[Commlist] CfP: Interactive images and new narratives

Call Paper n° 5

*Interactive images and new narratives*

*Coordination: Jacques Ibanez Bueno & Alba Marin Carrillo*

/Revue Française des Méthodes Visuelles/, while acknowledging the 
preponderant role of photography and cinema in the evolution of research 
practices, remains open to other types of (audio)visual methods. And if 
researchers can claim to be from visual sociology or visual 
anthropology, they can also be from other disciplines, in an 
institutionalization of disciplines or sub-disciplines more or less 
asserted in this field (PINK, 2003). Since /The Nuer/ (1940) by Edward 
EVANS-PRITCHARD and /Balinese Character/ (1942) by Margaret MEAD and 
Gregory BATESON, the resulting photographic and then film production 
(Jean ROUCH among the precursors) is necessarily linked to aesthetics 
and the history of visual art in a complex and often ambiguous 
relationship. Documentary film, for example, is part of the history of 
cinema and the history of visual methods. It is logical that documentary 
film should be permeable to the introduction of digital technology and 
then to its almost-generalization, which goes much further than the 
abandonment of silver film by the creation of new formats that are more 
or less stable in their evolving aesthetics. Jacobo SUCARI, in a 
classification of contemporary documentary (2012), adds to the usual 
categories of "documentary of cinematic tradition" and "video 
documentary" four other categories that illustrate the tensions between 
film and video: 1) the documentary in a contemporary art process, 2) the 
expanded documentary, 3) the transmedia documentary and 4) the web 
documentary. The porousness between visual methods in social sciences 
and the art of documentary filmmaking inevitably leads to the 
implementation of methods inspired by this rapid upheaval of forms 
through digital technology. This is why, in connection with point 5 of 
the Editorial Manifesto "Exploring new digital experiences by fully 
exploiting the opportunities offered by online publishing" (BOULDOIRES, 
REIX, 2017 & 2018), /Revue Française des Méthodes Visuelles/ proposes, 
in this issue 5, to shed light on these methodologies involving 
so-called "interactive" images, a field that is rich yet unstable due to 
the speed of the socio-technical innovations that cross it. By using the 
expression "interactive images", which we prefer to interactive 
documentary (ASTON, GAUDENZI, ROSE, 2017) or to "interface-films" (DI 
CROSTA, 2009), we wish to better grasp, in their formal diversity, 
visual methods producing research devices such as digital documentaries, 
but also video games, serious games, immersive and performative 
installations in virtual, augmented or mixed reality.

Beyond the strictly computational interactivity, the interactivity 
offered to the spectator is at the heart of the device, which allows a 
more individualized way than in the format of the cinematographic work 
with its linearity. The user is truly included not only through the 
interactivity induced but also through personalization, participation 
and immersion. This user can co-construct the content, for example, by 
integrating a self-produced video, but whose insertion is planned by the 
creator of the device (e.g.: web documentary). Without considering that 
the classic film viewer is a passive spectator before, during and after 
the projection, with interactive images, the new status proposed is that 
of "spect'actor" or "interactor" (PROULX, 1998). This is the case of the 
panoramic movement of the documentary film imposed in the chronological 
scrolling of the animated images, which becomes optional in the case of 
virtual reality from a capture with a 360-degree camera. This is why 
four elements must be taken into account in the methodological 
modalities: image (and sound), technology, user/work interactions and 
lived experience (MARIN CARRILLO, 2019).

Although in a broad sense some researchers integrate visual methods into 
visual studies, the epistemological position defended here does not 
favour research work where only content analysis or semiotics of a 
corpus of visual productions of users (e.g. semiotics applied to images 
produced and distributed on a digital social network such as Facebook 
during a social protest). The image is not considered as an object of 
research but as an indispensable element of a methodological research 
practice (CHAUVIN, REIX, 2015). Similarly, in a context of Arts and 
Sciences collaboration increasingly praised by some institutions, visual 
creation cannot be limited to audiovisual formatting such as the 
scripting of research data (e.g. interactive mapping of scientific 
data), non-visual methodologies in social sciences or in life sciences. 
In this call for papers, visuals cannot be limited to a visual and 
interactive design of research in a context of increased social demand 
for more attractive ways of scientific dissemination. A capture of 
images and sounds relative to a social group is indispensable under the 
authority of a researcher with his freedom as a creative author in 
writing, editing and digital design.

This call for papers invites researchers to propose papers that deal 
with the precise use of visual methods resulting in research productions 
consisting of interactive images (e.g. research webdocumentary; 
immersive research device with headsets and headphones). /Revue 
Française des Méthodes Visuelles/ is also interested in proposals for 
critical reflection with an epistemological perspective, both in terms 
of duration and the diversity of digital forms that claim to use visual 
methods. For this reason, a non-exhaustive list of work axes is 
proposed: status of the interactive image; participation in the research 
of the subject or social group studied; user reception of the production 
of visual and interactive research; interactive narration; between 
interactive aesthetics and research design; the sensory experience in 
visual methods; etc.

*AGENDA*

*February 29, 2020*: Proposals for articles in the form of an abstract 
of 1500 to 3000 characters, including spaces specifying the central 
question, the theoretical and/or methodological framework, and the 
contribution of the article to visual methods, should be sent to the 
coordinators of the call for papers:

(callrfmv /at/ gmail.com) <mailto:(callrfmv /at/ gmail.com)>

*March 15, 2020 : *Selection of proposals**

*May 15, 2020: *Receipt of articles for evaluation**

*Instructions to authors: *https://rfmv.fr/ecrire-dans-la-revue/

*REFERENCES*

//

ASTON Judith, GAUDENZI Sandra, and ROSE Mandy (2017), /I-Docs : The 
Evolving Practices of Interactive Documentary/, Wallflower Press, New York.

BIELLA Peter (1993), « Beyond Ethnographic Film: Hypermedia and 
Scholarship », in Rollwagen, J. R.(ed.), /Anthropological Film and Video 
in the 1990s/, The Institute, Inc.

BOULDOIRES Alain, REIX Fabien (2017 & 2018), « Méthodes Visuelles, de 
quoi parle-t-on ? //Images fixes, Images animées », N°1 & N°2, /Revue 
Française des Méthodes Visuelles/, MSHA, Bordeaux.

CHAUVINPierre-Marie, REIX Fabien (2015), « Sociologies visuelles. 
Histoire et pistes de recherche », /L'Année sociologique/, 2015/1 (Vol. 
65), p. 15-41.

DI CROSTA Marida (2009),/Entre cinéma et jeux vidéo l'interface-film : 
métanarration et interactivité/, De Boeck, Bruxelles.

HARPER Douglas (2012), /Visual Sociology/, Routledge, London.

HOWARD Alan (1998), Hyper Media and the future of Ethnography, /Cultural 
Anthropology/, 3, p. 304-15.

IBANEZ BUENO Jacques, CHABERT Ghislaine, LAMBOUX-DURAND Alain, WANONO 
Nadine, Dir. (2017), /Visual methods and digital worlds/, CNRS, 
Universités La Laguna, Bourgogne Franche-Comté & Savoie Mont-Blanc, 
Cuadernos de Comunicacion, Tenerife.

MCDOUGALL David (2006), /The corporeal image Film, ethnography, and the 
senses/, Princeton University Press, New Jersey.

MARIN CARRILLO Alba (2019), /Innovación tecnológica y formas de 
representación en el documental social. Desde los formatos interactivos 
hasta las experiencias inmersivas/, Universidad de Sevilla & Université 
Savoie Mont-Blanc, Cotutelle de thèse de doctorat en communication.//

PINK Sarah (2003), « Interdisciplinary agendas in visual research: 
re-situating visual anthropology”, /Visual Studies/, Vol. 18, No. 2, p. 
179-192.

PROULX Serge, BARDINI, Thierry, BELANGER Danielle (2000), « Des 
nouvelles de l’interacteur : phénomènes de convergence entre la 
télévision et Internet », /Sociétés et Représentations/, no. 9, Paris, 
p. 161-180.

REMILLET**Gilles*, *WANONO Nadine (2014), « Collaborative and 
Interactive Presentation: Tracks Of A Discipline Evolution », 
/Anthrovision/ [Online].

SUCARI Jacobo (2012), /El documental expandido: pantalla y espacio/, 
Universitat oberta de catalunya, Barcelona.


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