Founded by Lucien Castaing-Taylor in 2006, Harvard's Sensory Ethnography Lab promotes innovative combinations of aesthetics and ethnography, especially in film, video, sound, and photography. The Sensory Ethnography Lab has been honored with retrospectives around the globe, including as part of the 2014 Whitney Biennial in New York, and has produced some of the most acclaimed and groundbreaking documentaries in recent years.
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EXPEDITION CONTENT2021 Anthropology Cinema Studies Cultural Studies Directed by Women Education Indigenous Studies Political Science Sensory Ethnography Lab Sociology World History 2022
An immersive marvel of sonic ethnography, Expedition Content draws on audio recordings made by recent college graduate and Standard Oil heir Michael Rockefeller as part of the so-called Harvard-Peabody Expedition to Netherlands New Guinea in 1961
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SO DEAR, SO LOVELY2021 Directed by Women Middle Eastern Studies Sociology Short Films Sensory Ethnography Lab Peace & Conflict Cinema Studies 2022
In this two-part tour through the streets of Lebanon, a colorful Palestinian cab driver offers offhand insight into the regions fraught political and social climate through boisterous serenades and excitable outbursts.
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LIMBO2021 Latin-American Studies Spanish Language Indigenous Studies Short Films Sensory Ethnography Lab
An oneiric journey through Alex's life as a former guerrilla leads to a reckoning with the devil inside of him. His only cure is ayahuasca, sacred plant used by the indigenous community where he comes from. As both a perpetrator and victim, Alex exemplifies the complexity of the Colombian conflict and the difficulties of simply moving on.
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HOW TO RUST2018 African-American Studies Art History Cinema Studies Sensory Ethnography Lab Anthropology Directed by Women
From the Sensory Ethnography Lab at Harvard University comes a postindustrial fable told in iron, rocks, and wood. A unique look at Detroit artist Olayami Dabls’ installation “Iron Teaching Rocks How to Rust”
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INTO THE HINTERLANDS2018 Anthropology Cinema Studies Dance Directed by Women Sensory Ethnography Lab
The Detroit-based performance ensemble, The Hinterlands, practice a form of ecstatic training which they see as a provocation towards the unknown. The “hinterlands” evokes an unknown space both physical and imaginary whose mystery is its very source of generation and from which true creativity emerges. Their practice is one of ecstatic play, of finding the edge of one’s balance, and the limits of one’s body.
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LINEFORKAnthropology American Studies 2017 Music Sensory Ethnography Lab Cinema Studies Aging / Gerontology
Meet Lee and Opal, an elderly couple living in the Appalachian Mountains. Recorded over three years, Linefork is an observational film about marriage, community, resilience, and the raw yet delicate music of an unheralded banjo legend, linked to the past yet immediately present.
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SINGLE STREAMSensory Ethnography Lab Labor Studies Environmental Studies 2014 Business
A singular appreciation of waste processing " graceful, mesmeric, almost balletic " Single Stream plunges viewers into the steady flow of a materials recycling facility where hundreds of tons of refuse are sorted each day. Yet another revelatory documentary from Harvard"s Sensory Ethnography Lab Single Stream locates the beauty, efficiency and futurism of an industry built on our culture of excess.
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AS LONG AS THERE'S BREATHSensory Ethnography Lab Women's Studies Labor Studies Asian Studies 2014 Directed by Women
Following the acclaimed Kale and Kale and Monsoon- Reflections, As Long as There's Breath is Stephanie Spray's third film documenting the lives of the Gayeks family in Nepal. Building on a deep bond of trust (Spray was eventually adopted by the family), she captures a multi-generational household struggling for cohesion after the departure of a beloved son.
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UNTITLEDSensory Ethnography Lab 2014 Asian Studies Anthropology Directed by Women
A revealing one-shot portrait of two Nepali newlyweds in a moment of rest and playful interaction, Untitled challenges our perception of two themes at the very core of ethnographic filmmaking: human relationships and the ways in which they can be experienced by the viewer.
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KĀLE AND KĀLESensory Ethnography Lab Asian Studies Anthropology 2014 Directed by Women
In exploring the lives of two wandering Nepali musicians, an uncle and nephew, Kāle and Kāle (pronounced kah-lay) exposes the rootless occupation of the Gaine caste and communicates both its joys and pitfalls – domestic, economic and spiritual – in their daily lives.
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MONSOON-REFLECTIONSWomen's Studies Sensory Ethnography Lab Labor Studies Asian Studies Anthropology 2014 Directed by Women
Drawing its title from a poem by the renowned Nepali poet Lekhnath Paudyal, which depicts the monsoon season as sublime and blissful, “joyous from start to finish,” filmmaker Stephanie Spray captures the melancholy and grit of two strong-willed female field hands (passengers in Spray and Velez’ Manakamana) as they carry out their arduous routines; a deeply felt reflection on labor, gender, and fleeting pleasures in rural Nepal.
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THE YELLOW BANK2014 Sensory Ethnography Lab Asian Studies Anthropology
A short documentary that captures the longest total solar eclipse of the 21st century, The Yellow Bank takes you on a contemplative boat ride across the Huangpu River in Shanghai, China. The film uses the eclipse as a catalyst to explore the way weather, light, and sound affect the urban architectural environment during this extremely rare phenomenon.
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