Documentary Aspects on Kieslowski Fiction

Winter 2012-13 – Free written home-assignments (To be uploaded to Absalon – 1 copy only). (Uploades til Absalon i et eksemplar) Navn (Name) Katarzyna Inez Dawczyk Studienummer (Student ID) qtw401 Telefon (Telephone) 27632783 e-post (e-mail) k. inez. [email  protected] comVed gruppeopgave anfores ovrige navne (Names of other participants in group essays) Navn (Name) : __________________________ Navn (Name) : __________________________ Navn (Name) : __________________________ Navn (Name) : __________________________ Studienummer (Student ID)__________ Studienummer (Student ID)__________ Studienummer (Student ID)__________ Studienummer (Student ID)__________ If the information concerning length below is not filled in correctly, the assignment will be rejected and you will be graded as a †no show†.ANTAL NORMALSIDER: 25 (Number of standard pages of 2400 keystrokes) ANTAL TYPEENHEDER: 60 178 (Total number of keystrokes, including spaces and notes but not cover p ages, bibliographies and appendices). OMFANG AF OPGAVER: L? ngden af en opgave er en del af opgaven – hverken for lange eller for korte opgaver accepteres. LENGTH OF THE ASSIGNMENT: Neither too long nor too short assignments are acceptable. S? T KRYDS (Mark) S? T KRYDS: (just Danish students) Individuel opgave X (Individual essay) Intern censor__________ se i studieordningen) Gruppeopgave _________ (Group essay) Ekstern censor X (se i studieordningen)Studieelement/Modul (Study Element/Module) 47790313-01/ Module 3 (f. eks. 47790316 Modul 4: Skriftlig formidling) Emne (Subject) : Between Documentary and Fiction (f. eks. Japansk Film) Er opgaven fortrolig (s? t kryds) JA___ (Is the essay confidential? ) (mark) Studieordning (s? t kryds): (Curriculum) (mark) : NEJ X (Yes) EKSAMINATOR: Arild Fetveit (Examiner) (No) __ Anden studieordning: _________________________ __Gymnasierettet Kandidattilvalg 2008-ordningen __Grundudd. i Film- og Medievidenskab 2005 – eller 2012__ __BA -tilvalg i Medier og Kultur, Tv? Hum. 2007 __Gymnasierettet tilvalg i Film- og medievidenskab 2007 __Enkeltstaende tilvalg i Film- og Medievidenskab 2007 (Curriculum for Elective Studies in Film and Media Studies 2007) __Kandidatuddannelsen i Filmvidenskab 2008 (Curriculum for the Master’s Programme in Film Studies) x__Kandidatuddannelsen I Medievidenskab 2008 (Curriculum for the Master’s Programme in Media Studies) __Master i Cross Media Communication __Tv? rhumanistisk Tilvalgsfag i Digital Kommunikation og ? stetik 2007 Dato og ar 1. 01. 013 Date and year DOCUMENTARY ASPECTS ON KIESLOWSKI? S FICTION ABSTRACT This paper examines different concepts of documentary and the influence of documentary dispositions on Kieslowski? s fiction that might be found by analysing his selected feature films. Different definitions of documentary in cinema created by various critics and cinematographers will guide the discussions of the ways in which Kieslowski comments on filmmaking, particularly how his fiction might carry the echo of reality which is recorded by documentaries.The paper is an attempt of describing the pattern, where realism is a dominant factor that might create an illusion of reality. This project is important to provide the theory about documentary aspects on Kieslowski? s fiction in order to find similarities and connections between two genres of film that are on the opposite poles. The study provides the unit of analysis about which the information were collected in order to create an understanding of the context. The assignment has got theoretical dimension and analyses.KEYWORDS: documentary, fiction, film studies, Kieslowski, realism, representation Before starting evaluate documentary as a form of film, it is necessary to replay on fundamental questions: what is a film? ; and how film can be understand? The elementary definition of film says that film is a story or event recorded by a camera as a set of moving images and shown in a cinem a or on television. †1 Furthermore, it is a medium and an art and a very complex technology undertaking . 2 Film belongs both to recording media and representative media.The spectrum of film looks like: -the performance art, which happen in real time -the representational art, which depends on the established codes and conventions of language – the recording art, which provides a more direct path between subject and observer: media not without their own codes but qualitatively more direct than the media of representational arts. 3 1 2 www. oxforddictionaries. com James Monaco, â€Å" How to read a film†, 3rd Edition, Oxford University Press, 2000, p. 17 3 Inbid. ,p. 27 Every film contains a range of various messages, which are not always apparent.However, by analysing film, messages can be discovered. Film makes absence presence. Moreover, the special techniques of film-the concentrated close-up-and the special qualities of film projection, make intimate experien ce of face as the sole, cause impression of living reality. 4 DOCUMENTARY John Grierson, a father of documentary used the phrase â€Å"documentary value† in reviewing Robert Flaherty? s â€Å"Moana† in 1926 for a New York newspaper. It was the first occasion on which the word â€Å"documentary† was applied in English language, to this specific kind of film. In English language, the adjective â€Å"documentary† was invited quite late as in 1802 with the modern meaning of its source word â€Å"document† as something written, which carry evidence or information. The contemporary use of â€Å"document† still carries the connotation of evidence. Besides, from the beginning of documentary, a photograph was received as a document and therefore as an evidence. 6 Documentary film has begun in the last years of the IXX century. It seems that, its beginning had many faces, as for some scholars the first documentary was â€Å" Nanook of the North† (1922) about Eskimo life ; some claimed that it was Joris Ivens? â€Å" Rain† ( 1929) a story about a rainy day; for another â€Å" Man with a Movie Camera† (1929) made by Dziga Vertov. 7 So what is a documentary then? A simple answer might be that is a movie about real life. However, it sounds to be too simplified, as there is not such a real life, as a camera can see just a part of real, just a small piece. Irritating are arguments that the camera is a window of world. On which worldthe question is rising? The camera can see just a part of the world, the part of real, the part of life.As a result, it could be said, that documentary movie does its best to represent a part of real life and it does not manipulate about it. 4 Philp Simpson, Andrew Uttern and K. J. Shepherdson, â€Å"Film Theory. Critical Concepts in Media and Cultural Studies†, Routledge, London, 2004, p. 70 5 Brian Winston, â€Å"Claiming the real. The Griersonian Documentary and Its Legitimat ions†, British Film Institute, 1995, p. 8 6 Inbid, p. 11 7 Patricia Aufderheide, â€Å" Defining the Documentary† in â€Å" Documentary Film. A very short introduction†, Patricia Aufderheide, Oxford University Press, New Your 2007, p. In other words, it could be said that â€Å"documentary is defined and redefined over the course of time, both by makers and by viewers. Viewers certainly shape the meaning of any documentary, by combing our own knowledge of and interest in the world with how film-maker shows it to us. †8 From another point of view, Plantiga claims that documentaries are moving picture texts of affairs represented in the world hold in actual world. Sobchack claims that documentary is a subjective relationship to a cinematic object.Patricia Aufderheide arguments in documentaries, â€Å"we expect to be told things about the real world, things that are true (†¦) we expect that a documentary will be a fair and honest representation of someb ody? s experience of reality†. 9 Additionally, she points out â€Å"the truthfulness, accuracy, and trustworthiness of documentaries are important to us all because we value them precisely uniquely for these qualities. † 10 According to Eric Barnouw â€Å"some documentaries claim to be objective-a term that seems to renounce an interpretative role.The claim may be strategic, but it is surely meaningless. The documentarist, like any communicator in any medium, makes endless choices. He selects topics, people, angels, lens (†¦). Each selection is an expression of his point of view. †11 John Grierson defined documentary as the â€Å"autistic representation of actuality† 12, additionally as â€Å"the creative treatment of actuality†. 13 It seems that, by using the term â€Å"creative treatment†, he meant that the documentary go beyond simple recording of reality, as documentary is fulfilled by sort of material creatively.It could be said tha t, documentary is based an authentic recordings with realist tendency, construct on fascination with a visible evidence. The evident share about the discussion of documentary has got Bill Nichols. He arguments that the documentary tradition relies on being able to conduct the impression of reality, â€Å"(†¦ ) a powerful impression. It began with the raw cinematic image and the appearance of movement: no matter how poor the image and how different from the thing photographed, the appearance of movement remained indistinguishable from actual movement. 14 Nichols claims, filmmakers often use in documentary modes of representation, in aim to make questions that are directly depend on historical world, narrative has existed in every known human 8 9 Inbid. ,. 2 Patricia Aufderheide, â€Å" Defining the Documentary† in â€Å" Documentary Film. A very short introduction†, Oxford University Press, New Yor k, 2007, p. 3 10 Inbid. , p. 4 11 Stella Bruzzi,â€Å" Introducti on† in â€Å" New Documentary. A Critical Introduction†, Routledge, London, 2000, p. 4 12 Patricia Aufderheide , â€Å"Defining the Documentary† in â€Å"Documentary Film .A very short introduction †, Oxford University Press, New York, 2007, p. 3 13 Brian Winston,â€Å" Claiming the real. The Griersonian Documentary and Its Legitimations†, British Film Institute 1995, p. 11 14 Bill Nichols, â€Å" Introduction to Documentary†, Indiana University Press, 2001, p. XIII society. 15Moreover, Nichols offers the theory that describes every film as documentary. Even the most fantastic fiction, as it gives evidence of the culture that is reproduced of the people who perform within. As well, he divides documentaries on two kinds: (1) documentaries of wish- fulfilment nd (2) documentaries of social representation. 16 Documentaries of wish- fulfilment are on the shape of fictions, that give expression of people? s dreams and wishes and a sense what peopl e wish, or fear, reality might be or might become. And documentaries of social representation are non-fiction that make the stuff of social reality visible and give representation to aspects of the shared world. Moreover, they deliver a sense of what might be understand as reality, of what is now, or what might become. Documentaries of social representation offer ideas on common world to explore and understand it. Documentaries offer the sensuous experience of sounds and images organized in such a way, they come to stand for something more than mere passing impressions: they come to stand for qualities and concepts of a more abstract nature. †17 15 16 Edward Branigan, â€Å"Narrative, Comprehension and Film†, Routledge, London, 1992, p. 1 Bill Nichols, â€Å" Introduction to Documentary†, Indiana University Press, 2001, p. 1 17 Inbod. , p. 65 According to Nichols, every documentary has its own distinct voice that has got a style. In order to analyse those styles, he provides a typology that enables various modes of documentary.He identified six modes of representation that function as like sub-genres of the documentary as genre itself. These six modes are: the expository mode- emphasizes verbal commentary and argumentative logic, has got more rhetorical and argumentative frame, addresses the viewer directly often with a narrator-voice over commentary (a voice of God, voice of authority) the poetic mode- is more subjective with artistic expression that moves away from objective reality of a given subject, situation or people to take at inner â€Å" truth† can be possessed by poetical manipulation, characters are with psychological complexity he observational mode- coming close as it possible to objective reality, observation of what happens in front of camera and recording it, the filmmakers takes a position of observer and makes impression of not intruding on the behaviour of characters the participatory mode- direct engagement betwe en a filmmaker and subject, the filmmaker becomes a part of the recorded event using the methods of anthropology of going into the field the reflexive mode- increases awareness of the sample of representation in film that shows not just historical world, but also the problems and issues that call into questions.It is the most selfconscious and self-questioning mode of representation the performative mode- direct engagement between a filmmaker and subject, the filmmaker as a participant Presented above modes are well knew in a documentary discussion. However, the critic with Stella Bruzzi towards them, it seems to be well argumentative. She criticises Nichols for suggesting that filmmakers doing documentaries, aim for the ‘perfect representation of the real? and that would fail in this impossible aim as all types of documenters exist at different time.Moreover, his typology of modes seems to be quite weak, cause documentaries very often has got mixed styles of modes. There is n ot such a one mode for one movie. As the result, the question of necessity labelling documentary on modes, arises. Documentary might be also defined as an organised arrangement of images that construct metaphors. Metaphors in movies help in defining and understanding matters in terms how they look or feel with involvement in physical and experiential encounter. Metaphors draw on basic structures of personal experiences to assign values to social concepts. The selection and arrangement of sounds and images are sensuous and real; they provide an immediate form of audible and visual experience, but they also become trough their organization into larger whole, a metaphorical representation of what something in the historical world is like. † 18 Types of Kieslowski? s documentaries psychological portraits In a documentary film about himself â€Å" I`m so-so†, Kieslowski admits that his early films, were made in order to get a common portrait of Polish mental condition.In â⠂¬Å"From the City of Lodz†, he presented people and their sad faces with a dramatic expression in their eyes in order to portray the reality of this city. Lodz is presented as a grey mass of ruins with its citizens lacking of vitality. He shows a factory and an old women who is going to retiring, however she says she would like to continue the work, but she cannot; workers who complain about a lack of support for their orchestra, in streets some men who seems to wander aimlessly. Another movie within psychological portrait is â€Å"The Railway Station†.A movie begins with television news broadcast â€Å"Nasz Dziennik† about production figures on the rise. The presented news is on the contrast to the sad and stony faces of people who are waiting in the station. There is a picture of a slice of Polish reality with so many trains delayed and cancel with not much care about passengers. Crucial is a detail of a camera at the station, with its reference to communist sy stem which seems to be this camera-eye. recording metaphors Kieslowski interest in metaphor, appears also in his documentaries.For example in the one called â€Å"The Office† ( 1966) that deals with intimate burdens in an impersonal routine manner office. In an insurance office in spite of dialogue, there is not people? s lips moving. The emphasis is on what kind of rubber stamps are needed on form. A clerk acts impersonal. The movie is not just a 18 Bill Nichols,â€Å" Introduction to Documentary†, Indiana University Press, 2001, p. 74 picture on bureaucracy, but clearly stands for the whole communist system. Especially the last scene which shows a room filled with documents about everyone.The last scene might be used as a clear metaphor for communist system, where everyone was checked and a state tried to know everything, what a single man did. The communist system seemed to be as this office, an executor of strict control. Another metaphor on society, he used in a d ocumentary â€Å"Factory†, where in close-up shots, he presents the disproportion between the workers and those in power. Also the movie shows the Poland? s economic limitations that time when factory was lacking equipment due to bureaucracy.Personal stories In â€Å"I was a Soldier he interviews 7 men who lost their sight during the war. In this simple story the characters sit and talk about their feelings, in close up shots. Every scene ends by fading to white. Although, the movie ends by fading to black that might be seen as deliver of personal ant-war message. It seems to, be one of the most powerful documentaries, not only for a subject that men presented in movie are blinded during military service in World War II. It is powerful for its understated treatment. The war is a subject of blame of movie? s anti-war expression.The next documentary, where Kieslowski uses the same technique of interviewing people is movie called â€Å"Talking Heads†, which serves also h is interest in human faces. In the movie, he interviews 40 people (he begins with a toddler and ends with a 100 years old women), asking them few elementary questions: Who you are? , Where were you born? , What matters most for you? It seems that, the majority of people sound quite idealistic and overwhelmingly democratic. However, the irony punches a line in a replay of 100-year old women who just simply wishes to live longer.It could be said that the ethnics of Kieslowski? s documentary are based on respect for a single character. He tried to interfere as less as possible in order to respect his character? s privacy. To achieve it, he applied various methods of implementation as like: the documentary observation or interviews. REALSIM- RECORDED PATERN BY DOCUMENTARY Realism is a contentious field of debates across scholars of philosophy, social science, and aesthetics in on-going dialogue about the role of representation: in fine art as like photojournalism for example, and writte n forms as reports or autobiographies.It would seem that, there are two tendencies in realism. The one extensive tendency goes into some material aspect of the physical or social world, the other intensive that penetrates further into the recesses of the soul. 19 The term â€Å"realism† came to cinema from literary and art movement of the IXX century and went against the solid tradition of classical idealism in order to portray the life as it â€Å"really† is. The focus was on ordinary life, indeed the lives of socially deprived people.It seems that, questions of realism in the art came before the discovery of the cinematographic process by brothers Lumiere. The creation of photography brought about realism many different assumptions, precisely about possibilities of realistic representation on pictures. Fox Talbot, one of the precursors of photography, reminisces about seeing in a camera obscura â€Å" the inimitable beauty of the pictures of nature? s painting† (†¦) It could be said that, Talbot uses the phrases â€Å" nature? s painting† and â€Å" natural images† in order to refer the invention derived from earlier observations.Later â€Å" natural images† were patented by Daguerre that could bring out in daguerreotype photographs â€Å"One positive view held photography to be a medium of absolute truth; the negative estimation saw demonic powers at work in this strange apparatus. Both views are closely connected: one is merely the flipside of the other. Both are alike in that they view the outcome of any daguerreotype to be completely independent of human agency. † 20 The important pattern is perhaps, the world â€Å" truth† that is used to describe a photographic image.There is a tendency for perceiving photographic images as displaying something about truth and real word. And film shares with moving photography as a part of its most obvious technical process. Watching those moving pictures mak e in people feelings different than watching paintings on the grounds of reproducing reality. Somehow, photography and film have a special place in the debate of realism. Williams claims that film â€Å"combines elements drawn from pre-existing forms of still photography, painting, the novel (†¦) and the theatre, and all welded together on a specific technological base. 21 Realism in cinema might mean different things. There are various ways of defining and exploring 19 20 Arthur McDowall, â€Å" Realism. A Study in art and thought†, E. P. Dutton& Company, New York 1852, p. 24 http://home. foni. net/~vhummel/Hawthorne/hawthorne_1. 3. html 21 Christopher Williams,â€Å" Realism and the Cinema†, A Reader, London: Routledge 1980, p. 2 cinematic realism in debates. Cinema Verite filmmakers perhaps hope to produce something that is more or less â€Å"true to nature†. Jean-Luc Goddard comments that cinema is not the reflection of reality, but the reality of the reflection.Andre Bazin considers that in order to be realistic, a film must be located its characters and action in historical and social setting. It also worth mentioning that Grierson founded in British documentary movement, three basic principles: -a documentary should photograph the living scene and the living story – it should use original actors and scenes -â€Å"the materials and stories thus taken from the raw can be finer than the created article† 22 Allied to the more formal concept of realism is the notion of truth telling.Realism seems to be obliged to represent social reality and make sense of this realty. Jakobsen discusses five ways to make sense of realism: – – – – Realism can be an artistic aim, the artist considers his work to inhabit Realism can be something perceived ( by others than artist) as realistic Realism can refer to specific periods in history defined by historians and critics Realism is defined by convinced narr ative techniques ( customs of spending time on actions) Realism is defined by the way it motivates style or narrative 23It could be said, the steam of realism was adapted to cinema well, as camera seems to be natural tool for realism as it reproduces what is there, in the physical environment. Cinema makes absence of presence and puts reality up on the screen. Besides, cinema might be an attempt to present a direct and truthful view of real world through its presentation of the character and environment of realm functions in film both on the narrative level and the pictorial and photographic level. Through the narrative structures, physical realism goes into psychological one to address social issues.Scholars, Lapsley, Westlake and Williams divide two types of realism with regard to film: the first one with ideological function that concealment the illusion of realism and the second one with naturalizing function that attempts to use a camera in a non-manipulative way. However, Andr e Bazin supports conversely ideas. Bazin? s argument illustrates that realist discourses not only 22 23 Inbod. , p. 17 Anne Jerslev,â€Å" Realism and Realty in Film and Media†, Museum Tusculanum Press University of Copenhagen 2002, p. 16 suppress certain truth, but also produce other truth.The realist aesthetics recognise the reality-effect produced by cinematic technique in such a way that provides a space for the audience to read the message for themselves. The critical approach to realism in film studies is briefed by two strands of thought, both with roots in formalist conceptions about how film texts which are arranged on abilities to comprehended artistic products. One strand espouses debates in which realist films are departing from the codes and conventions of film practice as like commercial film practice and mainstreams.Another one is modulate by ideological approaches, which treat all mainstream film texts as versions of the classic realist texts which developed i n the XIX century novels. 24 According to these approaches, realism cannot be confined to a particular style of representation as is contingent, in alternation. Important was the development of photography made painting become obsolete, changed the impressionistic mimesis by the empirical objectivity of the photographic image. From the other side, in literature, the early realists called themselves as careful painters of human life, asserting that `art always aims to represent reality?. 5 Although, George Eliot, the realist writer Adam Bede ( in chapter 17) demonstrated her appreciation of difficulty, in particular, how a writer is able to translate the truth into words? Writers took different positions on realism. Guy Maupassant suggests that realists are illusionists, but Henry James favours of terms as impression of life and air reality. In film studies, the post- structuralism position on realism is presented by Collin MacCabe in his well know essay called â€Å"Realism and the cinema: notes on some Brechtian theses†.MacCabe argues in some conventional documentary films, there is metalanguage in the form of voce over narration which provide different versions of reality presented by numerous voices in order to perform a truth-telling function. 26In turn, he claims that fiction film is similarly structured, just with images taking precedence over words. The photographs show to the spectator what happens; the camera provides the metalanguage by situating the spectator within the fictional narration of the film. He also argues that the truth of the situation is created by the images: we as an audience believe what we see rather than what we are told about.In contrast, Bazin advocates a realist cinema that upholds the freedom for spectators to choose their own interpretations of an object, narrator and story. This concept of realism respects 24 25 Julia Hallam, Margaret Marshment,â€Å" Realism and popular cinema†, Manchester University Press, 20 0, p. 4 Julia Hallam, Margaret Marshment,â€Å" Realism and popular cinema†, Manchester University Press, 200, p. 4 26 Inbid, p. 11 perceptual time and space, advocating depth of field and the long take techniques which seem to be at the level of recording as they take place.However, he also adds that just techniques cannot guarantee that a realistic cinema will be a result from its use. 27 Jakobsen discusses five ways to make sense of realism: Realism can be an artistic aim the artist considers his work to inhabit Realism can be something perceived ( by others than artist) as realistic Realism can refer to specific periods in history defined by historians and critics Realism is defined by convinced narrative techniques (customs of spending time on actions) Realism is defined by the way it motivates style or narrative 28REALITY CAPTURED BY KIESLOWSKI? s CAMERA It could be said that, for some â€Å"the real is the same thing as the true. Others describe reality to what exists or happens in the surrounding physical world and at the heart of realism, in all its variations seems to be the sense of actual existence, an acute awareness of it, and a vision of things under that form. 29 Descrates with his theme,† I think, therefore I am†; began the first of many attempts in order to explain reality in terms of mind. Pascal said, man is but a reed, yet he is a thinking reed. 0 â€Å"The reality represented in film is constituted by the so-called represented objects. †31 Plesnar writes that the represented reality of film consists in four ontological levels. The first level comprises represented events-individuals. The second level consists of represented things, which depend on represented events; the third level is designed for represented process and the fourth for strictly relative categories. As cohesion to his four levels, the represented reality in film must be defined as a set of all represented events.Slavoj Zizek presents â€Å"Kies lowski? s starting point was the same as all cineastes in the socialist countries: the conspicuous gap between the drab social reality and the optimistic, bright image which pervaded the heavily censored media. The first reaction to the fact, in Poland, social 27 28 Inbid, p. 15 Anne Jerslevâ€Å" Realism and Realty in Film and Media†, Museum Tusculanum Press University of Copenhagen 2002, p. 16 29 Arthur McDowallâ€Å"Realism. A Study in art and thought†, E. P. Dutton& Company, New York 1852, p. 3 30 Inbid, p. 5 31 Lukasz Plesnar â€Å" Represented Space in film† in â€Å" The Jagiellonian University Film Studies†, Wieslaw Godzic, Universitas Krakow 1996, p. 77 reality was unrepresented, as Kieslowski put it, was, of course, the move towards a more adequate representation of real life in all its drabness and ambiguity-in short, an authentic documentary approach. †32 In the interview with Danuta Stok, Kieslowski says: â€Å"At that time, I was inte rested in everything that could be described by the documentary film camera. There was a necessity, a needwhich was very exciting for us-to describe the world.The communist world had described how it should be and not how it really was. We-there were a lot of us-tired to describe this world and it was fascinating to describe something which had not been described yet. It is a feeling of bringing something to life, because it is a bit like that. If something has not been described then it does not officially exist. So that if we start describing it, we bring if to life. † 33 After the Second World War, the political atmosphere in Poland was extremely tense. Siegel, quoting Norman Davies? work called â€Å"Heart of Europe: A short History of Poland†, adds: â€Å"Poland became a Stalinist one-party. By 1946 the State had taken away over ninety present of Poland? s industrial production, and sweeping land reforms broke up the pre-war Polish estates. Heavy industry was give n precedence over agricultural production, and the general standard of living declined as the private sector was abolished and worker were exploited†¦ Anyone suspected of disloyalty was interrogated, censored and put in prison. † 34 The situation in Poland definitely caused Kieslowski? s pessimist in his movies which was dictated by communist.In the same interview with Stok, he provides examples when he was forced to edit part of reality that he recorded, particularly when the reality in film did not impose the reality that government wanted to provide. However, he tried always to find methods in order to present â€Å"the truth† by tricking the censors, he adds. Realism was what Krzysztof Kieslowski concentrated on, and his fictions have a documentary feel to it. In his movies there is a shift from using the observational camera-work associated with documentary with classical conventions of continuity as like in a questions session in Decalogue 1, between Pawel an d his auntie.This questions session becomes the focus of narrative interest through the use of medium/ close ups and shot of dramatically the curious face of Pawel. 32 33 Slavoj Zizekâ€Å" The fright of real tears. Between theory and post-theory†, British Film Institute, 2001, p. 71 Danuta Stok,â€Å" Kieslowski on Kieslowski†, faber and faber, London 1993, p. 54, 55 34 Annette Insdorf,â€Å" Double Lives, Second Chances†, MIRAMAX, New York 199, p. 9 DOCUMENTARY+/= FICTION When documentary aspects can be visible in Kieslowski? s fiction? How these aspects influence on his fiction? Are these aspects make similarities between his documentaries and fictions?Kieslowski started with documentary as an attempt to describe reality that surrounded him and later moved from describing form of reality to expressing form of reality, in his fiction. However, it seems that, there is number of corn similarities between his documentaries and fictions. Firstly, he shifted his in terest about a man from documentaries to fiction. â€Å"Even the short documentary films were always about people, about what they? re like. † 35( †¦) In addition, in documentaries and fictions his main interest was inner-life. Secondly, almost all his work, apart from this feature Short Working Day ( 1981) that shows the worker? strikers from 1976; are set in the present, although they might have got some links to the past. Kieslowski focus on the present, on the stories of ordinary people, demonstrate them on the grounds of importance. In addition his focus on individual character, an observation of a small portion of reality is well seen not just in documentaries, but also in his fictions. In â€Å"Blue† a melting cube of sugar which proves Kieslowski? s obsession of close up, shows that the main character is not interested in something else then in this cube of sugar.For her, important is what is in front of her, her inner world. He achieved this technique by close-up zooming which creates an illusion of isolation a person of object from the wider context. The same techniques can be notice in his documentary called â€Å"Hospital† where details also play a significant role. A detail has got a significant role to evoke feelings in the audience as it delivers also a metaphysical context. Closing-up on doctors who hold and smoke cigarettes is seem to be reaction that in hospital they do not have medical tools to heal their patients and they use some building tools. The realist paid attention to redundant detail, which often meant writing dialogue that accurately reflected a character? s social identity, as well as, or instead of, forwarding the plot. In production, realist effect was created through props and sets that reproduced everyday life in great detail. † 36 35 36 Danuta Stok,â€Å" Kieslowski on Kieslowski†, faber and faber, London 1993, p. 144 Julia Hallam, Margaret Marshment,â€Å" Realism and popular cinemaâ € , Julia Hallam, Manchester University Press, 2000, p. 20 Furthermore, from his documentaries, he brought kind of simplicity of presenting subjects or person, much avoiding authorial intervention.He never used both in documentaries and fictions his voice over commentary. It would seem that he believed that shooting in close-up characters tell story enough well without the need of commentary. Also from his documentaries, he gained the skills of photographing people? s feelings as like happiness, sorrow, tiredness, hopeless, indecision and hope ( most evident â€Å" I was a Soldier, â€Å" X-Ray†, â€Å" Talking Heads†), and adopted them into his fiction, Clearly seen in the scene of Decalogue 1, when Krzysztof lost his son, when he runs to the church to protest and despair.Thirdly, Kieslowski also used the documentary technique to raise tension and attention in his fiction. This statement supports the view in Blue, when Julie asks the housekeeper lady, why she is c rying and when she hears â€Å"because you are not†. Julie who is normally unresponsive to others; reacts by embracing. And what a camera does in this particular moment? The camera is moving in close, reframes. The camera fallows the action rather than leading it. It seems that the moment might feel as documentary, as cameraman was surprised by Julie? s sudden reaction as audience might be. 7 By using this documentary technique in fiction he was more to fallow â€Å"the focus†. As in documentaries, noticed event that just happened is a part of what makes a documentary feels real. Fallow feeling with the character, not purely indemnification with him or her, but the kind of recognition of what the character feels in his/her world. His fiction (especially Camera Buff, Personel or Decalogue) provide feelings of authenticity and naturalness. Moreover, he often uses â€Å"deep focus† which is a technique that depends on a wide depth of field.Depth of field is a cinem atographic practice, whereas deep focus is a technique in a film. Depth of field refers to the facial length and is achieved by a wide-angle lens. Deep focus, Bazin arguments as a greater objective realism possible. Besides, Kieslowski use to start the first scenes of showing the setting which carry information of the plot. In his documentary â€Å"From the city of Lodz†, at first a spectator sees the fabric, which is a basic and corn place for the characters of movie. The spectator, can observe the same technique in his fiction, for example in Decalogue 1, when at first sees the lake, the place of catastrophe. Kieslowski represents a creation as a form of suffering, an urgency that nothing can impede, like solitary cry before indifference of ? deals. †38The tendency of showing the setting first in movie might be a shadow what is a film about. The same tool is in Decalogue 7, when a movie starts from the off-screen scream of a child who is a main matter of the movie. 37 Steven Woodward, â€Å"After Kieslowski. The Legacy of Krzysztof Kieslowski†,Wayne State University Press, Michigan, 2009, p. 154 38 Annette Insdorf,â€Å" Double Lives, Second Chances†, MIRAMAX, New York, 1999, p. 3 In addition, there is also characterisers melancholy which seem to be started in documentaries and was continued in fictions, which has got some philosophical reflections. There is a tendency in both his fiction and documentaries to show the same kind of man who does not how to life and for what reasons. Consequently, cyclical nature of his fiction movies had background in documentaries. For example the documentaries such as: Hospital, Office, Station, Factory might be put in one cycle, as all of them tell the story about Polish national institutions.The documentaries such as X-Ray, I was a Soldier , The Talking Heads might create another cycle. There is a same technique in fiction with the cycles as Blind Chance, Decalogue, Three Colours. In many intervi ews, Kieslowski pointed out that he makes movies in order to register. In 1976 he remarked: â€Å"I started to combine elements of both filmic genres- documentary and fictionfrom the documentary taking the truth of behaviour, the appearances of things and people, and from fiction, the depth of experience and action- the driving force of this genre. †39 39Marek Haltof, â€Å" The cinema of Krzysztof Kieslowski†, Wallfower Press, London, 2004, p. 27 KIESLOWSKI? S AESTHETICS â€Å" Critics, particularly Polish film critics, usually debate the distribution between the ? early realist „and ? mature „metaphysical Kieslowski, and majority of them clearly favour `Kieslowski the realist?. †40 The argument for that might be, he started from detailed representation of reality, later moved this realist form of observations of people to his fictions. , the most evident in Decalogue, where he keeps a camera on a character, often working class character.Kieslowski believed that trough the documentary he can describe the world around him. His documentaries and early fictions show Poland and all its ugliness. He used very cold form of showing the grimy period of Poland under the communist regime whit a main focus on every day? s life of ordinary Poles. The world in which he grow up as an artist, the world with he continually dialogued in his movies, was not stable, free and economically successful like in Western Europe. The suffering of his country in many ways appears in his work.In Decalogue ( 10 parts that refer to the Biblical Ten Commandments), the ugliness of grey urban setting dominates the filmic landscape, together with close-ups of characters who endure these harsh conditions. Kieslowski? s observation of desperate characters, struggled for a better tomorrow, entanglement to the system, living in a communal way of life in grey, tenement blocks give Decalogue the feeling of documentary film. It seems that an inspiration for Decalogue were â€Å"chaos and disorder ruled Poland in the 1980s-ever-where, everything, practically everybody? s life. Tension, a feeling of hopelessness . 41 However, the Decalogue combines both; realism and hallucinatory style, as there is a mysterious zone in this cycle which is represented by a mysterious stranger who appears at crucial moments in different parts. The mysterious stranger is the silent witness and appears symbolically. He brings the element of mystery, something inexplicable also the tone for the series by dramatizing the conflict between the rational and the spiritual. Moreover, in Decalogue, Kieslowski preoccupied with issues of chance, fate, alternative possibilities, and the tentative suggestions of a providential esign to the arc of human life quite similar as Ingmar Bergman. His characters suffer from dislocation, a displaced orientation, a disappear identity. In many ways, Decalogue is a set of the dramatic conditions and tone of isolation, despair, longing what cannot be recovered. â€Å"Chaos and disorder ruled Poland in the mid. 1980s-everwhere, everything, practically everybody? s 40 41 Inbid. , p. XI Danuta Stokâ€Å" Kieslowski on Kieslowski†, faber and faber, London, 1993, p. 143 life.Tension, a feeling of hopelessness, and a fear of yet worse to come were obvious (†¦) I am not even thinking about politics here but about ordinary, everyday life (†¦) I was watching people who did not really know why they were living. † There is also kind of tendency for them going round and round in circles, without achieving what they wish to achieve. The series of Decalogue is also a compact about such questions as what is right, what is wrong? how to be honest? .how to live with the acceptance to the nature? However, considering these questions, it seems that in movies Kieslowski avoids easy answers. Slavoj Zizek argues that Kieslowski? interest in Decalogue is ethic not morality. This is showed by breaking the moral code in each film that the ethical path is to be found. † 42 Moreover, Kieslowski used a form of ethical questioning as opposite to the strict moral code based in religious principles in 10 Commandments. It as an attempt to narrate ten stories about different individuals, caught in some struggles of difficulties of Polish life. The Decalogue is â€Å"the virtualisation of (†¦) life experience, the explosion/ dehiscence of the single ? true` reality into multitude of parallel lives, is strictly correlative to the assertion of the pro-cosmic abyss of a chaotic. 43 Decalogue has got an authentic recording of reality, but also has got acting and stimulation which offers still authentic imagery. â€Å" The major staples of Catholic thought-moral law, sin, guilt, free will, angels; infuse Kieslowski? s world† 44 in Decalogue. The first Decalogue episode presents the death of a child. The film opens with a picture of the frozen lake, suggesting a winter. It seems that the camer a surveys this elemental image in order to avoid the human habitation, depicting despoil universe. A young man seats beside a smoking fire. He is a part of this landscape, the furry collar of his coat add animal look.The same returns at least 4 times in this part of Decalogue and returns in another part. He has no influence on action, however he leads the characters. Again in the first episode of Decalogue, there is the same technique, which Kieslowski used in his documentaries, called the technique of details. For example, Krzysztof is upset when ink that suddenly stains on his paper. It is like liquid is out of the control. This detail is reference to moment when Pawel his son is on the ice and this liquid functions as a foreboding liquid of out of control. 42 Steven Woodward , â€Å"After Kieslowski.The Legacy of Krzysztof Kieslowski†, Wayne State University Press, Michigan 2009, p. 44 43 Slavoj Zizek,â€Å" The fright of real tears. Between theory and post-theory†, British Film Institute, 2001, p. 95 44 Steven Woodward, â€Å" After Kieslowski. The Legacy of Krzysztof Kieslowski†,Wayne State University Press, Michigan 2009, p. 186 In the third Decalogue episode, there is the same technique of playing with light as for example in his documentary X-Ray. In this documentary light presses on characters? hope and fears. The first shot is of blurred light that comes into focus when a drunk appears. Light is significant foreground here.Later when a police car is fallowing Janusz in stolen taxi, the scene is shot with close-ups of flashing blue light. As in other segments of the Decalogue, close-ups with wider shots filled with variations of lighting tend to isolate characters. If one character is in shadow, the other in light present the formal separation on emotional state. In X-Ray, light press characters? desires. Shots of a wood at sunrise follow, with a mysterious fog rolling through the scene. The abstract impulse is clearly in these sh ots and they act as a suggestion of eternal space cut against images of facing death people.Also the stark contrast between the pastoral rehabilitation centre and the smog-ridden city is showed by visual rhetoric of lighting as well. From the other side, Decalogue can be also analysed trough the terms used by Joseph G. Kickasola: the mosaic structure and Multivalent Consciousness. The mosaic structure is a kind of film composed with small pieces of narrative. Mini narratives come together to form a larger narrative. Narratives are related, and the drama of the film is contingent on these relationships developing and changing throughout the course of the film.The watching elements come together to form a whole. 45 In Decalogue all 10 episodes take place in Warsaw, the same blocks- tenements arrangement, among neighbours who may know each other. There is the connection between characters within the theme. Kieslowski realised argument that â€Å" We perceive our environment by anticip ating and telling ourselves mini-stories† about that environment based on stories already told†. 46 Multivalent Consciousness takes a place when one person in some ways or another has got two or more simultaneous modes. It presents the idea of two people who might be the same person.In Decalogue, there is a mysterious man who once is a man sitting by lake in another part he takes different role. Somehow, there is an experience of a sense of mysterious connection between this one character to another character in particular episodes of Decalogue. â€Å"Tim Pulleine writes that Kieslowski? s perception of the world is saturated with â€Å" East European sinisterness. Even if one agrees with this comment-suggesting that the characters in Decalogue are themselves the products of specific East-Central European historical, political and 45Steven Woodward , â€Å"After Kieslowski. The Legacy of Krzysztof Kieslowski†,Wayne State University Press, Michigan, 2009, p. 168 46 Edward Branigan, â€Å"Narrative, Comprehension and Film†, Routledge, London, 1992, p. 1 cultural circumstances- one also has to notice that they face universal, truly Bergmanesque dilemmas. †47 The open structure in Decalogue which is also in Bergman? s movies invite to fallow the action of his characters written in symbols, allusions, ambiguity and a number of motifs such as bottle of milk- sipped, frozen, spilled and delivered.In Decalogue 1, the frozen milk in a bottle seems to be a signal that the ice is thick enough for Pawel to go skating. Ironically, the ice cracks as the water was too warm in a lake, may it be a motif of the bottle of milk de-freezing itself? Furthermore, when Pawel is on the ice-skating, the ink bottle spills on his father? s table, makes uncanny spot. Is that can be read as melted milk? In addition, the motif of milk appears later in another parts of Decalogue. In Decalogue 2, the old doctor goes to buy a bottle of milk when in Decalogue 4 is very similar scene, when father goes to buy a bottle of milk.And the same bottle of milk is prominent in Decalogue 6, when young boy Tomek distributes milk in order to contact with Magda. Magda spills the bottle of milk on a table. Might the spilling of milk occurring as an echoed red stain of blood that fills the washbasin after Tomek? s suicide attempt, when he cuts his wrists? It could be said that, the bottle of milk is a sublimation of the detail which gives a meaning for another scenes as a simple trick of theatrical play. However, Kieslowski says â€Å"When it spills, it means milk? s been spilt. Nothing more (†¦ ) And that is cinema. Unfortunately, it does not mean anything else. 48 Anyhow, this statement does not mean that he disagreed with metaphorical ability of cinema, but he simply found it more difficult for cinema than for example for a novelist to capture the inner life. One of the Kieslowski? s famous actor Jerzy Stuhr says that Kieslowski used a method of perfect dialogue. Two people on the screen are silent, and a third one in the audience knows why. From documentaries, he avoided in his movies over informative dialogue. He weaved the information through character? s behaviour and details which were always important tools of information in his movies. 9 Idziak one of his famous cameraman said about Kieslowski: â€Å"He strongly believes that the look is more important than anything else, he understand to what extent the style affects the story. He understand that the style is the story itself. † 50 Also memories are important part of his movies. This approach to memories, dreams is visible already in his documentaries ( â€Å" I was Soldier†, â€Å" X-ray†) and it is much developed and 47 48 Marek Haltof,â€Å" The cinema of Krzysztof Kieslowski†, Wallfower Press, London, 2004, p. 79 Danuta Stok, â€Å"Kieslowski on Kieslowski†, aber and faber, London 1993, p. 127 49 Steven Woodward, â€Å" After Kieslowski.The Legacy of Krzysztof Kieslowski†, Wayne State University Press, Michigan, 2009, p. 70 50 Steven Woodward , â€Å"After Kieslowski. The Legacy of Krzysztof Kieslowski†,Wayne State University Press, Michigan, 2009, p. 150 questioned in his fiction. In his documentaries, dreams were treated more as portraits of characters; in fictions they have got more metaphysical and spiritual aspects. From time to time Kieslowski characters confess to odd feelings, strange dreams that dived them in a certain direction. Torkovsky once wrote: â€Å"Time and memory merge into each other; they are like two sides of a medal. Memory is a spiritual concept†¦Bereft of memory, a person becomes the prisoner of an illusory experience; falling out of the time he is unable to seize his own link with the outside world-in other words he is doomed to madness. †51 51 Andrei Tarkovsky, â€Å" Sculpting in Time†, trans. Kitty Hunter-Blair, Austin: University Texas Press, 1986, p. 58 WHY RETRACTION FROM DOCUMENTRY? In the switch to fictions, it is quite clear that Kieslowski started to see the limits of the realist aesthetics. He discovered there was still much in life to be explored. â€Å"Not everything can be described. That is the documentary? s great problem. It catches itself as if in its own trap†¦If I am making a film about love, I cannot go into a bedroom if real people are making love there†¦ I noticed, when making documentaries, that the closer I wanted to get to an individual, the more objects which interested me shut themselves off. That is probably why I changed to features. † 52 In the interview with Stok, Kieslowski gives example about one documentary that he was making during Polish martial law in the early 1980s. He received permission from the lawyer Krzysztof Piesiewicz ( his co-scriptwriter of Decalogue). The case for it was, expose the brutal and unfair sentences of the Polish judges were passing on Piesiewicz? worker clients. â€Å" The moment I started shooting†¦ the judges did not sentence the accused. That is, they passed some sort of deferred sentences which were not in fact, at all painful. † 53 It seems that judges did not want be recorded on film passing unjust sentences. Kieslowski understood that this causes false visions of reality behind him. According to the interview with Stok, Kieslowski claims that he made his films on documentary principles. These principles reflected not to â€Å"unmediated truth, but the premise that films â€Å"evolve trough ideas and not action. 4 However, he still believed in human experiences and describing the reality as his artistic territory although, at the end of his carrier, he moved from social focus to more universal metaphysical ideas of life. It could be said that the instruments of authenticity which he used in documentaries, went toward the task of metaphysical exploration which still caused thrust to his all movies, just i n this case metaphysical thrust of portraying human feelings. Another reasons, seems to be more ethical. Probing into other? s intimacy by referring to the right. â€Å" I managed to photograph some real tears several times.It is something completely different. But now, I have got glycerine. I am frightened of real tears. In fact, I do not even know whether I have got the right to photograph them. At such times I feel like somebody who has found himself a realm which is, in fact, out of bounds. That is the main reason why I escaped from documentaries. †55 52 53 Slavoj Zizek,â€Å" The fright of real tears. Between theory and post-theory†, British Film Institute, 2001, p. 72 Danuta Stok, â€Å" Kieslowski on Kieslowski†, faber and faber, London 1993, p. 127 54 Joseph G.. Kickasola â€Å" The films of Krzysztof Kieslowski†, Joseph G. Kickasola,continuum, London 2004, p. 3 55 Slavoj Zizek, â€Å"†The fright of real tears. Between theory and post-theor y†, British Film Institute, 2001, p. 72 Zizek argues that Kieslowski supplements the prohibition to depict the intimate moments of real life with false images of fiction. He adds that Kieslowski moved from documentaries as when somebody films real life scenes in documentary, people ( actors) play themselves and he claims that the only way to depict people beneath their protective mask of playing it, paradoxically is making them directly play a role into fiction. It seems that, in Zizek? s augment fiction is more real than the social reality of playing roles.He supports the view that if in Kieslowski? s documentaries, the characters seem to play themselves, then his fictions cannot but appear as documentaries about the brilliant performance. 56 Zizek also makes very crucial questions in order to analysing Kieslowski? s. He asks; if his escape from documentaries to fiction was dictated by the ? fright of real tears? , by the insight into obscenity of directly performance real li fe intimate experiences? How fictions are even in a way even more vulnerable than reality? If documentaries show the hurt the personal reality of the character, that fiction intrudes into and hurts dreams themselves?Documentary has got its limits; â€Å"not everything can be described†, he said in â€Å" Kieslowski on Kieslowskim†. Turning camera on external events cannot capture the intimate experiences such as making love or dying he said. Analysing his fictions, the question this arises: â€Å"Could a feature describe better than a documentary? † The dominant characteristic of the fiction film is that it represent something what is imaginary of the director. However, the feature representation seems to be more realistic then in another field of art such as painting or theatre as those show effigies of objects, their shadows.When in a fiction, the setting and actors represent the â€Å"real† situation even if they played it of the certain number of film ed conventions which we recognize from our life. In â€Å"Blind Chance† , Kieslowski composed three version, which seems to begin as a dream; the young man running to catch the train to Warsaw. The movie starts, that the main character is screaming as he lost his father who wished that he becomes a doctor, however he loses his wishing whist he was dying, he tells to Witek: â€Å"You do not have to do anything†. And somehow his father? death frees him from necessity. Later in the same part he becomes a Party activist, in the second part he gets lost and in third one, he got marry, become a doctor and suddenly die in an aircraft explosion. â€Å" Witek 1 is shot with a Tarkovskian adherence to ? real time? : no time is edited out of any of the 56 Slavoj Zizek,â€Å" The fright of real tears. Between theory and post-theory†, British Film Institute, 2001, p. 75 sequences. The life of Witek 2 is edited more conventionally, highlighting the â€Å" key† moments † (†¦) The final version of Witek? life is edited most conventionally from all, virtually in the no-nonsense manner of a television movie. † 57 The end of the movie confers a sense of fantasy. â€Å" By beginning Blind Chance with Witek? s scream and by developing opposite scenarios that logically require a middle one to complete and close them, Kieslowski gives to his film a structure that preserves it from succumbing entirely to the dictates of chance. † 58 Start with a close-up of a man who screams â€Å" No† with a moving camera into darkness of his throat. This might be a scene of Witek? s flashback.Witold? s scream at the beginning, might be a replay on the end of the film, when a plane? s explosion occurs. Blind Chance seems to be more of the same elevated to an iconic Munch-like open-mounted scream with which the film starts, and exactly this scene realises at the conclusion of the film, when it means the death of the main character. As the res ult, the movie might be described as the binary of â€Å"catch† or â€Å" miss† the train: missing the train with positive outcome, missing the train with negative outcome, corresponding to the third story when he caught the plane.Catching or missing, determined his death. 59 The term Forking Paths created by Joseph G. Kickasola, where one character proceeding along a particular narrative trajectory that divides in several directions. One path might be a true, and the others just are alternative endings. 60 This term suits for Blind Chance as outcome the moment of contingency. Alain Masson refers to the construction of Blind Chance as a dilemma or trilemma, where Kieslowski invites the audience to puzzle over whether Witek? s experiences device from choice, chance or perhaps destiny.As he said in â€Å" I? m So-So`, â€Å" We are sum of several things, including individual will, fate and chance which is not so important. It is the path we choose that is crucial. â₠¬ 61 57 Paul Coates, â€Å" Kieslowski, Politics and the Anti-Politics of Colour†: From the 1970s to the Three Colours Trilogy† in The Red and The White. The Cinema of People? s of Poland†, Wallflower Press, Great Britain, 2005, p. 191 58 Inbid. , p. 192 59 Steven Woodward, â€Å"After Kieslowski. The Legacy of Krzysztof Kieslowski†,Wayne State University Press, Michigan 2009, p. 122 60 Inbid. , p. 69 61 Annette Insdorf,â€Å" Double Lives, Second Chances†, MIRAMAX, New York 199, p. 59 CONCLUSION In Poland in mid-1970s and 80s, Kieslowski was a leading documentary film- maker with the following output :The Office ( 1966), The Photograph ( 1968), From the City of Lodz ( 1969), I Was a Soldier ( 1970), Factory ( 1970), Before the Rally ( 1971), Refrain ( 1972), Between Wroclaw and Zielona Gora ( 1972), The Principles of Safety and Hygiene in Copper Mine ( 1972), Workers? 71: nothing about us without us ( 1972), Bricklayer ( 1973), X-Ray ( 1974), Curri culum vitae ( 1975), Hospital ( 1976), From a Night Porter? Point of View (1977), I don? t know (1977), Seven Women of Different Age ( 1978), Station (1980), Talking Heads ( 1980),Seven days a Week ( 1988). Kieslowski started from documentaries as a fight for a representation of the lack of an adequate image of social reality in Polish cinema caused by Communist regime. It seems that, he moved into fiction, as he noticed that when he let go of false representation and directly approach of reality, he lost reality itself in his documentaries. Notably, his documentary achievement has got unquestionable reflections on his fiction.Precisely, to feature films, Kieslowski moved â€Å"a criterion of authenticity† visible for example in â€Å" Personel†, where he made significant remark toward â€Å" authentic cinema†. For this production, he used improvised dialogue within the tradition of Italian neorealists, to cast non-actors for majority of roles. In the interview with Stok, he describes, how characters are true as they contradict the conventions of filmic stereotypes. Moreover, the next important tool in his movies is the tool of detail. Kieslowski, already started using this tool in his documentaries, whereby he developed within fiction.A detail in Kieslowski? s films, it is not just a construction of reality, but the detail plays crucial role in the transmission of reality. Furthermore, analysing Kieslowski? s films on the grounds of its documentary elements in his fiction, it is also important to interlace them with the term of naturalism which is closely associated with realism and which was not mentioned before in the paper. Naturalism fist came in the theatre of the nineteenth century with the work of Andre Antonie. He created a method of acting in order to get the actors to move away from the theatrical gestural.It means that the actors supposed to act as the audience was not there and audience feels as if it witnessing slice-of-life realism, which was also crucial for Stanislavsky? s method of acting. Actors enter the personae of their characters in order to not represent themselves. The essays describes the importance of naturalism, as Kieslowski? s actor appears to play in very natural and realist way and Kieslowski precisely stylised a life in a film. Especially, the Decalogue delivers naturally the conclusion for Poles- â€Å"they speak just like us†. The reality of what that might be seen in front of eyes, can drives nto the illusory nature of representation. It could be said that in this way, naturalism has got also an ideological effect of naturalizing. Therefore, it gives a surface image of reality. Always, aesthetic, social and moral concerns work together to deepen Kieslowski? s films. â€Å"Kieslowski? s work was prescient in all kinds of ways, that developed innovative narrative forms and stylistic methods to address pressing existential, moral and political issues ( †¦) with references to his social context and the tensions and conflicts that surrounded him. † 62Emma Wilson describes Kieslowski as a director of intimacy and interiority.Kieslowski in his movies guid

Changes in Economic Structures

Changes in economic Structures Introduction Show knowledge of primary, secondary, tertiary Changes in primary Develop at least two points about why the primary sector has decreased in developed countries Explain advantages and disadvantages Change in secondary Develop at least two points about why the secondary has decreased in developed countries Explain Advantage/disadvantages Changes in Tertiary Develop two points about why the tertiary sector has increased Explain advantages/disadvantages (what’s good and bad about it) ConclusionWhat’s going to happen in the long term? What do you think the impacts of this have been overall? Changes in economic Structures Within the business industry there are 3 main sectors in which firms operate to, which is the primary secondary and tertiary sectors. Each of these sectors forms a chain of production which provides consumers with products and services. In the primary sector firms are involved in extracting raw materials from earth ’s natural resources.This includes fishes being fished out of the ocean, rubbers being tapped from trees, and oil being drilled from the ground etc. Whilst as the secondary sector manufactures and assembles the raw materials collected from the primary sector to make a complete product. Examples are refining crude oil to turn into useful products such as gasoline, cooking uncooked food to serve in restaurants and turning copped wood into finished products such as chairs and tables etc.Finally in the tertiary sector firms focus on selling the refined and manufactured products/services to customers, for example selling finished chairs in a furniture shop, refilling gas tanks in a petrol station, selling diamonds to soon to be engaged couples etc. Over the past centuries we have seen many changes in the business industry including the decline of employment rate in the primary and secondary sector, and the employment boom in the tertiary sector.In the 1700’s 75% of the worl d’s population was working in the primary sector, 15% in the secondary sector and 10% in the tertiary sector, whereas now only 2% are employed in the primary sector, 28% in the secondary sector and 70% in the tertiary sector. One of the main reasons why there has been a decline in the primary and secondary is sector is the change in technology. As the newer technology provided businesses with more efficient ways of extracting and manufacturing products (using machinery) it also reduced the amount of workload needed by humans in the chosen job.This meant a lot of workers had to become redundant and thus taking jobs in the tertiary sector. Additionally because of the over-extraction of natural resources there are very scares resources left to extract out of the earth; as a result businesses have to compete for the resources that remain meaning businesses that cannot compete to acquire these resources have to make their employees redundant hence the decline in employment rate in the primary sector.Finally because of the increasing safety standards and more people caring about their health there has been a decrease in primary and secondary sectors. On the other hand, whilst the primary and secondary sectors are decreasing, the tertiary sector has increased dramatically. This is because of the increase in educational standards and the amount of pay in the tertiary sector. As decades past more and more people are receiving better education around the world, thus people with higher education require higher paying jobs.This is where the level of employment in the tertiary sector skyrocketed because the tertiary sector could provide these people with a higher pay and a job that they want to pursue. Furthermore as a result of increase in tourism many tertiary sector businesses have opened up to fulfill the demand tourists. In conclusion the sectors in the business industry will always keep on changing because of the factors shown. We are in a generation where the tertiary sector is very popular and this has influenced the way each country works.For example in Thailand there are many tertiary businesses in the capital city such as offices, super-markets and malls which are mainly highly successful. And schools nowadays guide students to work in the tertiary sectors instead of primary of secondary. However there are still large populations of people working in the primary sector as rice farmers etc. Nevertheless I believe in the future the tertiary sector will decrease and the primary and secondary sectors will rise again because once the tertiary sector meets its peak, it will drop back down.

How should future generations contend with the French-English divide? Has this divide changed over the past 20 years, if yes how so? Essay

As a part of Quebec’s youth and up and coming younger generation I have witnessed the conflicts between the French- English divide since I could remember and it is important that the needs of both sides are full filled or at least compensated for, future generations need to focus on other issues and need to resolve the French-English divide in a fashionable matter so that both sides can work together and benefit from each other such as the increase of speaking French in schools and businesses. Cleavages are defined as â€Å"a politically significant distinction among identifiable groups in a given population† (L7, S5). Language is an important cleavage in Canadian society (L7, S6), Canada is known to being a diverse country the population consists of many different types of people, cultural backgrounds and value systems each of which should be respected and tolerated by every citizen of this country. The English-French divide has persisted over time as a result of events and decisions by governing bodies that have continued to fuel the divide (L7, S7). There are different solutions to the language issue among French and English speakers but it takes time and although the divide has changed a lot, the past 20 years we aren’t where we want to be just yet and it is up to future generations to solve this problem. Further issues such as the compact vs contract theory will be discussed and also in recent news the dispute over the Charter of values the Pauline Marois government seek to put in effect that has sprung up a dispute other issues that will be discussed are Bill 101 and the disputes over the equalization of payments that has become a major topic for discussion and a large part of the French-English division if future generations were to resolve these topics they would be one step closer to a neutral decision. The language divide has played a key part in intergovernmental policies  between the federal government and the provinces and is therefore an important part to understand. We’ve learnt throughout history that the English have often attempted to assimilate the French (L7, S8) you don’t often see the English trying to preserve the French language and this resulted in a heated battle among English and French especially in the late 1800’s and late 1900’s where the divide had intensified and almost seemed imminent. In a video demonstrated in the lecture slides (L7, S8) former premier of Quebec (2001-2003) Bernard Landry and former leader of the Parti Quà ©bà ©coise points out that 75% of Anglos in Quebec speak both French and English and almost all the younger generations speak both language and admits this is a great improvement. Part of Quebec’s problem is that you can become a citizen by speaking English or French this is a problem for the Quebecoise because people are coming from different countries with just an English background, if there was a divide they would make it so that if you were to become a Quebec resident speaking French would be mandatory. Preserving the French language has been a top priority for Quebec. The French lived in constant fear of losing their language (L7, S8) so in order to preserve the French language and culture the appropriate decision the Parti Quebecoise have decided to do is to promote separatism. There was talk of the separation of Quebec from Canada being more of a sovereignty-association, Quebec would separate but would retain a political and economic association with Canada. They would share the same currency and have some joint governments to oversee their relations. Quebec would not really be independent it would actually rely heavily on both Canada and the United States for trade. Quebec would then be able to change the language laws so that French would be the first language. This could be a good decision but there’s a large amount of English speaking Quebec citizens who disapprove. Bernard Landry points out that Quebec has improved over the years and that he has seen a lot more Anglo’s speaking French as well but he points out that it is a different issue in different provinces. Being an English speaker myself it is very encouraging and helpful that I am perfectly bilingual, being bilingual has helped me in the work force, in my studies and in my social life. These are some factors that have English speaking Quebecers  speak more French and really made an impact among English and French speakers of Quebec. In Bernard Landry’s video he talks about speaking to his cousins that live in British Columbia and displays how they have lost their French Background it is in the Parti Quebecoise best interest to prevent this from happening. As we have seen, la survivance was the notion that fuelled traditional Quebec nationalism. The Quiet Revolution gave rise to a new type of nationalism in Quebec which had a different vision of the state and its ability, through its institutions, to help the French survive (L7, S49). The French-English divide was further aggravated when the Quebec government decided to use its institutions to implement legislation to ensure the survival of the French language in Quebec. This caused a great deal of controversy in English .In an attempt to counter such nationalist language tactics and appease the French, the federal government also used its institutions to enact legislation related to language. There is no doubt that the French-English divide has been fuelled by these issues (L7, S58). After all these events had taken place the French took action into preserving the French language and culture and to implement it on all of Quebec. The Quebec Board of the French Language (OQLF) more popularly known as the ‘language police’ by the English media are probably the most feared people to business owners. In Quebec, Bill 101 implements that all visible form of writing must be in French, there are strict laws that indicate that the French words have to be visually larger than any other language as well as businesses more than 50 employees were going to have to adjust and use French as their language of business (L7, S59). Maintaining the two official languages is not cheap. Even Canada’s current Prime Minister Stephen Harper commented on the cost of bilingualism even before he was elected as the prime minister. These factors have played a major role in the changes Quebec has had over the years and I have noticed it myself. The divide has changed a lot of the years and with Pauline Marois and the Parti Quebecoise who knows what will happen next. The French and English divide is becoming less and less of a problem in Quebec although tensions have been rising lately with the PQ it is in their interest to keep the French population in Quebec happy and to keep pushing new legislations to enforce the speaking of the  French language. Although it is a great approach to preserve the language you could say that the language police have taken it a step too far at some points with disputes and attempted ban of these words in restaurants such as â€Å"pasta† and â€Å"fish n chips†. The Anglo’s have a hard time dealing with disputes such as these knowing our tax dollars are being spent on non-sense such as the banning of those words. In all I think it is important to implement that business owners change their signs and put in place a French first basis and plays a big factor in today’s language battle and it is a large reason why a lot of Quebecers are speaking French first. I myself walk in a place of business and speak French first to the clerk, when I am working myself I introduce myself in French first and I adapt to whomever I am talking too whether or not they are French or English it is important to respect the language of other people. In recent news a large dispute has sprung up with the â€Å"Charter or Values† Pauline Marois and the Parti Quebecois brought up the idea of banning religious symbols and dress codes when at work. This includes the Christian cross, Jewish and Muslim headwear, hijabs, turbans, etc. As the government expected, the plan to introduce the Chater of Value’s created street protests. Situations like these aren’t helping the French and English division it has strung up protests and aggravates the English speakers these aren’t ways to increase French speaking and culture in Quebec it had fuelled the fire in a way and bring us a step back from where we would like to be in the English – French division. The linguistic battle among French- English has improved in Quebec over the past 20 years with French being highly implemented in schools and businesses but I couldn’t say that for the rest of the provinces. These are ways to further increase the population of French speaking Canadians, future generations should focus on increasing French in schools and businesses rather than try to force the language on people with new legislations and fines. We have seen improvements over the past 20 years and that should continue if other provinces were to adapt more the French language in their place of business and in schools you would see a large increase in the population of Canada that speak French rather than just Quebec. Bibliography Bernard Landry, former Premier of Quebec (2001 – 2003) and leader of the Parti Quà ©bà ©cois (2001 – 2005 Brooks, Stephen (2004) â€Å"Canadian Democracy – An Introduction 6th edition† Oxford University Press: Toronto. PP.187-189 http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/is-pasta-french-enough-for-quebec-1.1301918

First Amendment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

First Amendment - Essay Example Speech, as defined by the Constitution is not limited to the spoken word. It can be an expression or idea. Symbolic speech, as it is often referred to, includes various types of nonverbal communications such as peaceful protests, campaign signs in the front yard and burning the American flag. Yes, burning the flag is a legal expression of free speech. The Supreme Court, through years of rulings, has clearly defined the parameters of free speech. For example in 1969 Brandenburg v. Ohio case the Court ruled that government could not forbid speech that encourages subversive or illegal activity unless that â€Å"advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.† (Brandenburg v. Ohio, 1969) Using Brandenburg as precedent the Supreme Court ruled the government could not prosecute a Vietnam draft dodger who said â€Å"if they ever make me carry a rifle, the first man I want in my sights is L.B.J.† in Watts v. U.S. (1969). ... A person risks their life in many other countries for much less flagrant self expressive speech than that. The right to free speech is not all-inclusive however. The Court has ruled speech which damages another person’s reputation or defamation including both slander and libel is actionable in court. (Cohen, 2009). â€Å"Defamation law attempts to balance the freedom of speech and open exchange of ideas without giving someone permission to run around spreading lies about another that may harm his or her reputation, ability to earn a living, etc.† (Fabio, 2009). Merely expressing an opinion, however, is not regarded as defamation. Factual statements can only be considered defamatory. Public figures such as celebrities and government officials have not enjoyed the same level of protection under defamation laws. For those in the â€Å"public eye† actual malice toward that person by the speaker must be demonstrated in order to prevail on a defamation claim. (Cohen, 2 009). This is the reason we see so many celebrity tabloids with outrageous headlines in he checkout lanes in grocery stores. It’s much tougher for celebrities to win a lawsuit than the general public. Most forms of speech are covered by the First Amendment but besides defamation other types of speech may be legally restricted and civil litigation initiated based on these restrictions. The Supreme Court has set guidlelines for these other types of speech such as obscenity, causing panic, incitement to crime, sedition, fighting words and hate speech. The test for obscene speech established by the Court is (a) whether that spoken word or expression of speech such as artwork is regarded by the average person as being erotic, (b) whether the words or art depicts acts that are obviously offensive, and (c)

Linguistics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Linguistics - Essay Example Hence, the â€Å"written† language enjoys the superiority of being official and acceptable everywhere. The difference between jargon, accents, slang and dialect is also important. Dialects keep changing since language is made and modified by the times people live in, which of course are incessantly in a flux. Some legitimacy is also enjoyed by different dialects depending on who speaks it, mainly subscribing to the various strata of society. Usually the choices of the elite determine the stratification of dialects and languages; via which many other stratification can also be explained for example fashion etc. 2. Non-standard dialects and its usage is quite political if you come to think of it. The chapters elaborates about how standard versus non-standard is largely a matter of what is in vogue at that particular point in history. For example, the r-lessness that suffers changing connotations on either side of the Atlantic is simply a matter of fashion. At the same time it is not so simple because it has serious implications for the members who speak in it as the way of talking is a very important judgment factor, voluntarily and involuntarily. This kind of stratification of language relegates communities to the periphery by defining ‘popular’ dialect etc. ... The politicians and well-educated might also talk in the same vernacular dialect to portray a sense of belonging to their local community. 3. Linguistic variability is important because it represents the variety of cultures and styles. They are of many levels and types. The various levels are lexical (vocabulary and meaning), phonological (pronunciation), morphosyntactic (syntax and usage of words), and pragmatic (way of talking, pausing, and pacing). The various types are those of social class and social networks, gender, and ethnicity. Social status has varied influences on language, with no easy one on one relation. In some places, (Arabic speaking nations), the level education defines status and not the profession (unlike America, where occupation is the general parameter). Also, the high or correct Classical Arabic is not spoken in daily use. In America, and other western countries however, standard language is preferred over nonstandard by people who are of upper class, so to s ay. Loose social ties (usually in lower class groups) tend to be more open to language change as compared to people belonging to dense social ties who maintain vernacular speech features and are less likely to language change (Milroy and Milroy). Like Labov suggested, that the lower class are also more open to language change because they are the ones who are most upwardly mobile of all class groups. 4. Language variation and gender researches show markedly concrete inferences. In case of stable language features, women tend to use standard language more than men. For example, swimming instead of swimmin’. Interestingly, women are more subject to language change than men in many western countries. In another example, Labov observed

One Economics asepct of the auto industry Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

One Economics asepct of the auto industry - Essay Example It is important to explain that the 2007/2008 economic crisis had a very negative effect on the American auto industry, with almost all American auto companies becoming on the verge of bankruptcy. Companies such as Chrysler and General Motors were on the verge of bankruptcy, and this forced the American government to intervene and bailout these companies. This is by using the funds emanating from TARP, which is an acronym for the Troubled Asset Relief Program. A company such as Ford Motors was able to protect itself from the effects of the financial crisis, mainly because it was maintaining a hedge fund, whose money could be used for purposes of protecting the organization, during a period in which it was facing some financial crisis. There is a lesson to be learnt from this study. The lesson is that, it is always necessary for companies or business organizations to maintain an hedge fund, that could be used to fund the operations of a company or a business organization during periods of recession. This should not only be applicable to the auto-industry, but to other industries as well, such as the finance, communication, transportation industries, etc. Furthermore, this information is also significant to me, mainly because the auto industry has managed to improve from a near bankruptcy situation in 2007/2008, to one of the most profitable industries in the United States. This is because all these companies that were bailed out have managed to repay their debts, totaling to billions of dollars. It is quite interesting to know what type of strategy that these business organizations were able to use, despite the strong competition that emanated from the other companies, specifically from Japanese auto companies. My interest in this issue also emanates from the desire to know more about the 2007/2008 global crisis. In my knowledge, the crisis emanated because of the inability of the

Western civilization.The rise of Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin. Rise Essay

Western civilization.The rise of Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin. Rise of Islamic Fundamentalism - Essay Example The study of history can be tedious and cumbersome to most people but provides many of the important lessons and insights that learning from the past offers to anyone interested in it. This is because knowledge of the various social, economic and political events in the past gives and also provides a guide for the future events as well which prevents committing or repeating the same mistakes or errors. Interpretation of the past is a requisite to have a better grasp of today's events, putting them in the right perspective, context, or understanding enabled with the benefit of hindsight. This paper presents four major historical events which still influenced present events despite the passage of several years. Discussion The four major events were the rise of radical totalitarian dictatorships out of the chaotic political and economic conditions at the turn of the twentieth century, which in turn produced important political figures like Hitler and Stalin who took advantage of those c onditions to change the course of world history, the women's movement (sometimes termed as feminism) that originally grew out of the black American civil rights movement and aimed to improve the lot of women like the right of suffrage and lastly, the rise of Islamic fundamentalism or extremism that saw its culmination in the September 11 terrorist attacks and the war in Afghanistan today. The Rise of Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin Totalitarian dictatorships are political systems in which only one person or a small group of just a few persons control the levers of political machinery and the government. Radical totalitarian dictatorships in this regard are political systems in which the government or the state controls all aspects of the life of its citizens, including their private lives, hence the term totality is a reference to state control of all sectors of society, everything for the state and nothing is against the state (as the saying goes). A dictatorship is a form of author itarianism, in which only a junta, a committee or a small group composed of members of the political elites, hold power by virtue of their authority but implies not all social institutions are totally under state control. The radical term as used here denotes only one person holds all the powers, like Stalin was in Russia. Adolf Hitler was a German politician who was born in Austria (1889-1945) and he rose to power through the Nazi Party of Germany (NSDAP). He was a decorated World War I hero; he was imprisoned briefly in 1923 for a failed coup d'etat but once released the next year, quickly rose in the party ranks due to his populist ideas of pan-Germanism (extreme nationalism), anti-semitism (hatred of Jews) and strong anti-communism views. He was also a terrific orator and is able to convince the German population of his ideas, especially those repudiating the terms of the Treaty of Versailles (peace treaty in WWI) as pretty onerous to the German economy. He went on re-arming Ger many in violation of this peace treaty and seized adjoining territories in pursuit of his Lebensraum policy (expanding the living space of Germans), with Germany becoming one party dictatorship under Nazism (nationalist socialism). Germany was able to control most of the European continent and North Africa during the height of its military successes, but Hitler and his wife committed suicide in April 1945 to avoid capture by Red Army forces prior to defeat. Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was one of the original Bolshevik revolutionaries who had fought in the Russian Revolution of 1917 that brought down the Russian monarchy and considers himself as the rightful heir of Vladimir Lenin by eliminating most of his serious rivals, primarily Leon Trotsky who was assassinated in Mexico City in 1940 as a threat to Stalin's own ambitions. Stalin was

The Success of Dell's Business Innovation Model Essay

The Success of Dell's Business Innovation Model - Essay Example The company had later adopted its name from its owner. What began as a humble beginning was not confined to its small size. Over years Dell had transformed its business from a small company to one of the largest multinational companies in the whole world. It took Dell less than 30 years to transform itself under the competent leadership of Mr. Dell. The first step towards this beginning commenced when it was first decided that the company would go public. Initially 34.2 million dollars were raised from the initial public offering made by the company. The success of the company can be analyzed in retrospect. Product innovation has been one of the chief reasons by which the company has been an important reason for the success of the company. This could be understood better if one analyzes the range products that are being offered by the company. The business expanded from its initial offering of computer hardware to include a wide variety of products ranging from personal computers and storage devices to camera and printers. Dell now involves a considerable portion of IT services. Selling products produced by third party has been one of the common practices adopted by companies and Dell is no exception. The primary aim of an organization is to create value for its customers and deliver it to them at most affordable price. Business innovation is just the process by which an organization achieves this goal in the most successful manner. The idea behind any innovation is to create a unique business which enhances its value immensely and make it popular among the customers. It is believed that revamping of the business by incorporating innovative practices in it raises the value proposition of the business and propels it ahead of its competitors (Rajala, Westerlund and MÃ ¶ller, 2012). Research work of Osterwalder had identified nine different dimensions of business innovation; namely core capabilities, partner network, value configuration,

Financial analysis Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 1

Financial analysis - Assignment Example Despite the fact that there are more phones than humans worldwide the global penetration of cellular technology is 79% of the population. The market for cellular phones is attractive, particularly the sales of smartphones such as the iPhone 6. In 2012 the worldwide sales of smartphones reached 967.8 million units (Plunkettresearch, 2014). In the United States the market penetration is 104.3% with 68.8% of users using smartphones. Smartphones are revenue makers for companies such as AT&T that sell cellular talk, text and internet data services for cellular devices. Cellular devices are the biggest seller of any kind of consumer electronic with approximately 1.8 billion units sold each year. 53.76% of all cellular phones sold each year are smartphones. New phones today offers a vast array of advanced features that make smartphones the new computing device of the 21st century. U.S. wireless service company revenues in 2013 reached $189.2 billion. The average user of a cellular phone spends $48.79 on their monthly bill. The ability to sell internet data services has greatly increased the capacity of cellular phone providers to increase their revenues. A major merger that occurred in the industry in 2013 was Japan Softbank merged with Sprint Nextel. The cash flow of Sprint increased by $5 billion after completion of this deal. Cellular phones have become a mature product in the United States as market penetration exceeds 100%. Focusing on selling smartphones with better features and specifications has become the mostly utilized strategy in the industry to achieve growth. Cellular phone providers benefit from the innovation of companies such as Motorola, Apple, and Samsung. New smartphones are going to become more powerful due to the consumer desire to have a computer at the reach of their hands. A growing trend among cellular phone users is to utilize phones to pay for goods or services. 3G and 4G networks are the current standard of the industry, but beware

Information Technology- Information Retrieval Annotated Bibliography

Information Technology- Information Retrieval - Annotated Bibliography Example In this article, Chowdhury, Gibb and Landoni assess the ease at which a group of users is able to access information from a given source. This article is supported by a quantitative analysis conducted on users to support the necessity of considering uncertainties in the design of an information system. This article is useful in my case since it justifies the need for conducting studies on information retrieval and the possible risks involved. This article is a documentation of the development in the computing industry and the strategies implemented in adapting to changes in the field. Liu, McMahon and Culley describe the processes that led to the development of SDR technology. In the article, the authors explain the reasons behind development of the information retrieval (IR) technologies, such as incompatibility of files between the traditional and modern systems. This paper justifies the existence of the SDR in the engineering filed and its purpose in information retrieval. This article provides information on the challenges that led to the development of a better-structured information retrieval system. According to Tu and Seng, works involving IT technologies in the education sector is one of the fastest growing ventures. The article in question represents a collection of ideas from comprehensive studies in the information technology filed. The article by Tu and Seng is an attempt to congregate information on the information retrieval subject with considerations to current operational systems. The intelligence gathered exposes the need for continued studies in the information retrieval field. This article is useful in my study for it shows that perfection in the information retrieval subject has not yet been attained, there exists challenges. The article presents an exhaustive tutorial on the basics of applying information retrieval techniques to acquire useful information on a

Negative Impacts of Oil Exploration on Nigerias Biodiversity Essay

Negative Impacts of Oil Exploration on Nigerias Biodiversity - Essay Example It is Africa’s largest wetland, which consists of flat and low lying swamps that are a result of sediment deposition beautifully arranged in a terrain. The area has four different ecological zones which include coastal barrier islands, mangrove swamp forests, fresh water swamps and lowland rainforests. Due to this diverse ecosystem, the delta is one of the world’s most concentrated regions in biodiversity. Not only does it have the potential of supporting abundant fauna and flora, it has the potential of sustaining agricultural production. The freshness of the water gives it the ability of harbouring fresh water fish as well as a water catchment area for domestic consumption. However, the biodiversity has been destroyed by oil exploration activities around the area, and is proving to be a threat to the environment of the place. This paper will look at the various negative impacts of oil exploration in Nigeria has had on the biodiversity. Statistically according to Kadaf a (2012, p. 18) Nigeria ranks at first position in the world with flare gas, constituting 46% of Africa’s total flared gas per tonne of oil produced. This accounted for 19.79 per cent of the total global figure in the 1990s. During the period between 1970 and 1979, the average rate of gas flaring in Nigeria stood at 97%. In the period between 1980 and 1989 saw 97% of gas being flared while the years between 1990 and 1999 saw a total of 97% of gas be flared in Nigeria. Most of the gas extracted in the delta is immediately flared into the environment at a rate of 70 million/m3 per day. Gas flaring is the biggest contributor of air pollution in the Niger delta (Edino, et a., 2010, p. 67). Gas flaring emits greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere which include methane and carbon dioxide, the major contributors of global warming. Environmentalists argue that air pollutants are highly concentrated in the Niger Delta than in the rest parts of Nigeria as a result of oil extraction. Gas flare sites produce a lot of heat, which is as high as 1,600 Celsius, making it a major contributor of thermo pollution. Moreover, areas as far as 43.8 metres away from the sites experience temperatures of close to 400 Celsius, which negatively affect the vegetation and animal life and affects ecological equilibrium (Emoyan, 2008, p. 30-34). Global warming is potentially dangerous to the sea level of the low laying coastal areas as it potentially raises the sea level. Evidence of environmental degradation of the delta include inundation on large scale, increased coastal erosion, modification of habitats as wildlife are redistributed in the area, increased intensity of high rainfall events which is associated with increased run off. Soil erosion is a major occurrence as flash floods are common in the region while ocean storm surges have been a frequent occurrence (Kadafa, p. 2012, p. 20). Combined, these effects on the environment potentially jeopardize the survival of communities l iving in the region. Gas flares have been responsible for rain water and ground water acidification, research has indicated. Evidence shows that the Niger delta has high levels concentration of volatile oxides of carbon, nitrogen and sulphur oxide which exceeding normal standards of federal environmental protection agency. Due to the increased pollution levels, water from shallowly dug wells has indicated the presence of low pH levels, a cause of acid rain. The effects of acid rain cannot be underestimated. Not only does it corrode roofing sheets of houses and commercial buildings, it also damages vegetation as well as contaminate pools, lakes and rivers which are home for fish and other marine life (Akpomuvie, 2011, p. 206). Oil mining in the Niger delta