Multimodal anthropology

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Multimodal anthropology is an emerging subfield of social cultural anthropology that encompasses anthropological research and knowledge production across multiple traditional and new media platforms and practices including film, video, photography, theatre, design, podcast, mobile apps, interactive games, web-based social networking, immersive 360 video and augmented reality. As characterized in American Anthropologist, multimodal anthropology is an "anthropology that works across multiple media, but one that also engages in public anthropology and collaborative anthropology through a field of differentially linked media platforms" (Collins, Durington & Gill).^[1] A multimodal approach also encourages anthropologists to reconsider the ways in which they conduct their research, to pay close attention to the role various media technologies and digital devices plays in the lives of their interlocutors, and how they these technologies redefine what fieldwork looks like.^[2][3] Scholars Collins, Durington, and Gill call it "anthropology that works across multiple media." It's not just about doing research alone; it's also about working with others and looking at how we do research in new ways. Multimodal anthropology has been growing since the early days of anthropology, changing along with new technology. It's not just about pictures anymore; now it includes things like podcasts, interactive designs, and even storytelling. Collins, Durington, and Gill say that multimodal anthropology adds to visual anthropology instead of replacing it, recognizing how media keeps evolving. Journals like "entanglements: experiments in multimodal ethnography," led by Nolas and Varvantakis, show a strong dedication to exploring all the different sides of multimodal research, encouraging scholars to think differently and embrace the rich experiences of studying people and cultures.