LIGHTS, CAMERA AND ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE. A SOCIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF COLLECTIVE ENVIRONMENTAL ACTION IN AUDIOVISUAL NARRATIVES (ARGENTINA. 2007-2010)

SOLEDAD FERNÁNDEZ BOUZO

Congreso; The Second ISA Forum of Sociology "Social Justice and Democratization". Buenos Aires, Argentina; 2012

The new communication technologies and their increasing diffusion favor an intensive use of audiovisual tools in our current world. Apart from the possibility to make DVD copies or reproduce uploaded videos on Internet, it is possible to notice, particularly during the last years, an increase in film projections, movie discussions, film festivals and similar kinds of events, which treat environmental issues. In various and increasing contexts, there are not only professional filmmakers who make audiovisual productions, but also base organizations, NGOs, social movements, just as well as public officials and academic investigators, who construct their own audio and visual narratives and reproduce them by different means. In each of the productions which arise as the stories are developed ? as well as the different devices used for diffusion - it is not only possible to glimpse intents to generate new sources of legitimacy and arguments in relation to the environmental question in our country (and in the world), but it is further possible to find register of existing disputes between different social actors concerning the meaning of nature, the environment, the natural resources, and sustainable development. In Argentina the social production of environmental images has intensified during the last five years as a result of the emergence of the environmental question and how it has been socially problematized, and in relation to the need for public visibility that the question requires. These instances not only enroll in a wider public process which problematizes the society-nature relationship and the social and political construction of the environment, but are also evidence of process of imaginal production, in this case the ?environmental question?. In this way, the emergence of so called ?environmental? documentaries is accompanied by a process of social disruption. For the social sciences this aspect implies a requirement that visual and audiovisual analyses are incorporated within the frame of academic investigations. The purpose of this article is to perform an analysis of the environmental audiovisual productions in the specific academic scope of social sciences, productions which often are produced in collaboration with social organizations. Particularly the aim is to reflect on the ?scenification? of three specific environmental conflicts.