TU#03 Insight - Collaboration vs Negotiation

Talking Uncertainty

How can we complicate the notion of collaboration and more transparently discuss the ways in which we work alongside our communities? Collaboration has become a catch-all, utopian term that is used uncritically to describe our relationships with our interlocutors. Making ethnographic films is sometimes considered an intrusion by communities, and the power differential between filmmaker and interlocutor usually means that it takes time to develop a close relationship. As such, we should perhaps speak of negotiation instead of collaboration. While working with our interlocutors, we must reveal our often clashing narratives and make these processes transparent. It is these frictions that are usually the most generative. Read all the insights here - https://www.urgentemergent.org/talking-uncertainty/ethno-science-fiction