The 1920s museum-sponsored expedition film: Beguiling encounters in an all-but-forgotten genre
2011; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 9; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/17460654.2011.621311
ISSN1746-0662
Autores Tópico(s)Media, Gender, and Advertising
ResumoAbstract Many natural history museums, including the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH), enthusiastically adopted the young medium of motion pictures in the form of the sponsored expedition film. This essay examines Camping Among the Indians, shot in the American Southwest in 1927 by Clyde Fisher, AMNH curator (and later Chairman of the AMNH Hayden Planetarium), and Ernest Thompson Seton, wildlife illustrator, children's book author, and founder of the Woodcraft League (1902) and the Boy Scouts of America (1910). Co-sponsored by the Woodcraft League, Camping Among the Indians serves as a revealing case study in reconstructive film history, and the extant footage and sparse documentation of its exhibition illuminate the unique situation of the museum sponsored exhibition film as a vital, if overlooked, area of ethnographic filmmaking. Keywords: Expedition filmmuseumsNative AmericansWoodcraft LeagueBoy Scoutsethnographic film Acknowledgements Several people offered invaluable support and feedback in the writing of this essay: Joshua Bell, Alison Brown William Boddy, Peter DeCherney, Barbara Mathé, Simon Popple, and Haidee Wassoon. Notes 1. For a discussion of the expedition film, see Staples 2005 Staples, Amy J. 2005. Popular ethnography and public consumption: Sites of contestation in museum-sponsored expeditionary film. Moving Image, 5(2 (Fall): 51–78. [Google Scholar] and Brown 2001 Brown, Alison K. 2001. "Revealing histories: A cross-cultural reading of the Franklin Motor Expedition to Canada". In Collectors: Expressions of self and other, Edited by: Shelton, Anthony. 23–40. London: Horniman Museum in association with the Museu Antropologico of the University of Coimbra. [Google Scholar]. 2. The Gallup Inter-Tribal Ceremonial occurs every summer and according to the official website. 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