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Introduction: Intersecting Cognitive Theory and Documentary Film

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Cognitive Theory and Documentary Film

Abstract

This collection of essays explores the intersection between cognitive theory and documentary film. Western audiences live in a mass-mediated culture that filters reality through the prism of factual media; hence, their emotional and cognitive comprehension of the world is, to a significant extent, informed and consolidated by documentaries. This volume seeks to illuminate the production, exhibition and reception of documentaries, exploring intratextuality (in which filmmakers employ narrative and aesthetic strategies to achieve particular audience responses and effects) and extratextuality (whereby filmmaking practices and sociocultural traditions negotiate the indexical link between representations and their real-life counterparts). The interplay between these levels means that documentaries impact our attitudes towards and interaction with the world, helping construct our social, cultural and individual identities.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Although cognitive theory has developed differently in separate disciplines, some common historical threads can be discerned—for instance, in media studies (see Nannicelli and Taberham 2014), psychology (see Pecher and Zwaan 2006), literature studies (see Goldman et al. 1999) and the philosophy of science (see Wang 2015).

  2. 2.

    Notable exceptions include the cultural contextualization of spatiotemporal perception (e.g. Barratt 2014; Coëgnarts and Kravanja 2015b) and the cultural-historical contextualization of spectatorship (e.g. Hake 2012; William 2017).

  3. 3.

    See Brylla and Kramer (forthcoming) for the development of a theoretical framework based on these research areas.

  4. 4.

    Interestingly, the creative application of cognitive theory in practice has been popular in performance and theatre studies (e.g. May 2015) and creative writing (e.g. Skains 2016). There have also been some isolated attempts to implement cognitive models in documentary film practice (Keeney 2016; Brylla 2017) and film editing (Pearlman 2009). Also, although not an example of its direct application, the Danish Broadcasting Corporation (DR/Danmarks Radio) has started using cognitive systems for gauging audience responses; the data is fed back to commissioning editors who may then ask for production practices to be tweaked accordingly (Gregersen et al. 2017, p. 3).

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank John Corner and Carl Plantinga for their generous feedback during the writing of this chapter.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of West London, London, UK

    Catalin Brylla

  2. University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark

    Mette Kramer

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  1. Catalin Brylla
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  1. University of West London, London, United Kingdom

    Catalin Brylla

  2. University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark

    Mette Kramer

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Brylla, C., Kramer, M. (2018). Introduction: Intersecting Cognitive Theory and Documentary Film. In: Brylla, C., Kramer, M. (eds) Cognitive Theory and Documentary Film. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90332-3_1

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