gave Me!
Buy Now: $320.00

This film takes its title from a book written by filmmaker Edmund Carpenter in 1972 about his engagement with media in Papua New Guinea. In the film, several filmmakers discuss the introduction of media, and film in particular, to native cultures. Media has the ability to help native peoples document their own cultures, but it also has the power to encroach upon those cultures and irreversibly alter them.

This film relates the ways in which native peoples engage with media, from the Biami who proudly developed the "Big Wink" to learn how to properly focus a camera, to the Kandagan people who changed the rules of a thousand year old male initiation ceremony to allow a woman camera operator to document the ceremony.

At issue is the way in which media "swallows cultures" and the benefits and dangers of introducing preliterate societies to Western modes of communication and expression.

Screening History

John Culkin Award for Outstanding Praxis in the Field of Media Ecology. Media Ecology Association, 2004

IWF International Festival of Ethnographic Film, Germany, 2004

8th Royal Anthropological InstituteÕs International Festival of Ethnographic Film, England, 2003

Northeastern Anthropological Association, Burlington, Vermont, 2003

14th Beeld voor Beeld Ethnographic Film Festival, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 2003

4th Media Ecology Association Annual Conference, 2003

American Anthropological Association, Chicago, 2003

7th Documentary and Ethnographic Film Festival of Belo Horizonte, Brazil, 2003

Taiwan Ethnographic Film Festival, 2003

Documentary & Ethnographic Film Festival of Belo Horizonte, Brazil, 2003

Göttingen International Film Festival, Germany, 2004

Interuniversity Ethnographic Film Festival of Montreal, 2005

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Our Lives In Our Hands

Tue, 28 Aug 2018 13:51:00 GMT

Our Lives In Our Hands
Buy Now: $320.00

Our Lives In Our Hands examines the traditional Native American craft of split ash basketmaking as a means of economic and cultural survival for Aroostook Micmac Indians of northern Maine. This documentary of rural off-reservation Indian artisans aims to break down stereotypical images. Basketmakers are filmed at their craft in their homes, at work on local potato farms and at business meetings of the Basket Bank, a cooperative formed by the Aroostook Micmac Council. First person commentaries are augmented by authentic 17th century Micmac music.

"This documentary film, in which our voices are going to be heard and in which we show how we live, how we work, and ways we have chosen to continue the lives of our fore fathers and mothers, will make an important difference. The Aroostook Micmac Council has fully supported this project. The Micmac Indian community is thankful and proud to share our lives with all of you in the hope that this film contributes to a better understanding of who we really are."
-- Chief Donald Sanipass

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Documentary Educational Resources - Filmmaker / Prins, Harald / All Films

Oh, What A Blow That Phantom Gave Me!

Our Lives In Our Hands