Human Planet: Ambitious BBC "anthropology" multi media project launched
This entry was posted by admin and filed under indigenous people / minorities, culture traditions, anthropology (general), media, websites. 4 comments
Comment from: Mick Csaky
Comment from: lorenz
Thanks, interesting. I watch a few short clips on the website and found it striking that you rarely hear the voices of the people themselves. Somehow old-style “We” represent “them"? Other things you noticed?
Comment from: Christine Nuttall
This is a very beautifully filmed programme and does show the very wide variety of human habitats but David Attenborough’s very similar programme broadcast in 1975 was called “Disappearing Worlds” and these programmes to very little to inform the watching public that the folk on their TV are a minute remnant of the numbers of people who did indeed, once live in this way. I have been very disappointed in that it depicts indigenous people as exotic curiosities rather than communities fighting incursions onto their land and threats to their way of life. Bruce Parry has done more recently with his “Artic” programme. Perhaps you should have at least mentioned this aspect and provded links to “Survival” the main charity which acts as an advocate to indigenous people under threat.
Comment from: yidaki53
Anthroponarcissism? 
I don’t see the point in trying to universalize the diversity of the social being that is the human.
But then again, exotification doesnt necessarily have to be bad. It was the exotic that got most of us into anthropology in the first place.
With millions of pounds and thousands of people at their disposal, why did the BBC and its partner Discover set the bar so low? Why is the linking narration so banal and cliche ridden? Why are the programmes little more than a flick through the pages of old National Geographic magazines from more than 50 years ago. While the quality of the images is of great credit to the camera crews, the series is shamefully low in content. A real missed opportunity!