Silvio Carta completed his PhD in Italian Studies at the University of Birmingham. His articles and reviews have appeared in Visual Anthropology, Visual Anthropology Review, Visual Studies, Visual Ethnography, and Journal of Italian Cinema and Media Studies, among other publications. To find out more about his book Visual Anthropology in Sardinia, Film Matters conducted a Q & A with Carta via email correspondence (June-July 2015).
Kailyn Warpole: Please tell us a little more about your book.
Silvio Carta: Visual Anthropology in Sardinia is a book about the advantages of the medium of film over written academic texts. It focuses on the construction of different experiences and identities in Sardinian documentaries and ethnographic films, and includes a discussion of theoretical developments in the area of visual anthropology. The book offers a survey of the somewhat peculiar filmic ethnographic discourse established in relation to Sardinia, which has often been constructed as a repository of all sorts of stereotypes about the Italian South.
KW: What inspired you to explore such a unique topic?
SC: I got the inspiration to write on such a unique topic from the landlord once a month. Theoretically the main sources of inspiration have been the impact and reception of Edward Said’s Orientalism on the discipline of cultural anthropology and the films and writings of ethnographic filmmaker David MacDougall, a very noble person I admire in many respects. His writings and artistic sensibility have inspired me to think, and it would be fair to say that without them it would have been virtually impossible for me to express my thoughts in an academically acceptable form – I believe so anyway. In all truth I felt special emotional and intellectual affinities with MacDougall’s ways of thinking and expressing himself, and these complicities of style have been a source of gratification for me as a human being.
KW: What were some of the most interesting discoveries you made while researching?
SC: The most interesting discoveries I have made while researching are nonacademic. I am not too sure I have added anything new in relation to the joyful mystery of defining the concept of “reality” in documentary and ethnographic film. I would say that the most interesting and often disheartening discovery I made while researching is that academics know how to write academically.
KW: How long did it take to put Visual Anthropology in Sardinia together, from concept to publication?
SC: The idea first hit me in 2008 while watching documentary films about Sardinia. Most of them dealt with Sardinia in a repetitive and dishonest way that I found very hilarious, and this spurred me into developing a serious doctoral project so that I could watch more documentaries and attempt to say something interesting about them. Then it took me three years and a half to write the book, and two years to sign the contract with Peter Lang.
KW: The book calls particular attention to the historically “limited circulation and commercial availability of Sardinian documentaries.” Did you encounter any challenges in trying to access Sardinian films for your research sample? How could readers go about finding Sardinian documentaries to view at home?
SC: I did not encounter any challenges in trying to access Sardinian films, partly because I am Sardinian and could spend extended periods of time on the island watching the films for my research sample and enjoying the good things in life – walks, food, and good weather. Readers interested in Sardinian documentaries may watch them online. The Sardinia Digital Library [http://www.sardegnadigitallibrary.it/], for example, is a sort of visual encyclopaedia of Sardinia’s cultural past. It offers a form of audiovisual memory that guarantees wide distribution of films and documentaries with high ethnographic content.
KW: In the first chapter, the book clearly outlines its approach, stating what it will discuss and analyze and what it will not. How did you go about deciding on your approach? Did you at first consider taking your research in other directions, or did you have a clear goal in mind from the start of the project?
SC: I did not have a clear goal in mind from the start and I have been pulled in so many directions and tangents . . . I am not a systematic thinker and it surprises me that I have written a whole single-authored book. I am convinced that if you need to write eighty thousand words to explain what you think, either you have very little to say or what you have to say is of very little interest.
Every chapter of my book was born as a self-standing piece addressing a particular issue: the representation of Sardinia in fascist documentaries and newsreels, the ability of ethnographic films shot in the observational style to overcome cultural difference, the understanding of film images as “natural” representations or the possibility of filmic autobiography.
KW: I found the section of the book in which you discuss “the role of the spectator” particularly interesting. To what degree (if any) do you believe that the role of the spectator changes from the documentary-esque fiction film Banditi a Orgosolo (1961) to the ethnographic documentary film Tempus de Baristas (1993)?
SC: It is difficult to answer this question, as different viewers see different things in different films. It is not easy to predict how the spectator is going to react to a particular film. I believe that both films are likely to allow elaborate and reflexive responses in the viewers, encouraging autonomous judgment, partly because this is what happened to me when I watched these films, which are both constructed using open strategies. But one can find many viewers who may feel threatened by Banditi a Orgosolo, or Tempus de Baristas, or both, most likely because of their lack of an extensive voiceover commentary providing political or historical contextualization.
KW: What do you hope readers will take away from your book?
SC: Readers can take whatever they wish from my book. One of my academic articles has been used to make a point in the Wikipedia entry for “Horror Film.” That’s quite interesting, or even amusing, as I did not write my article with horror films in mind. It is rewarding when people use your work in original and unpredictable ways. Unfortunately the queue of readers for books such as mine is not excessively long. Readers are the least of my concern, even academic ones in the fields of cultural anthropology or Italian studies. The expression “visual anthropology” may ring a bell to some of them, but perhaps not too loudly. I wanted to publish my book because I received a very generous EU scholarship through the Sardinian Council and I wanted to give something back in a tangible form. One might even say that having a book out may be a good way of trying to secure a job, but the true reason for publishing my book was to bring it into being.
KW: Can you offer any words of advice for aspiring film scholars?
SC: Well, I am not sure I can give very good advice for aspiring film scholars – I very seldom follow it. I was generously paid to do my PhD in the UK and that helped a lot, as I was interested in improving my English and in seeing new people and places. I am not sure there is a golden path to become a film scholar. I studied philosophy, for example, and I am interested in films more as a viewer than as a writer. My piece of advice would be to develop a thicker skin. If you don’t have it, get one. Now that I have published my book I am only skin, no bones left! One thing that helped me become a film scholar was a robust sense of humor and a healthy degree of cynicism towards what lecturers and peer reviewers who do not have the foggiest idea what you’re talking about call constructive criticism.
KW: What’s your next project?
SC: At the moment I am teaching religious education in a secondary school in the most religiously diverse road in Britain. Soho Road in Birmingham is a stellar example of multiculturalism, as the people who live there have their roots in one hundred and seventy countries. In teaching their children I have touched the reality of what I have read out of intellectual curiosity during my doctorate – that cultural, linguistic and religious differences very often pale before the actual, immeasurable presence of another individual.
Author Biography
Kailyn N. Warpole will graduate from the University of North Carolina Wilmington in December 2015 with a BA in film studies, a BFA in creative writing, a minor in English, and a Certificate in Publishing. In addition to Film Matters, she has done editorial work at Atlantis and Chautauqua, and hopes to continue working in the publishing field after she graduates.
To read Kailyn N. Warpole’s review of Visual Anthropology in Sardinia, please click on this link: https://www.filmmattersmagazine.com/2015/09/14/visual-anthropology-in-sardinia-silvio-carta-2015-reviewed-by-kailyn-n-warpole/
