Patricia Zimmermann, Charles A. Dana Professor of Screen Studies and Director of the Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival, and Dale Hudson, Associate Professor, New York University Abu Dhabi, have published an essay on independent media in Ukraine chronicling the war. The essay focuses on the Babylon ’13 new media collective formed during the Maidan Revolution of Dignity in 2013.
Their essay, “Small Media of Urgent Utility,” analyzes how the short videos produced across the country by both professionals and amateurs offer a counter-narrative to Western mainstream media coverage of the war and create an archive-from-below. These videos are housed on a YouTube channel and circulate across social media platforms, demonstrating the potential to broaden media representations and to facilitate global solidarities.
Their essay can be accessed here: https://docalogue.com/babylon13/
The essay also features four playlists developed by the Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival in collaboration with Ithaca College faculty on the war in Ukraine: Histories of Ukraine, Ukrainian Films, Ukrainian Literature, and Solidarity and Protest Music.
Docalogue is an international online space for scholars, filmmakers, and documentary enthusiasts to engage in conversation about contemporary documentaries. Each month, it features one documentary and essays by two writers who have been asked to write about that film. It is dedicated to opening up dialogues about documentary in the current moment.
