the purity of perspective: using digital video in an applied research context.

1. When We First Met.

I’m watching you. I like what I see. I’m writing about what I see. I’ve taken on the role of an author. I am rendering a piece that would describe to you, dear reader, what it is I have been doing with a video camera lately, and why I am doing it. In reading it, you will probably agree with some elements, disagree with others, and hopefully question all of it. Within that exercise of coming to terms with what you read, you internalize that which is written, processing it in your own mind, and base your interpretation solely on the reference points that you have acquired over time, uniquely. They are distinct to you, and they serve to construct your perspective; pure, distilled, and yours alone. If I ever get to meet you, I would like to think that you and I could interact, and that this piece would serve as a catalyst for some dialogue. It’s precious. I can think of few things that award as much satisfaction as interacting with someone on the basis of some exercise where I have attempted to make my perspective explicit. It serves to challenge and recognize the reference points I have internalized, because through interaction with you I am forced to revaluate how I navigate my own experiences. I think this is called growing up.

I state this here, at the risk of stating the obvious, because this seemingly simplistic mapping of an interaction has given rise to a series of themes that, in their overlap and permutation, have become far from simple for me to negotiate, in my own mind in any case. I’m currently a doctoral research candidate. I spend my time asking questions. I reside in a community of 700 people, mostly farmers. My role in this community is varied, depending on whom you ask. My own take on what it is I am doing in this community is arguably equally as varied; it grows and develops into other representations regularly, catalyzed by what someone I had spoken to had told me in response to my query, the way their eyes moved to the left and then back to me after their response, and how I then interpreted and internalized their vocal and physical response to me. This awareness and analysis of my role in this community and the reactions I facilitate in these interactions rings within like some clarion call on a seemingly daily basis. I welcome this.

I ask these questions as I am trying to understand how a nation state deals with regulating technologies that are mired in uncertain consequences – consequences that may have been explicitly characterized statistically by probabilistic conjecture, but consequences that exist within a realm of risk and uncertainty regardless. If one doesn’t know what will happen when you introduce a technology into society, how does one proceed to manage it in an effort to maximize the welfare of a vast and often disparate number of parties who have vested interests in using the technology? I’m interested in a transgenic variety of cotton called Bt Cotton, and am basing my field research in the Vidharba region of Maharashtra, India. There has been a lot of discussion in political, academic, activist, and scientific circles about Bt Cotton, and the popular media has latched on to the rather sensationalist theme of farmers committing suicide in the region. But there is very little in terms of trying to gauge how farmers themselves navigate the technology and the terms they use to do so. I am particularly interested in how farmers understand the two terms that frame the debate on transgenics – risk and uncertainty – according to their internalized understanding, unique as they are from the parties listed previously. If one wishes to discuss how farmers identify with and use these new technologies, one must understand at the outset where farmers are coming from in terms of semantics and discursive reference points.

The problem I face is rooted in the person I have become. My awareness of maturing in a particular societal context has facilitated a reflexive paradox with regards to how I can ethically, efficiently, and successfully conduct this research endeavor. My perspective is borne of two cultural reference points; one of being the son of Bengali parents: macher jhol, listening to Anup Jalota’s voice in the afternoon, and going to Durga Puja in a hotel conference room somewhere every October. And on the other hand, being brought up in rural eastern Canada: Solomon Gundy, amplifier distortion, rugged 808 beats , lyrical nihilism, and game show hosts offering mercenary salvation. These are all admittedly superficial reference points, and I state them here not as a list of events that have been seminal factors in my development in full, but rather as an exercise in depicting variety. They are stated here to characterize in part my awareness of who I am as a work in progress.

2. An Exercise.

If this is who I have become, then how do I consider my faculty as someone to enter into a community that is geographically and spatially distinct from my own? As a doctoral student, I have been subject to the perspectives and directives of the academy. Trying to come to grips with the thought processes of those within a community via ethnographic inquiry and then rendering an interpretation of a series of events into something akin to a definitive description is not a novel exercise . Without a distinct awareness ones positionality, the outcome of the exercise may amount to something approaching a self-referential series of recollections and events, filtered through a lens tinted with personal, seminal experiences. The academy is aware of this, acutely. But this is a dynamic that simply is; you can’t become someone else in an attempt to be objective. You may attempt to abandon who you are temporarily for the sake of acting out a role scripted by yourself or as presented by another directive party, but you will return back to your original self, furthered enriched as you may be due to the temporary flight from normalcy, but “yourself” regardless. Ultimately, you can only refer to what you allegedly “know”, as formed by your own unique experiences, and what you author about the experience can only reflect this. I’m not entirely certain what objectivity truly means in such a context.

The basis of the problem is located at that initial entry point into a dialogue: the first question asked by you as a researcher. It is you who has formed the question. It is you that will then internalize the response and offer a further query to better isolate some semblance of a theme, notion, or narrative. And while it appears that you are engaging in a bilateral exchange, the end product is often a unilateral exercise in authoring the results of those interactions you have had. Those who formed the basis of your understanding are embedded in the paper; translated, transcribed, arguably transparent, or perhaps translucent. I accept that if not for asking questions, the exercise cannot occur. Yet I have to be accountable for the dynamics that arise from asking the questions in the first place. On the one hand, my role as a doctoral candidate is to learn how to do research, via a combination of my appreciating the experiences of others and through my own experiences. On the other hand, my role is to represent a certain reality to an audience who has never been to this community. It is this process of contextual accuracy in my representing my dynamic with this community and how I rationalized my perception of what I found that is an issue.

The only solution that appears feasible is to reallocate the responsibility of asking the question to those individuals who possess the experiences I wish to understand better. An exercise in asking farmers to define terms alone has presented a combination of what they expect I want to hear and their own honest interpretation of these terms. The challenge is to distil the latter down by removing the former as much as possible. In another representation of this dichotomy, it is to remove myself from this process as a directive element, and to allow those I am working with the opportunity to navigate these questions on their own terms. It is, in essence, to retain the integrity of the purity of perspective.

3. Ways And Means: A Theoretical Framework.

My attempt at addressing this challenge is through using the medium of the moving image as a tool to facilitate this role transferral. My interest in using the medium is not due to the explicit outcomes of a production (i.e. edited content for wide dissemination), but rather the process undertaken by others in depicting a fictional account of a series of events for eventual broadcast. It is the process of telling a story to another and how individuals working together come to some semblance of a consensual agreement on how to satisfactorily do so that is of interest to me, as that process serves as a catalyst among those negotiating the exercise to ask questions. Questions that I do not have the faculty to ask, as they are rooted in the distinct experiences of the participants. There are two bodies of work that I have drawn upon to facilitate this process as I have pursued it: first, what has been termed Participatory Video, and second, Participatory Rural Appraisal techniques. There has been some work in merging these two approaches by capitalizing on the common themes that both present, though mostly in a development context . In a research-oriented context, and in light of the issues I have attempted to make explicit here, I believe that there is a pressing need to recognize these symmetries in a practical, applied sense.

3.1 Of Participation and Pragmatism.

In a development context, the term participation has been used to such a wide extent that one cannot help but question what it means in a current, applied context. Shirley White describes participation in a developmental communication context as:

[…] a person’s active involvement in interaction, dialog, sharing, consensual decision-making and action-taking. Participatory communication is the foundation of this process. Empowering people around the globe to express themselves, develop their human potential, and begin to seize opportunities to lift themselves out of poverty and become a person valuable to the self and community, has been the ultimate outcome of the participation process (White 2003:33) .

The origins of the term in this context can be traced to the seminal work in the late 1960s of Paulo Freire on rural communities being actively involved in their own development via techniques that challenged the typical unilateral teacher to student dynamic and dichotomy , and more recently in the work of Robert Chambers on Rapid (and more recently, Participatory) Rural Appraisal, or PRA . Chambers’ work presented an alternative framework to fieldwork practitioners, bound by the pragmatic realities of distance, time, and language, but seeking to better understand the challenges faced by members of a particular community. It was a response to other efforts in providing “assistance” at the level of a community, where a third party would ascertain the problem, decide on a solution, and then return to the geographic area where the assistor is based. The boundaries outlined here often implied that the process of ascertaining the problem may have been based on a short visit to a community and concluding on what the problem is based on cursory observation or dialogue. Solutions were then based on the assistor deciding what the problem was using his or her framework of analysis to come to a conclusion, and that due to the geographic distance between the community and the assistor, that the implementation of the solution would be then left for the most part for the community to maintain and manage, with monitoring and evaluation exercises undertaken by the assistor within a specified timeframe only. PRA accepts these boundaries, and presents a pragmatic solution in light of these challenges via the incorporation of the community in all three elements, thereby facilitating participation.

Box 1: The Hallmarks of the PRA Approach

- Sustained participant observation over time in both formal and informal settings
- Group exercises or interviews that incorporate those living within the community to depict their reality through visual exercises and to determine points of entry as a consequence (i.e. diagrams depicting experiences, events, or relationships, developing calendars of particular events, generating maps based on transect walks)
- Generating procedural feedback by sharing the outcomes of these exercises with the community
- A focus on “well-being” (as defined by those in the community) as opposed to income to frame comparative exercises among members of the community
- “Role-reversal”, or reflexive processes that encourage both parties (especially the researcher) to question, learn and modify their approaches based on sustained interaction
- Non-exclusive and transparent inclusion among community members with the process

What is now termed Participatory Video (PV) is based primarily on the efforts of Don Snowden, who used video in the early 1980s with fishing communities in the Fogo Islands in Newfoundland, Canada. The aim was to identify common struggles and use the content as an advocacy tool by sharing the visual content with policy makers at the level of central governance . In essence, PV is an exercise whereby the process of production involves those that would commonly be termed “actors” in a documentary context and relegates them more as “producers”, thereby shifting the dynamic of who produces content, who determines what the story is for, and for what use the content will be applied towards.

Box 2: The Hallmarks of the PV Approach

- To remove the distinctions between producer, scriptwriter and actor by incorporating all as participants in the process over time, thereby ensuring that those producing and being represented in the content have more control over how they are represented
- Challenging the notion that engaging content can only be produced by parties with expensive equipment and significant broadcast oriented expertise
- Targeting particular audiences for eventual dissemination (i.e for advocacy, research, or monitoring purposes), with a muted focus on production quality and more emphasis on the process of content development
- The most relevant element of the exercise is the process of deciding how to tell a story, as doing so via discussion and deliberation within and among members of a community facilitates a pointed exercise in establishing what the issues truly are

The potential application of PV as a tool is very malleable, and can be tailored accordingly. But the common thread is the assumption that that the audiovisual medium presents a visceral, pragmatic, and immediate form of depicting a particular theme, and that control over that medium can be held by anyone, and used for a variety of purposes, with explicit reference to the terms championed by the producers .

3.2 Of Application and Symmetry.

While PV may find its roots in an exercise that took place forty years ago, it has begun to take on a new relevance in recent practice, due primarily to three reasons. First, devices to capture digital video (DV) are now widespread and relatively affordable . Cassette or card based DV cameras, mobile phones, and digital still cameras with video capture capability are common and becoming increasingly affordable. Second, editing and compressing content requires a simple desktop computer, an optical media writer, and either proprietary software (i.e. Windows Movie Maker within Windows XP and Vista) or free, open source distributions (i.e. dyne:bolic) . Third, sharing this content to a wide audience is possible to anyone with direct or indirect access to connectivity through portals such as YouTube or Google Video. Given this, the opportunity to use PV in conjunction with PRA presents itself as logical and pragmatic in a research context.

Box 3: Why Should PRA and PV Be Used Together as Complementary Research Tools?

- Facilitating a group scripting exercise on the broad themes of ones research facilitates a minimization of the intrusive nature and bias of the researcher from the exercise of both forming and asking questions, as community members themselves undertake the process of how best to present a narrative
- Broadcasting the resultant content (i.e. on a TV set, a laptop screen, or an LCD projector) facilitates immediate interaction and feedback with the participants and the broader community and gives rise to fora where further discussion can be had, often immediately after the screening
- The audiovisual medium is appealing and easily understood, and community members are drawn to the process, thereby facilitating wider inclusion
- Participants realize that creating content is not a highly technical affair, which furthers the possibility of future efforts of producing content to suit their own objectives, according to their own terms

The precise objective of my using digital video has been to address my positionality as a researcher, and to minimize my directive role as an “asker of questions” . In practice, this was achieved by facilitating a series of productions undertaken by farmers on a number of themes, not limited to my own research interests. The objective is to distil themes that are of concern to the community via a means that minimizes the possibility of my gauging the concerns based solely on responses of queries rooted in my own perspective alone, and to then address and analyse these themes in my research.

Box 4. How Have I Applied PRA and PV In Practice?

1. Establishing links. Prior to my visiting the community, I required contacts. I was looking for an organization that was both working in the area, as well as one interested in using video in the context I was proposing. The rationale here was that I did not want this exercise to be isolated to the time I was in the community, but to ensure that after I left, there would be someone willing to support the initiative and to widen the number of other parties who could be involved in the process, either as contributors or viewers. I decided to work with YUVA, an NGO based in Nagpur, about three hours away from the community . This was how I met the family I have been staying with, as well as others in the surrounding areas also involved in YUVA’s work.
2. Who are you? My first introduction to using the tool entailed house-to-house visits to ask the elementary questions that would allow me to focus logistically and thematically (i.e. your name, how much land you have, what you are growing). This would be achieved by my first asking these questions to one household, and after their response, to show them how to engage the camera to record and then ask the same questions to the next household, with that person showing the next how to engage the camera to record, and so on. This was done over 170 households over three days, which was then screened back to the community each evening for their comments and reactions.
3. What’s Your Story? A piece of paper would be divided into six sections (i.e. six scenes), and after giving an example of a story, I would then ask groups of people gathered in a coming public space to tell me a story in these six (or more) boxes by drawing it out, referring to themes of their own choice. In the first instance of doing this, one of the participants wrote down a dialogue to complement the storyboard with input from others, which was beyond what I had expected, but has since stuck procedurally.
4. The Shoot. The participants would then find actors and a “set” to shoot the story, based on the proceeding exercise. After deciding on who the cameraperson, sound tech, actors, and extras would be, they would then would shoot it. All editing was done in camera, which was relatively easy to do given the planned and sequential nature of each storyboarded scene.
5. The Screening. After the shoot was done and credits were added (i.e. a still shot of a piece of paper with the information written on it), my camera was hooked into my laptop, which was then fed into an LCD projector and enlarged onto a white bedsheet approximately ten feet high. It was broadcast in a common space where people could easily gather, and began around 8pm (i.e. after dinner). An amplifier and speaker were borrowed from the panchayat hall and a microphone was placed near the speaker of my laptop .
6. Late Night with KR. After the piece was screened, one person (KR, name changed here) from a neighbouring village (about a 15-20 minute walk away) who has done some voluntary work with YUVA and myself, acted as talk show host, and people came up to the mic and in front of the camera, which projected their interaction to the rest of the audience, about 200 people. KR would ask questions (in this case, about farming and cotton in particular) and conversations (often quite entertaining) would occur.
7. Processing and Analysis. Elements 2-6 would usually occur over an eight hour period over the course of a day. After it was all over (around midnight), I would begin to (and at the time of this writing, am) get the footage translated of the piece and the talk show, and attempt to make the necessary links to my research in terms of themes (i.e. risk and uncertainty) and their representation.

While 1-6 above are fairly procedural in nature, it is the last element, processing and analysis, that presents the most pressing challenge of all.

4. Processing and Analysis: A Case Study.

By way of an example, consider the piece on farmer suicide referenced above. There are distinct themes that arise here: what constitutes a “good” farmer (i.e. following instructions as presented by scientific institutions, avoiding debt, capitalizing on new technologies such as seed and pesticides, accumulating material wealth) and a “bad” farmer (i.e. what could be termed laziness, alcoholism, the acceptance of debt, and the resultant resort to suicide as a final solution the problems incurred from his decisions). Of interest to me here was this notion of formal regulation in terms of farming practice, as well as the role of credit in farmers’ decision-making processes (as voiced by the main scriptwriter at the end of the piece). The narrative seems to allege that in order to be successful as a farmer, one must capitalize on formal knowledge, and avoid informal debt.

In terms my own work, the link here is the relationship between traditional farming practice and new, “scientific” techniques, such as using Bt Cotton and other inputs. “Progress” is determined by successful application of these new technologies, and that information on how to do so should be gleaned from third parties; in this case, an agricultural university. This will lead to success: having two gas cylinders, a “Hero Honda Super Splendor”, cotton plants “up to my waist with 100 bolls and 200 flowers”. Via the more traditional elements of addressing my research objectives (i.e. formal/informal group interviews), I have found that an understanding of regulation at the level of farmers is not based on government directives or legal frameworks, but rather by practices undertaken by farmers for generations; what could be termed “traditional knowledge”. This exercise of production has provided additional insight on how farmers consider the introduction of new technologies, and the resultant onset of new ways of “regulating” their farming practice. If you want to succeed and be prosperous, you must adapt to new technologies in an informed manner, as the consequences of not doing so are dire indeed. This is what lies at the basis of a decision making process.

Prior to this exercise, I had not asked about what constitutes a “good” or “bad” farmer; I did not really consider it on those terms, as I was more focused on an understanding of regulation, risk, and uncertainty. In allowing those I was working with an opportunity to form their own narrative, I was able to gain access to a process of asking a question that I would not have asked otherwise, with the corresponding production and themes arising (i.e. a judgement of progress as fuelled by behavioural change via technological adoption as a means to avoid severe consequences) furthering my own capacity to understand what I was seeing.

5. Is This Valid?

Ultimately, as a research candidate, I am expected to produce a document that will serve to summarize, expose, and detail the findings I have derived via a process of inquiry and analysis. To do so, I will author a document (i.e. a thesis) that may very well fall prey to the same elements of authorial bias that I have been seeking to address via the methodology, and in my particular my interpretation of what I have witnessed, experienced, and internalized according to my own discursive reference points. It is an acute awareness of this dynamic that has led me to pursue this methodology; I have to accept the existence of this, as I am not clear on how one can go about the exercise without reference to what one “knows”.

I would never argue that using video in such a context could replace traditional systems of applied fieldwork inquiry in a research context. There has to be an initial familiarity with the people one is working with, which can be secured from both historical experience and everyday interaction (i.e. living in the community for some time, asking strategic questions, and using the extant literature as reference points to guide your inquiry). That said, the use of a video as a tool has opened up new doors of inquiry and analysis that I do not think I would have been able to pursue if not for offering those I was (am) working with the opportunity to ask the questions themselves.

I’ve been wary to use the term participation in this piece to describe my work; it has been used here to describe existing bodies of work. Participation is a term that I am not comfortable with, due to it being used in so many contexts in the development studies literature. In my view, research must be participatory by construction. Lending the term towards an exercise implies that there is “non-participatory” research. But I don’t know what that means. How can you conduct research without an awareness of how your distinct perceptions of the world around you – as compared to those you are working with – form your analysis, and pursue strategies to address that awareness and potential of authorial bias?

This is an ongoing exercise. At the time of this writing, I will be returning to this community, and we will begin another production on historical understandings of the information required to prosper as a farmer, a theme again determined by a new team of farmers. The results remain to be seen. If we meet again, I’ll tell you all about it.