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Clara Banderali
State University of New York
Towards the Circumcision ... With Humor
    The purpose of my video screening is to present some aspects of the Sanwaís life during a one and a half year long preparation for the circumcision. The Sanwa are an age-group of 20 to 25 year-old men who belong to the Soruwe of the Taneka villages (North Benin). Their circumcision is a rite of passage to adulthood, where they prove courage and pain endurance to their relatives, co-villagers, and to themselves.
    The method I used to shoot my footage was to follow the Sanwa wherever they went and whatever they did during their liminal period. Some of the shooting was connected to a specific event, some, on the contrary, was just ìrandom shooting.î   I shot the Sanwaís spontaneous dialogues while they were attending their daily routine. The results were surprising: through the dialogues, I had answers without asking any questions. Also, I could capture the Sanwaís sense of humor, something that accompanies them throughout their path towards the circumcision. =============
Anne Zeller University of Waterloo Object Use and Tool Use in Primates Current definitions concerning the use of external materials by animals specify certain conditions under which tool use can be claimed to occur.  The objects used must be detached from the substrate, must be manipulated by the animal and a goal must be attained (or at least the attempt made).  To me this seems to be the far end of a continuum of possible manipulations. Objects may be used when not detached, the manipulations can be subtle and the gaol may be evanescent rather than of high functional value. At what point is an animal's manipulation of the external world such a commonality that it is no longer worthy of comment, and in what directions and stages can the increase of manipulation occur before reaching the breakover point at which tool use can be claimed? For many years we humans laid claim to being the tool makers and users of the world.  In a sense this parallels our human claim to be the only language users which is also being challenged by the abilities of the higher primates.  This paper is a discussion of the background of this controversy and an investigation of whether there is a fundamental difference between object use and tool use in primates.
  ============== Lynn Selby     San Francisco State University Critical Consciousness as a Goal of Applied Ethnographic Film Martinez' (1991) work on film reception calls attention to the need for ethnographic based audience analysis, particularly when films are used in applied contexts. A fifteen minute documentary, Surviving the Streets, a life-history video of two adults who were once involved in drug dealing and gang life, was field tested as a tool for applied critical consciousness with four different youth audiences. Five screenings were conducted: a compulsory class at a group home for pregnant teens, a boys' support group at an alternative high school, a girls' support group at a street-youth case management and night outreach program, and two high school senior peer-education classes at a private high school. Group discussions followed each screening, and three audiences also provided anonymous feedback written for the filmmaker. This paper will first discuss those themes in the video that most strongly resonated with youth at risk. Its secondary focus is to describe how privileged high schoolers responded to a documentary about street youth. Finally, the paper will address problems of conducting field research among teenage film audiences. It will show the importance of pre-screening work with adult agency staff members in charge of the young viewers, and will describe probes that yielded the greatest youth participation.