Ethical Issues in Documentary
This document discusses several key ethical issues in documentary filmmaking including: - Ethics are an ongoing process that involves continual discussion and understanding different perspectives. Signing a release form is just the beginning. - Directors Gordon Quinn and Alanis Obomsawin discuss the challenges of protecting subjects' privacy while exposing their lives, and making intentions transparent to viewers. - Filmmakers must consider their own biases and assumptions, and whether their films could recreate stereotypes. They must also think carefully about "speaking on behalf" of others. - The power imbalance between filmmakers and subjects is an important ethical consideration, especially regarding subject representation. - There are differing views on paying subjects and how it could influence
Ethical Issues in Documentary
- 1. Ethical Questions In Documentary Production School of Creative Media, Professor Shannon Walsh
- 2. Ethics are not static Signing a release form is the beginning of a discussion about responsibilities and implications But, a release form does not ensure you have dealt ethically with your subjects Ethics is a continual process, ongoing discussion and understanding of empathy It is one of the key issues in documentary filmmaking Ethics is taking responsibility.
- 3. Gordon Quinn on Ethics “There are no set rules in documentary filmmaking, only decisions about where to draw the line.” “the documentary process relies upon a constant negotiation of power relationships among the story, subject, and viewer.” …how to protect subjects' privacy while intimately exposing their lives, to filmmakers' responsibility to make their method and intent transparent to the audience.”
- 4. Obomsawin on Ethics “Alanis Obomsawin (Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance) says her films represent “the voice of our people, which has been silenced for many, many hundreds of years.”
- 5. What are your invisible assumptions & biases? Will the world of your film recreate stereotypes and assumptions? Who are your participants? Class? Wealth? Poverty? Race? Ethnicity? Gender? Other kinds of appearances? Sexuality? Environment? Power structures? Moral stance and world views?
- 7. Speaking on ‘behalf’ of others Think about “how charity gets dispensed by the privileged, how it can feel to the recipients, and how self-serving it can be to imagine one is promoting someone else’s interests.” -Michael Rabiger
- 8. “The difference in the power of filmmakers and their subjects can often be best measured by their relative access to the means of representation. Do subjects have the means to represent themselves? Do they have alternative access to the media apart from that provided by a given filmmaker? To the extent the answer is "no," the filmmaker's ethical obligation to avoid misrepresentation, exploitation and abuse rises correspondingly.” –Bill Nichols
- 9. Paying people? There are many different approaches to paying participants. As a rule, most documentarians say it is best to never pay subjects, as it will influence their performance, but there can be exceptions. We are in human relationships with the people you are filming.
- 10. Connections Don’t make films about people you don’t like! This isn’t a rule, but being condescending to your characters can come across as terrible. Sometimes you need to do it, but in general, empathy shines through.
- 11. 01 Dilemmas: Nathi & the blind Zimbabwean refugees
- 14. Segment on Ethics talks to a number of directors on their approaches.