A Visual Anthropology Laboratory has been established to capture the ethnographic nuances around important social issues
concerning everyday life of local communities.
The laboratory aspires to become the epicenter of documentation, projection and advocacy of anthropological insight at a national platform.
Arguing that visual representation is one shade closer to reality in comparison to the conventional ethnography, the presence of Visual Laboratory helps
in recording and analyzing history in a visual perspectiveas well as documenting visual imageries of present day life.
The visual medium is becoming important genre for unfolding policy initiatives and programme by Development planners and administrators.
Visual text and visual archives provide the necessary disciplinary insight in this direction for policy planning and governance.
The Visual Anthropology lab is being led by Dr. Avitoli G. Zhimo (Associate Professor). Currently the Department of Anthropology at the University of Delhi offers 'Visual Anthropology' as Discipline Specific Elective
for BSc semester V under NEP:UGCF2022 and MSc Sem II under NEP:PGCF2024. A Skill Enhancement Course (SEC) on 'Ethnographic Filmmaking' is also offered by the Department of Anthropology at MSc Sem I under NEP:PGCF2024.
ACHIEVEMENTS
Supriya Pandey (BSc Class of 2021) won the 2021 Undergraduate Student Award for Outstanding Work for her documentary film
A Non WORKING Woman
This award was bestowed by Society for Visual Anthropology, a section of American Anthropological Association.
Supriya Pandey (BSc class of 2021) won the poster competition on the theme 'Gender Across Space: Moving from Parity to Parallelism'
Organised by - KMC Geographia ( Geography Dept. Kirorimal college, DU) and featured in Bimonthly Magazine of KMC Geographia 2021.
Aakriti Thatal (BSc class of 2021) micro documentary film '5 to 9: Women in Pandemic' got published by Zuban (Through her lens) 2021.'5 to 9: Women in Pandemic' is a micro-documentary attempting to explore gendered roles in Sikkim and how social class and economic stability serve as important factors in determining these roles and responsibilities. The pandemic has not had a
neutral effect on all women and Aakriti broach this notion through short interviews with three women who come from different
sections of the society.
A short film "Being Ansar"conceptualised and edited by Hardik Gaurav won
Second prize in Short film competition at Antardhwani festival 2014.
Juan F. Cuyás, a PhD candidate Departament D'antropologia Social, Universitat De Barcelona delivered a talk on
ETHNOGRAPHIC PHOTOGRAPHY on 7th February 2023, in the Seminar Hall. UG, PG and PhD students from Anthropology, Education, Law, Mathematics, Germanic & Romance studies attended. Total registered: 100
Naduvilpat, Anusree. 2022. ഉസ്കൂൾ(school). Visual Anthropology DU Lab. (Officially selected and screened at New Wave Documentary Short film Festival, held from 5-6 March 2022).
Kahn, Alison and Avitoli G. Zhimo. 2021. A visual critique on the 'Secret Museum of Anthropology' (1935). PHOTO OXFORD FESTIVAL (UK), HATCHED2021: Women Creating Landscapes. 4-5 November 2021.
Zhimo, A.G. 2020. The village on the cliff. Visual Anthropology Lab. (screened at IUAES World Congress 2020, 14 March 2021)
PUBLICATIONS
Rath, Somen, Avitoli G Zhimo And Mercy Kipgen. 2024. ‘Agency, Aesthetics, And Commodification of Saora Art’. The Eastern Anthropologist 77 (1-2): 139-160.
Konyak, Eche.W, and Avitoli.G.Zhimo. 2022. 'Body Aesthetics: Contextualizing the Tattooing Culture of the
Konyak Naga'. J. Indian Anthrop. Soc. 57(1): 61-77.
Zhimo, Avitoli G. 2021. "Animistic Motifs and the Cross: A Visual Narrative on Indigenizing Christianity". Visual Ethnography (Italy) 10(1). ISSN 2281-1605
Zhimo, Avitoli.G. 2021. ‘We were the Others: Visuality in Colonial Writings’. In Materiality and Visuality in North East India: An Interdisciplinary
Perspective edited by Tiplut Nongbri and Rashi Bhargava. Singapore: Springer.
Zhimo, Avitoli.G. and Somen Rath. 2021. 'Tribal Arts and Aesthtics: Saora, Warli and Zeme'. SWAYAM, NRC Tribal Studies.
ACTIVITIES
Ten days Research Methodology Course on "Participatory Digital Methodologies and Ethnographic Filmmaking" was organized for research scholars from 14-24 January 2019. Participants were from
disciplines like Media studies, Culture studies, Social Work, Community Health and Medicine, Sociology, Gender Studies, Education. The Course was sponsored by ICSSR. Director: Prof. P.C.Joshi; Co-Director: Dr. Avitoli G. Zhimo. For details Click here
Special Lectures delivered by eminent scholars in webinars and virtual workshops organized by the department of Anthropology, University of Delhi, were recorded and edited by Dr. Avitoli G Zhimo and ethnographic/documentary films by UG/PG students were developed under her guidance only. The videos are on the youtube channel
'Visual Anthropology DU'
DOCUMENTARY and SHORT FILMS
The Visual lab has a youtube channel Visual Anthropology DU that offers an ethnographic archive of Indian communities, focusing on the intersection of ritual, material culture, and socio-cultural change. The collection highlights themes of visual ethnography, cultural continuity in the face of modernity, and the documentation of traditional knowledge systems through a reflexive gaze.
