Otherness as a Mirror: Ethnographic perspective in the Czech inter-war non-fiction documentary

Czech ethnographic film emerged in the inter-war period thanks to the then simultaneous expansion of the film as an instrument of scientific knowledge, and of the motoring. The connection of film and car was significant for it. The car made it possible to travel to unknown countries more easily and freely, and the film documented local nature and indigenous people; however, films also were to promote the car manufacturer that delivered cars for such a journey. As a genre, the Czech ethnographic film developed at the boundary between the travel, expedition and promotional films. For this reason, in that era one should rather speak about an ethnographic perspective mediated by the film, and its role in the wider context of visual culture in the inter-war Czechoslovakia. Based on the analysis of three most distinctive films (Gari-Gari, K Mysu dobré naděje [To the Cape of Good Hope], and Šest žen hledá Afriku [Six Women Are Searching for Africa]), the study shows in a wider context of society-wide debates, that in the Czech context the ethnographic perspective brought the awareness of exotic otherness on one hand, and on the other hand it contributed to the updating of local socio-cultural problems. Despite their own nature of the ethnographic “otherness”, the movies a priori made the ditochomy civilized-uncivilized more visible, and they reflected how particular cultural differences were rooted in the domestic society. In this way, the ethnographic film revealed certain aspects of “uncivilized behaviour” in the contemporary Czech context.