Academic Video online
Academic Video Online
The library catalogue is now subscribed to the Alexander Street video platform. This means you can now watch a selection of movies, television series, and documentaries through the library catalogue. Films such as 'Je ne suis pas moi-meme' and 'Nanook of the North: a story of life and love in the actual Arctic' are available to watch as an eVideo through our catalogue. Watch our guide below on how to use Academic Video Online:
eVideos Guide
Further Reading
Continuing research beyond the screen...
Some items from the library to assist with illuminating, critiquing and researching films and documentaries from our collection. Click on the image to access the library record!
Visual Resource Centre
The Visual Resource Centre
The Visual Resources Centre provides access to a variety of DVDs which include rare artists films, documentaries as well as classic films and audio material. Here are some DVDs which explore the theme of Anthropology. Click on the DVD title to be redirected to the item's record in the library catalogue!
Summary from the Irish Film Institute: "Robert Flaherty’s seminal documentary, Man of Aran today remains one of the most important cinematic depictions of western Ireland. Initially arriving for an overnight stay, Flaherty eventually spent over two years among the native community of the Aran Islands, which are described as “wastes of rock…without trees…without soil”. The film focuses on one family that represents the larger population and chronicles their struggle to eke out an existence in environs that constantly threaten to overwhelm them. Flaherty’s bold mix of documentary and dramatic fiction has led to criticisms of the film’s veracity, but what cannot be doubted is the sheer beauty of the imagery. With its elemental drama played out against the backdrop of a vast and ever-changing sea, this remains a remarkable document of a bygone era."
Papua New Guinea: Anthropology on Trial
Summary from Internet Archive: "Filmmakers travel to Papua New Guinea for a look at anthropology from "the other side," making the point that some of the remote islanders made known to the world by such anthropologists as Margaret Mead have begun to object to this attention."
Shot in Cameroon and Brussels, Je ne suis pas moi-même examines the complex network surrounding the international market of African antiquities, and the contradictions in a European art market hungry for new tribal objects. Where do the African masks come from? What journey do these masks make before their unveiling in the windows of the biggest galleries or art collections in Europe? Who determines the economic and aesthetic value of these objects now that colonialism is supposedly dead? And then there’s a continent called Africa, in need of economic resources and therefore willing to sell its cultural heritage or, if need be, to fake it. The authenticity of the objects becomes blurred when the people that once adored them start to sell them.