About the Project

In a novel, a house or a person has his meaning, his existence entirely through the writer. Here, a house or a person has only the most limited of his meaning through me: his true meaning is much huger. It is that he exists, in actual being, as you do and I do, and as no character of the imagination can possibly exist. His great weight, mystery, and dignity are in this fact. As for me, I can tell you of him only what I saw, only so accurately as in my terms I know how: and this in turn has its chief stature not in any ability of mine, but in the fact that I too exist not as a work of fiction, but as a human being.

James Agee from Let Us Now Praise Famous Men.

 

How does one measure the social impact of a documentary project? Over the last few years, models have been introduced to establish metrics and create tools that quantify an audience’s emotional response to documentary work. After viewing a documentary, a viewer’s level of engagement is measured and quantified through a series of questions in an online survey. While the Lewis Hine Documentary Fellows program applauds these efforts, we wondered if we might use documentary work itself to measure impact in ways that could not be captured through this more demographic approach. In 2013 – 2014 we asked filmmaker and photographer Natalie Minik to travel to Boston to see if she could – through her own research and video production – evoke the cumulative impact of documentary work over time in one major American city. Hine Sight: Seven years of Lewis Hine Fellowships in Boston, is the result of Natalie’s efforts.

For seven years, between 2006 and 2013, the Lewis Hine Documentary Fellows Program sent documentary Fellows to Boston to work with non-profit organizations focused on the lives and experiences of marginalized women, adolescents, and children in that city.

For her own Hine Fellowship, Natalie Minik produced five videos focused on the work of some of these former Hine Fellows in Boston. In creating these videos, Natalie wondered about the impact over time of Fellows’ documentary work on the individuals and families portrayed in their projects, on the neighborhoods these individuals live in, and on the organizations that were attempting to help them improve their lives. And finally Natalie was interested in the former Hine Fellows themselves. What was the impact of working on these documentaries on their own lives and careers? It is Natalie’s belief – and that of the Lewis Hine Fellows program – that to measure and assess documentary impact, these are all voices worthy of our attention.

_____________________________________________________

Founded on the spirit, values, and actions of Lewis Hine, the Lewis Hine Documentary Fellows Program connects the talents of young documentarians with the resources and needs of organizations serving children and their communities around the world.

To learn more about the program go to the Center for Documentary Studies website or check out our blog, Lookout.