School of Film and TV - Theses

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Start date: 2014 × End date: 2017 × Author: Lines, Jeremy ×

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    Voiceover narration and audio-visual imagery in non-fiction film
    Lines, Jeremy ( 2015)
    This project investigates the relationship between audio-visual imagery and voiceover narration in non-fiction film. This thesis examines that relationship as a particular case of the broader relationship between perception and language in human cognition. I review arguments that the meanings of language are grounded in concepts acquired through perception and action, through embodied interaction with our environments. Despite this dependence of language on perception, cognitive science research shows that language exerts a significant influence over perception. For example, language has been shown to modulate visual processing at an early stage, affecting what we consciously see and remember, and attenuating bottom-up cognitive processes. I argue that the audio-visual (AV) imagery in non-fiction films is perceptually realistic, since it addresses a subset of the same perceptual abilities we use to perceive our environments. We might therefore expect the influence of voiceover narration on our perception of AV imagery to be similar to the influence of language on perception more generally. Several film theorists, including Michel Chion and Bill Nichols, have noted such an influence in their writings. My creative works are concerned with a number of issues raised by the philosophical and scientific study of the mind. I have experimented with the form of these video works, separating AV imagery and voiceover narration. The resulting form diverges from the most widely used structure in non-fiction films, the expository mode, in which AV imagery serves to illustrate the narrative content of the voiceover. The evidence presented in this thesis indicates that separation of these content streams will diminish the influence of language on viewers’ perception of AV imagery. The resulting epistemic independence of AV imagery in my video works emphasises the act of perception as central to questions on the nature of cognition and consciousness.