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Acclimations: Speculations on Making Documentary in the Climate Emergency

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In ‘Acclimations: Speculations on Making Documentary in the Climate Emergency’ Kim Munro expands on ideas about environmental filmmaking through discussing her practice as an ecology which includes film production, community workshops and teaching. Munro discusses filming on Country with Aboriginal elder and writer, Bruce Pascoe, mobile filmmaking workshops in the Solomon Islands and teaching an environmental filmmaking course during the COVID-19 lockdown. Through these seemingly disparate practices, the author makes a claim for a documentary practice that weaves together multiple modes in what constitutes the documentary project. This is particularly pertinent in light of the climate emergency and the kinds of multivalent strategies that need to be employed. Rather than positioning the filmmaker as author and expert, her practice is grounded in an ecosystem of relationships.

Keywords: climate change ; ecology ; ecosystem ; environmen ; ethnography ; filmmaking ; mobile filmmaking ; participatory ; pedagogy ; precarity

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References

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  2. Beebe, R. . ( 2020;). On ‘Amazonia’. . Media-N: The Journal of the New Media Caucus, 16 (1), 67–78.
     [Google Scholar]
  3. Bruzzi, S. . ( 2006). New documentary: A critical introduction (, 2nd. ed.). Routledge;.
     [Google Scholar]
  4. Chang, A. Y. . ( 2019). Playing nature: Ecology in video games. University of Minnesota Press;.
     [Google Scholar]
  5. Cizek, K. ,, & Uricchio, W. . ( 2019). Collective wisdom: Co-creating media within communities, across disciples and with algorithms. https://wip.mitpress.mit.edu/collectivewisdom106
  6. de Cuir, G. . ( 2021). Chipping away at the Earth. Immerse. https://immerse.news/chipping-away-at-the-earth-534b6f9dfd22
  7. Gan, E. ,, Tsing, A. ,, Swanson, H. ,, & Bubandt, N. . (2016). Introduction: Haunted landscapes of the anthropocene. In A. Tsing, N. Bubandt, E. Gan, & H. Swanson (Eds.), Arts of living on a damaged planet: Ghosts and monsters of the anthropocene (pp. 1–14). University of Minnesota Press.
  8. Gibson, R. . ( 2015). Memoryscopes. University of Western Australia Press;.
     [Google Scholar]
  9. Gough-Brady, C. . ( 2019;). A river as a character. . Video Journal of Education and Pedagogy, 4 (2), 140–146. https://doi.org/10.1163/23644583-00401016
    [Google Scholar]
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  11. Kimmerer, R. W. . ( 2020). Braiding sweetgrass: Indigenous wisdom, scientific knowledge, and the teachings of plants. Milkweed Editions;.
     [Google Scholar]
  12. Lipari, L. . ( 2014). Listening, thinking, being: Toward an ethics of attunement. Pennsylvania State University Press;.
     [Google Scholar]
  13. MacDougall, D. . ( 2019). The looking machine: Essays on cinema, anthropology and documentary filmmaking. Manchester University Press;.
     [Google Scholar]
  14. Melbourne City Council .. ( 2021). Adapting to climate change. https://www.melbourne.vic.gov.au/about-council/vision-goals/eco-city/Pages/climate-change-adaptation-strategy.aspx
  15. Moore, H. . ( 2015). Living in molecular times. . In B. Blaagaard & I. Van der Tuin (Eds.), The subject of Rosi Braidotti: Politics and concepts (pp. 47–56). Bloomsbury;.
     [Google Scholar]
  16. Munro, K. . (Director). ( 2021). Regeneration [Film]. Self-produced.
  17. Nixon, R. . ( 2011). Slow violence and the environmentalism of the poor. Harvard University Press;.
     [Google Scholar]
  18. Pascoe, B. . ( 2014). Dark Emu. Scribe.
  19. Pink, S. . ( 2015). Doing sensory ethnography (, 2nd. ed.). Sage;.
     [Google Scholar]
  20. Rust, S. ,, Monani, S., , & Cubitt, S. . ( 2012). Ecocinema theory and practice. Taylor & Francis;.
     [Google Scholar]
  21. Salazar, J. F. . ( 2015). Science/fiction: Documentary film and anticipatory modes of futuring planetary change. . In A. Lebow & A. Juhasz (Eds.), Companion to contemporary documentary studies (pp. 43–60). Wiley-Blackwell;.
     [Google Scholar]
  22. Stewart, K. . ( 2011;). Atmospheric attunements. . Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 29 (3), 445–453. https://doi.org/10.1068/d9109
    [Google Scholar]
  23. Steyerl, H. . ( 2006;). The language of things. . European Institute for Progressive Cultural Policies, 3 . http://eipcp.net/transversal/0606/steyerl/en/print
    [Google Scholar]
  24. Story, B. . (Director). ( 2019). The Hottest August [Film]. Grasshopper Films.
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     [Google Scholar]
  26. Tsing, A. ,, Bubandt, N. ,, Gan, E. ,, & Swanson, H. . ( 2017). Arts of living on a damaged planet: Ghosts and monsters of the anthropocene. University of Minnesota Press;.107
     [Google Scholar]
  27. Vidal, J. . ( 2020). ‘Tip of the iceberg’: Is our destruction of nature responsible for Covid-19?. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/mar/18/tip-of-the-iceberg-is-our-destruction-of-nature-responsible-for-covid-19-aoe
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  29. WWF .. ( 2020). New WWF report: 3 billion animals impacted by Australia's bushfire crisis. https://www.wwf.org.au/news/news/2020/3-billion-animals-impacted-by-australia-bushfire-crisis#gs.3qh36i
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