The Meaning Of Documentary Spirit

Two mainstream groups of social documentary films can be found in China. One is theofficial media represented by the program named "Life Space", and the other is a group ofindividual producers embodied by Wu Wenguang and Duan Jinchuan. The content for thesedocumentaries are focusing on the sub-cultural group which is set on the edge of human'sconsciousness such as labors working temporarily in cities, the disabled, the urban poor,people who used to work in countryside and now have returned to cities and the mobilecrowds. The issues of the humanitarianism care to them, the ordinary dweller's perspectiveand the reality trend displayed by them that are involved in the documentaries, restore thehuman being's present living conditions throughout the communication media of thetelevision.For a long period, researchers on these documentaries have either talked about one issueof its own accord, giving detailed and meticulous opinions to the correlation of the isolatedtext theme with the form, or jump over to a higher stance, offering a fantastic illustration onthe aesthetic features of the documentaries in regards of "accountability" and "authenticity".The accumulation of the previous great findings and academic research will not be precluded,but something other than these achievements should also be witnessed. In terms of thetechnical skills, following shot, long shot and the audio and visual combination have got thecommon acknowledgement from all working staff dealing with the documentary film;regarding of standpoint, speaking for the people along social edges has become manydocumentary dealers a self-initiated mission. At present, the academic field seems to be moreconcerned with one innate feature of documentary workers ---exploitation. Settling in ahigher position which surpasses that of the videoed people, documentary workers take thesepeople's images, voices and lives as a footboard to win the acclaim, high social status andeven high economic benefits for themselves. Therefore, some questions are raised related tothe exploited feature of documentary workers in a new digital era which the audience hasbeen familiar with the video and film techniques. They are how the social documentaryworkers handle the relations and responsibilities between themselves and those being videoed;how to determine the roles and effects between cameras and cameramen so as to establish amutual respect and acknowledgement relationship among cameramen, videoed targets and theaudience.This paper intends to illustrate that with the digital times coming, the appearance of DVlows down the audio and visual rights to a relatively wider mass, and the mystery of videosand films is also unveiled. However, though documentary workers will adhere to theprinciple of "respect to people's living dignity" afterwards, some detailed practices in styleswill have go into a certain "chaos".After clarifying the productive styles of the developing history of two types ofdocumentaries, this paper adopts the mass communication theory proposed by the FrankfurtSchool to explain the certainty of the appearance of this "chaos". Specifically, the masscommunication believes that, in principle, communication is coreless in terms of quality, andis constructed by numerous order models considered the quantity. Each communicative modelis generated by a set of relatively autonomous practices. Order does not come from theknowledge. Since it could not appear prior to practice, order which is set up by anyknowledge can not serve as the standard for the communicative effectiveness.Under the same circumstance, the standard of effectiveness develops within theboundary of the conventions, and each order model is maintained by the habits of beliefs ofthe groups sharing similar communicative methods, not allowing other super-experientialknowledge to bestow a check on the reasonability. This kind of state which??? Correspondsthe chaos of the documentary production.Based on the author's expertise working in the TV station and the consulted references,the paper lists three foci: firstly, exposing the individual features does not equal to showingcommon traits;secondly, whether the camera needs to be overt or covert;thirdly, whetherthe standpoints should be subjective or objective. It is no doubt that these three points haveraised the arguments in the academic field, but the static ongoing situation which lasts uptill today verifies that during the period of future which is marked by the appearance ofindividual DV will continue the dispute on these three focuses.There are four parts in the paper. Part I briefly reviews the history of two types ofdocumentary films and defines their models. Part II explains the main productive styles,social background and cultural meanings. Part III puts forward the assumption of "chaos"throughout the comparison between the cultural phenomena along history. Part IV elaboratesthe conception of "chaos" and furthermore proposes the solutions.Limited by some subjective and objective factors such as the complication of the intendedsolved problem, the inadequate research preparation and the capacity, the hypothesis of thispaper needs to be further researched and discussed. The paper will not reach a universalconclusion because of this hypothesis, but it is only a tentatively study of this issue. The moredetailed and further work will have to be done in the guide of my supervisor.in the guide ofmy supervisor.