Geographic film as public research

Re-visualizing/vitalizing a terraced landscape in the Italian Alps (Piccola terra/Small land, 2012)

Datos Bibliográficos

ID3977515
AutoresMauro Varotto (0000-0001-5966-3691, University of Padua, autor de correspondencia), T Rossetto (0000-0002-9877-907X, University of Padua)
Año2016
Volumen17
Número8
Páginas1140-1164
Fecha de publicación2016-11-16
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaSocial & Cultural Geography (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1464-9365 • E-ISSN: 1470-1197
EditorialInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/14649365.2016.1155731
OpenAlexW2315790129
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas3
Referencias citadas43

This article describes an experience of geographic filmmaking carried out within a long-term research process (2000–2012) involving the terraced landscape of the Brenta Valley in the Italian Alps. The documentary Piccola terra [Small land] (2012) was co-produced by geographers and professional directors. Engaging in the recent debate on filmic geographies, the aim of this article is to discuss and show what makes a film ‘geographic’. The geographer authored a filmic interpretation of landscape which is spatially and temporally complex, open and mobile, anchored to material features and to personal stories and socio-economic contexts. Produced to support a campaign for the adoption of abandoned terraces by ‘new farmers’, the documentary Piccola terra serves as a means to engage society and produce landscape change. Geographic filmmaking as an action-, public- and social-oriented activity is discussed with reference to the so-called ‘impact agenda’. We propose a style of active engagement through filmmaking which is workable, rather than critical. In order to avoid purely auto-reflective, auto-referential academic speculation on doing filmic and public geographies, this paper, which ideally is read along with viewing of the documentary, materially enters the researched/filmed landscape, developing into a supplementary tool for the international dissemination of Piccola terra

Archaeology · Art history · Cartography · Filmmaking · Geographer · Geography · Media studies · Movie theater · Sociology · Geographies of human-animal interactions · Historical Geography and Geographical Thought · History · Rural development and sustainability