Against the Ivory Tower: An Apologia for "Popular" Historical Documentaries

Authors

  • Dirk Eitzen Studies at Franklin & Marshall in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA

Abstract

What makes a documentary good? What makes one bad? These two little questions account for probably eighty-five percent of the ink that has flowed in discussion of documentaries in general and historical documentaries in particular-both in academic circles and in the popular press. These questions continue to provoke strong disagreements. It is a safe bet that they are in no danger of a speedy resolution. Nonetheless, when it comes to the practical matter of doing things with historical documentaries -using them in the classroom, at conferences, in our writing- they are questions that insist upon answers. I do not have any all-purpose answers. I would like to make a case, however, concerning how we ought to approach the questions.

Author Biography

Dirk Eitzen, Studies at Franklin & Marshall in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA

DIRK EITZEN is an award-winning documentary producer and an Assistant Professor of film Studies at Franklin & Marshall in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA. His scholarly work has appeared in Velvet Light Trap, Iris, Post Script and elsewhere, and he has recently completed a Ph.D. dissertation, at the University of Iowa, on the rhetoric and reception historical documentaries.

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Issue

Vol. 5 No. 1 (1995)

Section

Essays

License

Authors retain copyright. Creative Commons: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike


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