Since the early days of anthropology, the production of images in the field—first photographic, then audiovisual—has accompanied research as a tool for classifying and collecting the diversity of the world in a colonial and positivist context (MacDougall, 2006; Piault, 2000). From the 1950s onwards, more collaborative, and reflexive approaches, notably driven by the pioneering work of Jean Rouch, profoundly renewed the practices of audiovisual anthropology.
Today, alternative forms of writing in the social sciences are experiencing remarkable growth, and the discipline of audiovisual anthropology is exploring different approaches that propose to move beyond text as the sole means of producing and transmitting knowledge to the public (Cox, Irving, and Wright, 2017).
My proposal for EuroSeas 2026 is part of this dynamic and will consist of the presentation of two ethnographic films that I made as part of a doctoral thesis in anthropology, in Cambodia and among the Cambodian diaspora in France: Forest of struggles (2025, 29 min.) and Les terres de Mme P. (2025, 10 min.). This presentation will address the context in which these two films were produced and their roots in ethnographic material. It will highlight a hybrid field research methodology, at the crossroads of ethnography and cinema, which questions the transmission and memory of the Khmer Rouge genocide, the exile of thousands of Cambodians abroad, and their forms of anchoring, through film and collaborative devices.