Both sides of the camera: anthropology and video in the study of a Gcaleka women's rite called Intonjane.
[摘要] This thesis explores the potential of video as a researchtool for anthropologists in the recording of a singleritual. The study examines interactions betweenethnographers, informants and viewers. The thesisreveals the capacity of video to make possible close,detailed readings of performance in terms not originallyanticipated by the researcher. Archival storage of thevideo recording allows for critique and assessment of theresearch.The case study chosen in which to test the potential of\ dcso as a research tool was a woman's 'initiation'r^L'ial (called inton jane) in Shixini in the Eastern Gape(in what was, until recently, the independent homeland ofTranskei). Historically, the ritual was supposedly heldat the time of a girl's first menstruation, this beingthe physical symbol of her transformation into adulthood.Ritual seclusion served to effect an accompanying socialtransformation in preparation for marriage.Paradoxically, in the late 1980's, it was older women andmothers, already married and well past the age of firstmenstruation, who were undergoing the ritual seclusionand symbolic marriage. The study explores this paradoxwith the goal of understanding the purpose of the ritualin contemporary times. By recording large segments ofthe ritual on video, and subjecting the footage to aclose analysis of verbal and non-verbal aspects ofperformance, both the ritual and the merits of video asa research tool could be examined.Video was utilised, in an interactive research process,as an information elicitation tool. The analysis of therecorded text of the ritual brings to the fore elementswhich make what is apparently a paradox understandable.The elements which explicate the paradox were notanticipated when the research commenced, and in alllikelihood would have eluded a researcher who did nothave the benefit of the incidental capture on video. Thethesis reveals the enormous Contribution video can maketo research and suggests that video has an importantcontribution to make to the discipline of anthropology.
[发布日期] [发布机构] University of the Witwatersrand
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