Graduate Update: Natasha Fijn

Class of 2001

Current Position: Finishing up a PhD in Anthropology at ANU (the Australian National University) in Canberra.


Tash has used her filmmaking skills developed at the University of Otago to great effect: she is doing her PhD in Mongolia and has made a documentary on her subjects as part of her PhD (an unique undertaking).


If interested, you can read about Tash’s work here: The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, Volume 8 Issue 4, p297-307, December 2007.


The paper is entitled Filming the Significant Other: Human and Non-Human and here is the abstract:


“The filming of 'significant others' (other cultures or other animals) is subject to different filmmaking styles and generally viewed by different audiences. My research encompasses people from another culture, Mongolian herders, and their engagement with non-human animals, horses, cattle, sheep and goats. A documentary that features human interaction with other animals is unusual, as most ethnographic films focus on the social relationships and dialogue between people, while wildlife films focus on animals with sparse reference to human influence. In this paper, I make a comparison between two genres, ethnographic and wildlife filmmaking, using British television series Natural World and Disappearing World as example. This paper is supplemented by digital footage, featuring Mongolian herders and their social interaction with sheep and goats in spring. The short clip that accompanies this paper is illustrative of my own approach to filmmaking.”