ABSTRACT
Most of the ethnographic film projects discussed in either this handbook or the rest of the scholarly literature are the result of scholarly work by professional academics with access (albeit variable) to time, equipment, funding, and assistants. In this chapter, the author discusses the use of ethnographic film and video as the main “deliverable” of a graduate project. Filming people as they are being interviewed complicates university ethics. Most universities have an ethics policy based upon issues encountered in science experiments, and this can sit awkwardly with the methodologies of other disciplines. The experiential nature of video allows for a different type of knowledge transfer. Elements that are implicit in text, for instance body-language, spatial relationships, or visuals, can be explicit in audio-visual media. There may be days when having to convince department chairs, deans, or thesis committees of everything one wish to do will take an emotional toll on them.
