Storylab Workshops from 2017 – 2020

Multimedia University, Malaysia, National Film and Television Institute, Ghana, and University of Ibague, Colombia, each hosted a 3 day workshop with participating independent filmmakers from their catchment area. Each workshop was followed by a 1 day reflective seminar between participating and collaborating researchers.

Utilising interdisciplinary approaches inspired from music and anthropology, the Research Network developed a methodology entitled Ethnomediaology. Ethnomediaology involves the active and immersive participation of researchers in the research culture and process, using this active personal engagement as a basis for knowledge generation, data gathering and evaluation. A unique feature of this network is the lateral collaboration that taking place between practice led film and media researchers in developing countries across continents.

With this approach and methodology, the network hopes to engage with the independent filmmaking communities of the countries involved in an intimate and unique way to:

UNDERSTAND

Understand if and how the democratisation of the means of narrative film production and dissemination may be liberating the storytelling forms of filmmakers in the developing world from the hegemony of western cinematic storytelling forms

IDENTIFY

Identify shared creative qualities, formal elements, and themes in narrative cinematic practices that transcend continental and cultural borders.

DISCOVER

Discover and articulate new directions, approaches and thematic preoccupations emerging from filmmaking in developing countries and their potential contribution to, and challenging of, dominant western hegemonies around narrative filmmaking.