Documentary, Culture and the Mind

Research output: Book/ReportBookResearchpeer-review

Abstract

This book presents articles on the different documentary genres from a cognitive theoretical point of view, but it also analyses case studies in American and
European documentary film and television on issues like history, war and climate
change. The book presents some of my most important articles on documentary film and television between 1994-2020. During this period I developed a theory of documentary genres inspired by cognitive theory, a theory that puts the basic narrative, emotional, and cognitive dimensions of media production and media use in focus. However, even though a basic, theoretical dimension runs through all the articles defining the main genres of documentary and the way audiences relate to
and interact with this, they also try to illustrate how documentary genres interact with history, society and culture, and how they speak to and influence our individual mind and the collective public debate. Documentary is a very central genre in our highly mediated and global world: the stories they tell, can potentially create mediated cultural encounters between people belonging to different societies and culture. The case studies presented deal with our historical past and heritage, with the global climate change and with war and social crisis. Cognitive theory stresses the
universality of humans, across social and cultural differences. However, the human and documentary diversity is just as important.
Original languageEnglish
PublisherSaxo Publish
Number of pages192
ISBN (Print)9788740409918
ISBN (Electronic)9788740402896
Publication statusPublished - 15 Jul 2020

Keywords

  • Faculty of Humanities
  • Documentary
  • Cognitve theory
  • Documentary genres
  • War
  • History
  • Climate change

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