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The history of visual anthropology in India and the task ahead
K. N. Sahay
a
a
Professor, Department of Anthropology, Centre of Advanced Study, Ranchi University, Ranchi,
Bihar, India
Online publication date: 17 May 2010
To cite this Article Sahay, K. N.(1991) 'The history of visual anthropology in India and the task ahead', Visual
Anthropology, 4: 1, 25 41
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The History of Visual Anthropology
in India and the Task Ahead
K. N. Sahay
This paper is a brief history of the earliest efforts of anthropological film making in
India. It includes documentation of ethnographic films, the international body in
India, and seminars at Delhi and Jodhpur. The filming of the rich cultural heritage of
the country; stock-taking; realistic fiction films; national, regional, and global net-
works; educational, archival, and research activities are explored. Additionally, the
author looks to future tasks to be undertaken by visual anthropologists in India.
Visual anthropology is inextricably connected with photography, whether it
be still photographs or films on the life and culture of various peoples that
are used for teaching, research, feedback, or other applied purposes.
Visual anthropology in India is still in a state of formulation and has yet to
emerge as an organised and effective discipline. One has to go back as early
as the end of the last century to understand its genesis. It is linked with the
beginning of fiction films in India when one could hardly think of anything
like visual anthropology. Nevertheless, many early film pioneers in the
country could very well be said to be the precursors of visual anthropology.
Efforts having a bearing on visual anthropology in the beginning were
widely diffused and contributions relevant to it have been made by persons
and organisations of diverse backgrounds not necessarily connected with
anthropology. However, it is only recently that some people have been
forcefully pleading the necessity of developing visual anthropology as a
useful discipline, keeping in view the world trend in anthropological
studies, and its vast scope in India.
Thus, any attempt to construct a history of visual anthropology in the
country will require piecing together the diffused efforts of the early dec-
ades and discussion of some important events in recent times that have
smoothed the way to the creation of visual anthropology in India.
K. N. SAHAY, Professor, Department of Anthropology, Centre of Advanced Study, Ranchi University,
Post Box 71, Ranchi, Bihar, 834001, India. He was co-chairman of the Commission on Visual
Anthropology, IUAES from 1973 to 1978 and organized the first International Seminar on Visual
Anthropology to be held in India, at Delhi in 1978. Sahay is widely published and serves as editor of the
Visual Anthropology Bulletin. Among his major interests are anthropological film projects for
Doordarshan, Delhi. Sahay's fields of specialization include cultural change, religion, social structure,
Indian civilization, ethnology, visual, and "spiritual" anthropology.
25
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26 K. N. Sahay
In India, a number of the early films were made by pioneer photogra-
phers and others who did not come from the profession of anthropology,
though their short films were generally shot on a wide range of real life
situations that occurred naturally and were close to ethnographic films.
Unwittingly, they were creating an informal tradition of Indian visual an-
thropology.
EARLIEST EFFORTS
Indian films date back to 1896 when the first fiction film was shown in the
Watson's Hotel in Bombay by the agents of the Lumiere brothers of France.
In the early years, films were mostly documentary and ethnographic in
character though obviously they lacked anthropological and methodologi-
cal sophistication, and related to life and culture and important events in
India. A significant development took place when the operators who fol-
lowed came with their projectors and cameras, often combined into one,
and found the scenic grandeur of India a good source to feed their constant
need of filmable materials. Coconut Fair and Our Indian Empire, the latter
showing the monuments of Delhi and the famous Imambara Palace of
Lucknow, were the first two films of this kind, made in 1897 by unknown
cameramen, and were also perhaps the first documentary films about India.
In Calcutta, it was Mr. Stevenson who brought the first 'bioscope' show to
the city in October 1898 at the Star Theatre [Rangoonwala, 1975:12]. The
same year, Mr. Stevenson shot local items known as A Panorama of Indian
Scenes, including the procession of Parashnath through the streets of Cal-
cutta. At about the same time in Bombay, Mr. Anderson showed some
documentaries based on Indian scenes: Train Arriving at Bombay Station and
Poona Race '98. In early 1899, Mr. P. A. Stewart announced some more 'local
scenes' in his shows at Trivoli.
The 'first really Indian footage' was canned by Mr. Harischandra S.
Bhatvadekar, who shot a film on a wrestling bout at Bombay's Hanging
Gardens in 1897 entitled The Wrestler. Another short was made by him which
showed some monkeys being trained by their master. In 1900 a film titled
Fatima, an Indian Dancer was shown in Bombay. In the mid-1900s Mr. F. B.
Thanawalla's film, Taboot Procession, covered the annual pageant of the
Muslims as it passed through the busy Kalbadevi roads. In 1903 Hiralal Sen
of Calcutta presented a series of his films, Indian Life and Scenes. These films
included scenes of Indian domestic life as well as events from Indian history
and Hindu mythology.
In 1906 the Elphinstone Company produced several shorts: Grand Parash-
nath Procession; Bathing Ghat of Howrah; Goat Sacrifice at Kalighat; Dancing of
Indian Nautch Girls; and Grand Masonic Procession. At about the same time,
the Paris Cinematograph showed films on Scenes of Native Life in India which
included the Malabarese, Charming Snakes, Juggling a Girl, and Dancing. The
names of the filmmakers, however, remain unknown.
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India: The Task Ahead 27
In 1910, the Excelsior Cinematograph of Bombay presented coverage of the
annual Muslim Festival of Muharram in Delhi. Fugitive Dalai Lama was
another special attraction, which is of special historical significance now,
showing the Tibetan leader's flight from the Chinese to seek protection in
the then British Indian Territory and the big reception given to him. In 1911
12 the coming of George V to India and the Delhi Darbar attracted the
attention of many filmmakers who covered the various events connected
with the Darbar.
Films relating to some aspects of feudal life in India were also produced:
Marriage of a Maharaja [1911], Coronation of Maharaja Holkarat Indore, filmed by
Gaumont and the Excelsior Cinematograph, coverage of a garden party for
Sir Shapurji Broacha, all in 1912. In about the same year a film, Benaras or
Kashi, depicting the scenes of religious life in the sacred city of the Hindus,
was made by an unknown cameraman and shown at the American-Indian
Theatre. Another short depicted the Ganpati Festival, exclusively photo-
graphed for Cinema de Lux [Rangoonwala 1975; Raha 1974:63-66; Srivas-
tava n.d.].
In the years that followed, the Indian film industry made rapid growth.
The talkie cinema came into being on 14 March 1931, when Alam Ara, the
first Indian talkie feature produced by Ardeshir M. Irani, was released at the
Majestic, Bombay [Kak 1980:5] and themes of films now shifted from shorts
and documentaries depicting situations and events from real life to the
classics, religious and mythological aspects of Indian culture, historical
events, reformation themes, or those made for pure entertainment. Under
the impact of Western culture, films based on themes of war and propa-
ganda also inspired governmental and private agencies.
DOCUMENTATION BECOMES MEANINGFUL
A systematic and more meaningful history of ethnographic films or docu-
mentaries with an ethnographic bias relating to glimpses of life and culture
of Indian people, however, did not start until India gained freedom in 1947
when a national government was formed and an urgent necessity was felt to
project the rich cultural heritage of India through the medium of short films.
The Films Division, Government of India, under the Ministry of Informa-
tion and Broadcasting came into existence in 1948.
With an annual target of 157 short films and a weekly national news review, Films Division is
the world's largest single short film unit. Out of the 157 films, about 50 are produced for the
Defence and Agriculture ministries; the remainder cover miscellaneous subjects. The films
for general release are dubbed in 15 languages, and distributed in the country's 11,000
theatres to a weekly audience of some 60 million [Tandava 1983:62].
So far, over four thousand documentary films have been produced. They
relate to a broad range of themes. Of all these films, those coming under the
categories of 'Biographies', Arts', 'Festivals', 'People of India', and 'Experi-
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28 K. N. Sahay
mental Films' are of special interest and relevant to the present context. The
Films Division has compiled a voluminous catalogue of its films made
between the years 1949 and 1972 and some other catalogues of selected films
from time to time.
Besides the Films Division, a number of state governments have also
produced several short films through their Departments of Information,
Publicity, or Public Relations. Such documentaries of the Governments of
Assam, Meghalaya, Arunachal, Manipur, Tripura, West Bengal, Madhya
Pradesh, Orissa, and Himachal Pradesh which show dances, festivals, arts
and crafts, economic life, historical events, or the nature of cultural change
among the tribal and non-tribal peoples of the respective states may spe-
cially be mentioned.
By and large, the films of the Government of India and the state govern-
ments mentioned above have a running time between ten to thirty minutes.
They are too short to depict a complete or systematic picture of even a single
aspect of life and thus lack scientific precision. Nevertheless, they give us
some glimpses of life and are in some measure important visual documents
of culture.
Among private companies Burmah-Shell, India, planned and produced
forty half-hour documentary films between 1954 and 1968 for Burmah Shell
Oil Company, with Indian production units, for distribution in various
regional languages within India. Among those which are of special interest,
mention may be made of the series on village life in Travancore, West
Bengal, and East Punjab. Other series related to family life in Andhra
Pradesh and Karnataka, and the life of weavers, tanners, martial dancers,
Oraons, fishermen, and so forth.
A significant development took place in the field of ethnographic films
when the Anthropological Survey of India, a Government of India body,
took up this task and produced under the supervision of anthropologists,
more than fifty ethnographic films since 1954. These films cover a wide
range of communities, regions, and aspects of Indian life. Out of the total,
thirty-seven films are in colour. The running time varies between eight and
fifty-seven minutes, though in a majority of the cases they are more than
thirty minutes in duration. These films mainly relate to the life of tribal
communities from different parts of India: the Abor, Onge, Nicobarese,
Khasi, Riang, Juang, Toda, Gaddi, Asur, Birhor, Olari Gadaba, Bison Horn
Maria, Rabari, Monpa, Garo, Lanjia Saore, Cholanaikan, Lahaulees, and
Spitialees. They also cover arts and crafts, and festivals and fairs held in
different parts of India. Most of these films are without sound though in
recent years efforts have been made to produce sound films.
Some of the tribal or cultural research institutes started by the state
governments in the early fifties, especially in Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, and
West Bengal, have also made some ethnographic films relating to the life of
some of the tribal communities in their respective states.
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India: The Task Ahead 29
It is of interest that several universities in the United States, Europe, and
elsewhere offer courses on South Asia with the help of ethnographic films
produced either by foreign anthropologists or agencies who have been
working independently in India or in collaboration with Indian counter-
parts. Here, mention may be made of the Department of South Asian
Studies, University of Wisconsin, Madison, State University of New York,
and others. The former made a film series called Contemporary South Asia.
The State University of New York, through an arrangement with James
Beveridge Associates, produced a series of biographical films on the Music of
North India. The fifth edition of Films for Anthropological Teaching published
by the American Anthropological Association [Heider 1972] includes half-
a-dozen interesting films on the Ganges, a mountain community, north
Indian village life, Tibetan traders, and other topics.
One of the recent films in this context is The Ho; The People of the Rice Pot (70
minutes) by Michael Yorke of London. This is a detailed ethnographic film
backed by data sheets for classroom discussion and analysis. Margaret C.
Fairlie of Ithaca College, New York, directed and edited two films on Tribal
Groups of Central India; Lifeway, Ceremony, Dance in 1971-72 which present a
unique educational contribution. These films record the ceremonial rites
and dances of four tribal and caste populations against the exotic back-
grounds of their contrasting ways of life, economics, and ecological settings.
Interaudiovisuel [1980], an official organisation in France, in its list of
ethnographic films published in 1980 mentions nearly a dozen ethno-
graphic films on India produced since 1965 by a number of French agencies
such as SERDDAV, S. Genevoix, les Films de TAdagio, INA, CNRS, and
others. These films depict the Ganges, Pushkar, a Buddhist village, boat-
men, dances, singers, and ballads. The Encyclopaedia Cinematographica [Wolf
1977:174r-77] published by the Institut fur den Wissenschaftlichen Film,
Gottingen, also lists a number of ethnographic films from India on the Bhil,
Baiga, Toda, Kond, Hindus, life in Mithila (North Bihar), Nagas, and others.
Besides these films, some professional film directors, either on their own
initiative or sponsored by others, have from time to time produced or
directed documentaries or films of ethnographic interest on India. Paul Zils,
a German, directed a film, Our India, in the mid-fifties which not only
showed glimpses of contemporary life but depicted a few scenes from
Indian history as well. Roberto Rosellini, the famous Italian director, came
to India in the late fifties and made an abortive attempt to produce India.
Satyajit Ray made a documentary on the life of the Sikkimese. Other names
that come to mind in this connection are K. A. Abbas, Sukhdev, Shyam
Benegal, Mani Kaul from Bombay, and Barindranath Saha, Sushil Karan,
Tarun Mazumdar, Ashish Mukherjee, and Harisadhan Das Gupta from
Calcutta. This list is not, of course, exhaustive [Sahay 1983:53].
Thus, in the light of these facts relating to the development of ethno-
graphic films in India it may be said that since the end of the last century
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30 K. N. Sahay
when the technique of cinematography was imported to this country by
agents of the Lumiere brothers of France and used for making short films of
a documentary and ethnographic character, several isolated attempts have
been made by different persons and organisations coming from different
backgrounds or those connected with anthropology to make meaningful
documentary and ethnographic films. However, such materials are widely
scattered and the efforts which have so far gone into the making of such
films lack coordination, system, and a 'convergent point' on the national
level that are necessary for the systematic growth of a discipline. Many
people interested in the making of such films do not know about others
engaged in this field, or how their films could be made available. Many
films of the early pioneers seem to have been 'lost' or may be lying in
unknown places, in a precarious condition due to lack of proper facilities or
knowledge about preservation. There is also lack of proper technical knowl-
edge on the part of many persons who want to make such films. Besides,
visual anthropology is a costly proposition and lack of funds is still another
big hurdle in the making of films.
INDIA HONOURED BY AN INTERNATIONAL BODY
Against this background, a very significant development took place in the
field of visual anthropology in India when the ICAES nominated an
IndianK. N. Sahay from the Department of Anthropology, Ranchi Uni-
versity (the present author)to act as its co-chairman from 1973 to 1978. A
preliminary meeting of the commission
2
convened at Ranchi in February
1977. Besides its chairman and other members from Japan (Masao Oka,
chairman; Junichi Ushiyama, member; Yasuko Ichioka, member) and
France (Marielle Delorme, who represented Jean Rouch), the meeting was
attended by L. P. Vidyarthi, President, IUAES [1973-78] and ICAES [1978] as
a guest participant.
Matters relating to cooperation with other organisations connected with
ethnographic films, substantial financial support for the activities of the
commission, the necessity of preparing, on an urgent basis, a catalogue of
bibliographies of ethnographic films, and production of ethnographic films
on themes specially relating to Third World countries like India were dis-
cussed. It was also decided to hold a symposium on visual anthropology
and an exhibition of ethnographic films during the Xth ICAES at New
Delhi. Dr. Sahay was entrusted with the task of exploring funds for this
purpose, doing the necessary correspondence, and organising the sympo-
sium on behalf of the commission. He approached nearly half-a-dozen
international and national bodies for necessary funding but unfortunately
nothing could be procured from any source except the Finance Committee
of the ICAES, which granted a modest amount. The co-chairman also
visited Tokyo and Paris in 1977 at the invitation of Dr. Masao Oka, the
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India: The Task Ahead 31
chairman of the commission and Nippon Audio-Visual Productions (NAV),
Tokyo, Japan, and Dr. Jean Rouch, General Secretary, CIFH, Paris, respec-
tively. (His foreign travels were sponsored by NAV while hospitality in Paris
was given by CIFH.)
The commission felt that since nearly two dozen committees and organ-
isations connected with ethnographic films throughout the world had pre-
pared their respective indices of ethnographic films, what was needed was
the creation of a bibliography of all such bibliographies or indices of films.
Jean Rouch of the Musee de l'Homme was requested to accomplish this task
through his organisation, while Junichi Ushiyama of NAV Tokyo, a member
of the commission, was requested to prepare an index of ethnographic films
on Asia and Oceania. Anna Hohenwart-Gerlachstein of Vienna, another
member of the commission and chairman of the Commission on Urgent
Anthropology, strongly pleaded for cooperation between the two commis-
sions and consequently published a few notes in her newsletter relevant to
those interested in visual anthropology. Sahay took up the matter of preser-
vation under proper conditions of the valuable ethnographic films of the
Anthropological Survey of India, the necessity of adding a sound track to
these films, making copies available to other institutions and researchers,
and developing this wing under the guidance of a senior anthropologist of
the ASI, with its director and some senior officials of the Department of
Culture, Ministry of Education, Government of India.
THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM AT DELHI
Subsequently, a definite advance was made when a five day International
Symposium on Visual Anthropology was organised at Delhi, in the audi-
torium of the NCERT in December 1978, on behalf of the commission.
The symposium was a great success. Originally, it was scheduled for only
three days, but was extended for two more. In addition to the symposium,
there was a screening of some three dozen ethnographic films for partici-
pants in the Xth ICAES. Marielle Delorme of Paris organised this pro-
grammr at Vigyan Bhavan, the main venue of the ICAES, on behalf of the
commission. The symposium was attended by delegates from ten countries:
Japan, Korea, Tunisia, Australia, France, Austria, the Federal Republic of
Germany, Canada, the United States, and India. It consisted of seven
sessions where a number of papers and ethnographic films were presented
and discussed.
This symposium was the first organised activity in India relating to visual
anthropology on country-wide and international levels, which will hope-
fully go a long way in shaping the future of visual anthropology in the
country. For India, this event constituted an important landmark in the
history of visual anthropology, where, among other things, possibilities
were explored to ensure international cooperation to develop it with special
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32 K. N. Sahay
reference to Third World countries. An emphasis was laid on establishing a
global network of regional and national centres in visual anthropology to
coordinate the filming, indexing, educational, archival, and research activ-
ities. The symposium created a deeper interest in ethnographic filming
among a section of young anthropologists, other scholars, and amateur
filmmakers, and inspired them to explore the rich prospect of ethnographic
films in India.
It was with this in view that the biannual, Visual Anthropology Bulletin,
containing news relating to ethnographic films and short articles, was
edited and published by K. N. Sahay beginning in June 1979.
On the last day of the symposium, a meeting of the Commission on
Visual Anthropology was held in which the following resolutions were
adopted:
Whereas the increasingly rapid loss of cultural variety in the world has intensified the need to
prepare permanent researchable, illustrative records of vanishing ways of life and culture;
and whereas the visual potential of film makes it well suited to presenting and preserving
multicultural viewpoints in records of human heritage; and whereas humanistic film studies
heighten national and international awareness of the needs of ethnic groups by presenting in
accessible and understandable form information vital to their social, cultural, and political life;
For these reasons it is resolved:
1. That the Resolution on Visual Anthropology passed at the IXth International Congress of
Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences, Chicago, September 1973, be hereby reaffirmed
and emphasized.
2. That film studies be undertaken which go beyond the particular belief system of a single
culture to present multicultural viewpoints.
3. That new kinds of humanistically oriented centres be created to take advantage of the
multicultural potential of the visual media for furthering human understanding.
4. That the technologically advanced nations be encouraged to lend resources, training, and
effort to developing nations, particularly those with broad independent cultural traditions,
to develop local talent and expertise in visual anthropology.
5. That, since much of anthropology is in the Western cultural traditions, a new type of
humanistic orientation be developed in which the nonverbal potential of film is employed in
cross-cultural studies and documentation.
6. That freer international movement of educational, cultural, and scientific film materials be
encouraged.
7. That a joint international commission on ethnographic film and urgent anthropology be
formed to bring together from time to time the existing Commission on Urgent Anthropol-
ogy and the Commission on Visual Anthropology.
8. That, in pursuit of the goals delineated above, a global network of regional and national
centres in visual anthropology be established to coordinate the filming, indexing, educa-
tional, archival, and research activities required.
SECOND INTERNATIONAL SEMINAR AT JODHPUR
The first Delhi Symposium on Visual Anthropology, held in 1978, deeply
inspired and stirred the imagination of a few people. It led to a second
International Seminar of this type A Portrayal of People, organized at Jodh-
pur from 15 to 19 December 1987. The idea of this seminar was conceived by
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India: The Task Ahead 33
Jayasinghji Jhala (currently at Harvard University), an ethusiastic young
man and filmmaker who was an active participant in the Delhi Symposium
and presented two ethnographic films, Apatani Sacrifice and Forgotten Head-
hunters. Jhala gave concrete shape to his idea with the help of the Indian
National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH), New Delhi, which
is associated with Pupul Jayakar and Rajiv Gandhi. Later on, the Anthro-
pological Survey of India joined in a big way and co-sponsored the seminar,
which took place with K. S. Singh, the Director General, A.S.I., as its
General President and Mr. Jayasinghji Jhala as the Coordinator of Pro-
grammes. Besides a large number of Indian delegates, nearly twenty for-
eigners participated, including Asen Balikci, Chairman of the International
Commission on Visual Anthropology, and John Marshall. Nearly fifteen
papers and several interesting ethnographic films were presented and thor-
oughly discussed. The seminar resolved to undertake the following tasks:
to lend support to institutions and stimulate interest within the ministries of
the Government of India; to identify Indian filmmakers and encourage a
dialogue between them and anthropologists on issues of common interest;
to promote films in India which would include the establishment of an
archive and the hosting of an annual ethnographic film festival; to identify
individuals and organizations with the skills, time, and shared sense of
purpose with whom collaboration can be undertaken to establish work-
shops and scholarships; and to promote interaction between Indian visual
anthropologists and their counterparts elsewhere in the world [Menon
1987:11]. Only time will tell how far these ideas are translatable into reality.
THE TASK AHEAD
India is a society with varied geographical, racial, economic, linguistic,
religious, and cultural groups. It has a rich variety of culture ranging from
that of pre-farming and folk communities to complex urban and industrial
societies. One can find here societies which represent all the stages in the
evolutionary process of cultural development. There are tribal groups as
primitive as cave-dwellers, hunters, food-gatherers, or shifting agricultur-
ists. On the other hand, some of the groups are so acculturated that they
have completely taken to the urban or civilized way of life. A large variety of
caste, creed, and religious groups, along with rural and urban styles of life
and a wide range of ecological settings which helped to develop different
types of culture, present still other dimensions of Indian life and civiliza-
tion. Indian civilization itself has an orthogenetic growth with a very long
history, and unity amidst diversity has been one of its basic characteristics.
A host of religious centres situated in different parts of the country, the
institution of pilgrimage, and the religious intelligentsia connected with it
foster a sense of unity amidst elements of heterogeneity. It all promises a
vast scope for visual anthropology.
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34 K. N. Sahay
In view of all this, there are a number of tasks before us which must be
accomplished on an urgent basis to develop visual anthropology in this
country. The first and the foremost task is a stock-taking exercise to locate
the various persons and organisations from India and abroad who have
been connected with the making of ethnographic and relevant documen-
tary films in the past and the present; to collect details of such films, evaluate
their quality, classify them meaningfully, and index them scientifically to
make them useful to the students and researchers of visual anthropology,
planners or whosoever is interested.
Some of the organisations, such as the Anthropological Survey of India,
various research institutes, public relations departments of state governments,
film divisions and the like, have their own catalogues of films. It would be
necessary to make an annotated bibliography of all such catalogues. The
documentaries made by persons or organisations not connected with an-
thropology should be scrutinized carefully and only those films which are
ethnographic in nature and relevant to anthropology should be selected.
Locating documentaries by pioneers in the silent era may prove to be a
difficult task as the whereabouts of some are unknown, many have been
completely destroyed, and still others have been stored in improper and bad
conditions. One has to know about and retrieve them, and preserve them
under proper conditions.
There are several communities living in precarious conditions as a result
of the negative forces of modernity they have been exposed to or the change
in the ecological balance and the new forest legislation. Their customs and
practices are fast disappearing. Some of the tribesOnge, Little Andaman-
ese, Shompen, and Jarwaare even threatened with cultural and physical
extinction. In view of this we are faced with the proverbial question of 'now
or never' and visual anthropology has to act fast by making a list of priorities
for the purpose of filming such communities.
Visual anthropology has still to take shape in our country. So far attempts
made in this field are highly diffused. One of the reasons for this is the lack
of information among those interested. Some people have the necessary
resources and potential to contribute to this field but have no idea of the
work done by pioneers or others in this field. Again, there are anthropolo-
gists devoid of the knowledge of cinematography, and filmmakers inter-
ested in the subject but devoid of the knowledge of anthropology. Under the
circumstances, dissemination of information relating to ethnographic films,
technical or otherwise, or the persons connected with them, developments
in the field, and available funds, is greatly needed. All these objectives can
be fulfilled by establishing on an urgent basis a National Centre of Audio-
Visual Data with a network of five regional sub-centres in different parts of
the country.
Such an Audio-Visual Data Centre should visually document the variety
of culturally patterned human behaviour which reflects diverse, sometimes
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India: The Task Ahead 35
unique, expressions of basic human potential on the one hand, and emerg-
ing developments in societies that lead to modernisation on the other [ICEF
1978:2].
Audio-visual materials will help us to study non-verbal communities and
'body language'. Such material may also serve as a scientific tool allowing
the repeated examination of movement and behaviour, segmented into
regular units and slowed down for microanalysis as developed by Ameri-
can scholars like Gregory Bateson, Ray Birdwhistell, Edward Hall, Alan
Lomax, Margaret Mead, and others in their film analysis [ICEF 1978:2].
Sorenson wrote:
. . . We need better understanding of how man fits into and copes with the world and its
transformations, including those he himself generates. These newer technologically based
ways of life change perhaps even more rapidly than do isolated cultures. Our incomplete
understanding of the dynamics of such change, or its socio-biological significance, fre-
quently forces us to make uninformed and arbitrary decisions about its direction. Movement
into the future would be less traumatic and more adaptive if we had greater understanding
[Sorenson 1975:463].
He talks further of four basic functions of such audio-visual data centres:
Repository and Archiving: which will store and preserve film records of man's varied ways of
life; maintain facilities and equipment to locate, view, and abstract specific kinds of visual
data from the collections; and provide a means to duplicate sequences needed for research
and educational projects;
Acquisitional: which will undertake and support programmes to document vanishing
cultures and changing patterns of human behaviour and encourage local production of
visual documents; accept gifts of films for deposit; copy undeposited original films before
they are edited; and purchase endangered prints of early films;
Research: which will support the scientific study of various ethnographic and 'research
films',
3
already archived; promote studies of various filming approaches; and support
studies to increase the potential of film as a scientific and humanistic resource;
Educational: which will support and conduct seminars, training fellowships, workshops,
etc., in the visual documentation of changing culture and human behaviour; support the
production of educational materials from holdings; and support studies of new ways to use
visual materials in education [reworded from Chanock and Sorenson 1975:473-74].
The heterogeneity of visual data in India, the complexity of its culture and
civilization, and the richness of its religious and philosophical traditions
provide ample scope for research and new experiments in the visual presen-
tation of anthropological material. Lost Child and Trip, the two films made by
Jagat Murari and Pramod Pati respectively, of the Films Division, Govern-
ment of India, are symbolic presentations of certain philosophical thoughts
[Sahay 1980:1]. Duvidha (Dilemma), directed by Mani Kaul and based upon a
Rajasthani folk tale dealing with spirit possession and exorcism, is another
significant film which opens a new vista in cultural studies as it has a
distinctive style.
The data centre will also work as a liason agency between the government
and the persons or organisations interested in making relevant films. It will
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36 K. N. Sahay
assume a greater importance if it acts as a storehouse and disseminates all
kinds of relevant information pertaining to visual anthropology in this
country and abroad through published materials of seminars and sympo-
sia, or newsletters, bulletins, and journals. Several other dimensions of
ethnographic filming can also be explored by the audio-visual data centre. It
may be of interest to note that films have a commercial side in an interna-
tional market. Hence, they may be commercially exploited, which could
gradually create requisite funds to enrich the data centre.
Films have a great feedback
4
value and this aspect should be fully utilized.
It has been observed that the lack of knowledge about others' culture often
breeds misunderstanding while a knowledge of it promotes mutual apprecia-
tion and trust among people. It would be useful to telecast a regular series of
films about the different peoples of India as this will foster a sense of mutual
understanding and integration on a national level. Such films may be of one
hour's duration and could be shown once or twice a week on Indian television.
Films dealing with comparative, cross-cultural subjects of universal inter-
est and importance like rites-de-passage, economy, religion, dances, crafts,
tribal problems, and the like, might be telecast. Such films serve a useful
purpose by radiating new ideas and insights among the people and are an
important source of 'controlled change' in the desired direction. They
would also be useful to planners and administrators and enable them to
have a better understanding of the needs of the communities they work for.
The introduction of various 'video booths' in our museums on the pattern
of the National Museum of Ethnology at Osaka, Japan, known as Videotheque
in that museum, would be significant. Visitors could then see international
ethnographic films of their choice. The Japanese museum has thirty-seven
video booths, a control room with a small computer, automatic video
cassette tape players, special robots, and so on [Omori 1978:1]. Such booths
in Indian museums, apart from facilitating human understanding and
national integration, will also work as an important tool for anthropological
research.
The vastness of the field in India is not met by the poor resources, and
indeed, there are hardly any funds available for ethnographic filming. It
calls for priorities to be fixed in terms of geographical areas least covered,
communities still untouched, and those aspects of culture that are changing
fast owing to the impact of modern forces. A phased programme for ethno-
graphic filming is obviously implied. A comprehensive filming programme
for India has to be carefully evolved to include many representative commu-
nities of the country and the various facets of Indian life. Here one has also
to keep in mind the need for cross-cultural visual data from different parts of
the world. The Visual Anthropology Bulletin, published in Ranchi, has taken
stock of ethnographic films about India.
This objective can be fulfilled by locating interested visual anthropolo-
gists, scholars, filmmakers with anthropological insight, institutions, and
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India: The Task Ahead 37
government officials interested in ethnographic filmmaking. They would
form a national committee with regional offices which would provide an
infrastructure of experts and work in dose collaboration with the audio-
visual data centre. This national committee would pursue the matter with
central and state governments, especially the Ministry of Information and
Broadcasting, the Films Division, and the Public Relations Departments and
create an awareness for the promotion of ethnographic films by requisition-
ing the services of visual anthropologists. The various Tribal Welfare Re-
search Institutes of state governments and the departments of anthropol-
ogy in various universities can also contribute significantly to ethnographic
filming. Some have audio-visual wings with cameramen, but due to finan-
cial constraints and lack of adequate technical know-how or interest, they
are sitting idle.
Apart from this, the departments of anthropology in various universities
should introduce visual anthropology as a part of their curriculum.
5
This
will help to popularise the subject and go a long way in serving the cause of
visual anthropology in the country. The bias against the use of film in
teaching on the part of older anthropologists is probably due to a lack of
technical knowledge, the paraphernalia associated with it, and the heavy
financial commitment involved. However, the apathetic attitude has to be
removed and a new generation of teachers must come forward. A special
provision should be made for fellowships and scholarships in visual anthro-
pology, to be awarded by universities, the national committee, or the audio-
visual data centre.
The government has realized the necessity of promoting 'film culture' on
the campus and in 1984 the UGC came up with a proposal to establish film
societies in the universities [Khanna, 1984:1-9]. Bangalore University is the
first to introduce a short course in film appreciation [Bahadur, 1976:106].
Such developments are likely to have a favorable result and may directly or
indirectly strengthen the cause of visual anthropology in India.
So far, the Anthropological Survey of India, the largest anthropological
institution in the world in terms of its extension and spread, with headquar-
ters in Calcutta, has been the major producer of ethnographic films. Unfor-
tunately, this important wing has been virtually a one-man show, function-
ing under Sushanto K. Chattopadhyay, its cin cameraman, stationed at
Calcutta (now retired), though there are also a few other cameramen at some
other stations. Of course, Sri Chattopadhyay worked in association with
anthropologists of the ASI, but he alone has been responsible for shooting,
editing, and processing the films. The ASI can strengthen this wing by
appointing an anthropologist of the rank of a deputy director who has an
orientation and personal interest in filmmaking and who can be assisted by
other trained anthropologists.
Nippon Audio-Visual Productions of Tokyo has been organizing the
Tokyo Festival of 8mm films every year since 1973 in cooperation with the
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38 K. N. Sahay
Japanese Television Network and newspapers to encourage more and more
Japanese to film the life and traditional culture of their country [Sahay
1979:11]. Junichi Ushiyama, who organises this festival, told the author that
he met with tremendous success. Such a festival could be organised by the
national committee on an all-India and regional basis to help locate talent
and at the same time add to the body of visual data on India. Talented
persons can be encouraged to pursue visual anthropology as a profession,
hi fact, such an effort to organise an all-India festival of short films by Indian
amateur filmmakers has already been started by the Students' Association
of the Film and Television Institute of India, Poona [Sahay 1981b:6].
So far, native communities have been studied and filmed by outsiders.
But under the fast changing circumstances, it would be worthwhile to train
native talent to make ethnographic films about their own culture. Meth-
odologically, it would be significant to note the difference of perspective
between our conception of the native culture and the insider's conception
and projection of it as reflected in ethnographic films. Secondly, Indians
should be encouraged to make films on the life of non-native communities
coming from the mainstream of society with a view to gauge their under-
standing of other cultures.
Another area which needs to be explored under visual anthropology is
the 'New Wave', Art', or 'Realistic' fiction films being produced in India (as
elsewhere) for the last few decades. The films of Satyajit Ray, Mrinal Sen,
Shyam Benegal, Sathyu, Mani Kaul, Govind Nihlani, Girish Karnad, and a
host of others can be mentioned in this connection. Besides the short films
focused on real life situations and events which occur naturally and sponta-
neously, ethnographic films may also include, under a separate sub-cate-
gory, those films which are not pure fiction but in a considerable measure
present a faithful and vivid depiction of the typical lifestyle, problems, and
events connected with a particular cross-section of the society. They could
be ethnographically and anthropologically useful.
6
Such films influence society in two ways: materially and non-materially.
On the material level films influence fashion, dress and decorations, man-
ners, etiquette, style of living, crime patterns, and material goods. But the
impact works more powerfully on the non-material aspects of lifebelief
and value systems, ideals, morals, attitudes, levels of aspiration, horizons of
knowledge, and awareness of various situations. This is significant, for any
real change in a society must be preceded by a change in the ideational
aspect of life. However, films, besides being an agency of change, also
reinforce some of our basic traditional norms and values. They can thus be
an effective instrument of cultural revitalization.
Students of the Film and Television Institute of India, Poona, and the
Institute of Film Technology at Madras have to make diploma films on
completing their courses. Some of these students could be encouraged to
make ethnographic or relevant documentary films.
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India: The Task Ahead 39
The magnitude of work before us also calls for international cooperation
especially in matters relating to technical, organizational, and financial
aspects of the endeavour. Here one is reminded of some of the resolutions
adopted at the meeting of the Commission on Visual Anthropology held at
New Delhi in 1978 which envisaged that:
new kinds of humanistically oriented centres be created to take advantage of the multi-
cultural potential of the visual media for furthering human understanding; the technologi-
cally advanced nations be encouraged to lend resources, training, and effort to developing
nations, particularly those with broad independent cultural traditions to develop local talent
and expertise in visual anthropology; and the necessity of a global network of regional and
national centres in visual anthropology be established to coordinate the filming, indexing,
educational, archival, and research activities required.
Now is the time to see that such resolutions no longer remain confined to
paper but sincere efforts are made to implement them in the larger interest
of the global community of visual anthropologists. The Commission on
Visual Anthropology of the ICAES and those immediately connected with it
should pursue the matter to ensure some results.
NOTES
1. This paper is a thoroughly revised and enlarged version of a paper published earlier in A
Portrayal of People: Essays on Visual Anthropology in India, Anthropological Survey of India,
New Delhi and INTACH, New Delhi, 1987.
2. A detailed report of this meeting of the Commission on Visual Anthropology held at
Ranchi was published in Review of Ethnology, Newsletter No. 2 1977-78, pp. 203-06.
3. "The research film method provides identified and annotated visual records useful for
continued study and use. These visual records are unedited and not in themselves "films"
in the usual sense: there is no attempt in them to present a coherent statement or point of
view. Not designed to demonstrate a conclusion or to impose preconceived ideas, they are
intended to facilitate review and study of passing, naturally occurring phenomena. They
are not constructed to conform to the aesthetic models of our age or to present worked out
concepts. Rather they are designed to serve as information potential: they are ordered and
annotatedbut not edited, rearranged or abstracted. Thus the name research films
[Chanock and Sorenson 1975:432].
4. Jean Rouch [1975:100] has the following to say about feedback: "This extraordinary
technique of "feedback" (which I translate as "audio-visual counter-gift") has certainly not
yet revealed all of its possibilities, but we can see already that, thanks to feedback, the
anthropologist is no longer an entomologist observing his subject as if it were an insect
(putting it down) but rather as if it were a stimulant for mutual understanding (hence
dignity)."
5. Earlier, the author had published "A Model Syllabus for Visual Anthropology" [Sahay
1981a:l-2] as one of two papers about teaching visual anthropology on the post-graduate
level to suit Indian universities. It was later expanded into "A Model Curriculum in Visual
Anthropology" [1986-87] for the U.G.C.'s Curriculum Development Programme in post-
graduate anthropology and sociology at the Department of Anthropology, Ranchi Univer-
sity, Ranchi, and sponsored by the University Grants Commission, New Delhi.
6. K. N. Sahay's paper "Visual Anthropology and Indian Fiction Films," Journal of Social
Research 29(2), September 1986.
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40 K. N. Sahay
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