Anthropomorphising Nature in Television Documentary

A video essay that discusses how nature documentary has entered into our viewing culture as a window on astonishing natural phenomena and a source of scientific information. It can uncover natural wonders that are largely unknown to us. But just like all media, television documentary presents us with a constructed representation of nature. Stuart Hall famously argued, “Something doesn’t have a fixed meaning until it is represented”. Throughout the years, nature-documentary television has slowly shifted from merely showcasing wildlife and natural phenomena to portraying them as having agency or even being negatively affected by human activity. Anthropomorphising nature plays a large role in this. To some extent, it enables us to feel empathy and care, but as long as we see nature as something separate from ourselves, we can easily fall prey to thinking we are superior to it. Or worse, that nature is something we can disassociate from. The necessity of discussing how nature is or is not represented as a living entity with agency in documentary television is essential in times like these. Not only will it confront us with the question of how and to what extent we are part of nature. It also reflects our connection with contemporary natural disasters (related to climate change).