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Invited Session: Cornelia Eckert and Ana Luiza Carvalho Da Rocha
Abstract Submissions Closed
RC57 Visual Sociology (host committee)
Language: English
Session Type: Oral
Invited Session
Key figures in Brazilian urban and visual anthropology Cornelia Eckert and Ana Luiza Carvalho da Rocha, coordinate two research centres: The Nucleus of Visual Anthropology (Navisual) and the Bank of Images and Visual Effects (see https://www.ufrgs.br/biev/) at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul in Porto Alegre.
Their work highlights and theorises the contribution of visual, audial and audio-visual methods to urban anthropology. Focused on Porto Alegre, the Bank of Images and Visual Effects (BIEV) holds films, sound recordings and visual essays that explore and recreate a palimpsest of this place over time. BIEV bears witness to the ongoing effects of broad historical, structural forces including extreme inequality, evictions of indigenous peoples, urban insecurity and conflicts over water and land. At the same time, their work highlights the words, agency, humour and creativity of those whose lives are represented. Resisting the flat, mono-tonal and linear approach of many academic platforms, BIEV incorporates past, present and imagination through historical maps, drawings, drone images and local music – a site for the collaborative construction of collective memory.
Drawing on Benjamin, de Certeau, Simmel, Perec, Silva their work is however grounded in the multiple complexities of a diverse settler community in the Global South. Highlighting the need for academics to work collectively and dialogically, they argue that visual anthropologists (and sociologists) – alongside others including human rights activists, urban planners, transport organisations, resident groups, artists and poets- can influence change.