Engaging with Reality

As our world becomes more globalized, documentary film and television tell more cosmopolitan stories of the world’s social, political and cultural situation. Ib Bondebjerg examines how global challenges are reflected and represented in documentaries from the United States, the United Kingdom and Scandinavia after 2001. The documentaries deal with the war on terror, the globalization of politics, migration, the multicultural challenge and climate change.

Engaging with Reality is framed by theories of globalization and delves into the development of a new global media culture. It also deals with theories of documentary genres and their social and cultural functions. It discusses cosmopolitanism and the role and forms of documentary in a new digital and global media culture. It will be essential reading for those looking to better understand documentary and the new transnational approach to modern media culture.

This book is framed by theories of globalization and delves into the development of a new global media culture. It also deals with theories of documentary genres and their social and cultural functions. Engaging with Reality contributes to a new and broader understanding of our changing, contemporary media culture and offers a comparative, transnational analysis of the forms and functions of documentary in a new global and digital media culture.

Introduction: Documentary, contemporary society and media culture 

PART I: Globalization, documentary film and television

Chapter 1: Globalization in a mediated world

Chapter 2: Sociology and aesthetics of documentary genres

Chapter 3: Engaging with and investigating reality: the social and political documentary

PART II: War, terror and democracy: the post-9/11 documentary

Chapter 4: Into the dark side: the politics of war

Chapter 5: On the battleground: reporting and representing war

Chapter 6: Behind the headlines: documentaries, war, terror and everyday life

PART III: A new global order: political, social and cultural challenges

Chapter 7: Politics and spin in a mediated world

Chapter 8: A multicultural world: migration, culture and everyday life

Chapter 9: Risk society: the environmental challenge

Conclusion: Cosmopolitan narratives: documentary in the new digital media culture