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Photo of Marina Svensson

Marina Svensson

Professor

Photo of Marina Svensson

Digitally Enabled Engagement and Witnessing: The Sichuan Earthquake on Independent Documentary film

Author

  • Marina Svensson

Summary, in English

This article builds on recent works on witnessing, socially engaged documentary filmmaking and studies on the role of new digital technologies for witnessing trauma, recording memories and enabling activism. In a devastating earthquake in Sichuan province on 12 May 2008, almost 90,000 people, at least 5000 of them being children, died. Parents and bystanders provided the first footage of the earthquake, recorded in shaky images on their mobile phones and camcorders, and many later continued to document the destruction and their search for justice, which hailed the beginning of citizen camera witnessing in China. A range of Chinese filmmakers documented the disaster and its aftermath in full-length films, and in doing so helped the victims bear witness to their trauma and fight for justice that was unacknowledged in the traditional media. At least 16 independent documentary films have to date been made dealing with the earthquake in different ways. The films fall into different types, ranging from poetic, observational, expository, participatory and performative, and they also reveal different forms of witnessing practices. The article addresses the witnessing practices of ordinary citizens, enabled by new digital technologies, and analyses a selection of the documentary films with respect to their genre and modes of witnessing.

Department/s

  • Centre for East and South-East Asian Studies, Lund University

Publishing year

2017

Language

English

Pages

200-216

Publication/Series

Studies in Documentary Film

Volume

11

Issue

3

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

Topic

  • Studies on Film
  • Human Aspects of ICT
  • Social Sciences Interdisciplinary

Keywords

  • documentary film
  • digital technologies
  • Internet
  • China
  • earthquake
  • activism
  • witnessing
  • Asian studies

Status

Published

Project

  • Digital China

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1750-3299