ABSTRACT
This chapter shows how documentary film and video production, with their reliance on visual images bring, into bold relief many of the ethical quandaries of field research more generally. Any research question of social significance carries emotional and social investments and potential ethical conflicts over the representation of findings. It introduces principles from psychoanalytic theory and social action research methods that inform the Sierra Leonean documentary projects. Although there is a rich history of psychoanalytic film theory, including feminist psychoanalytic film theory, the documentary film has been relatively under-theorized despite a growing consensus that the line between fictional and non-fictional films can be murky. The chapter enlists dual theoretical lenses in discussing visual methods in the Moving to the Beat project, the second of two documentaries carried out in collaboration with Sierra Leonean peace activists.
