ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the Life in a Day and Britain in a Day participatory documentary projects to explore the possibilities and tensions in creating culturally diverse representations of everyday life through film. It connects the Life in a Day with the 27critical approaches of Malik and Saha to address issues of participation and diversity. The chapter engages with critical perspectives on participatory cultures and documentary filmmaking. Specifically, it examines three dimensions of the Life in a Day projects: the invitation stage; the participatory processes; and the public responses. The chapter investigates how the management and usage of user generated content can be examined through analysing user generated content. It argues that initiatives to create diverse representations of everyday life must move beyond the 'numbers' approach to wide and diverse participation and go on to address cultures of production.
