Doing Documentary, Becoming Subjects

Performance and Performativity in Contemporary Nonfiction

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by Adam Vaughan

Type

Essays

Subject

Genre > Documentary

Keywords

documentary, philosophy

Publishing date

2025 (July 31, 2025)

Publisher

Edinburgh University Press

Language

English

Relative size

Physical desc.

Hardcover • 176 pages
6 x 9 ¼ inches (15.5 x 23.5 cm)

ISBN

978-1-3995-4650-8

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Book Presentation:
Doing Documentary, Becoming Subjects explores a range of contemporary nonfiction films, including autobiography, essay film and animated documentary, to understand how these films depict identities being constructed, altered and performed. By applying concepts such as performativity and Deleuze and Guattari’s metaphysics, this book aims to show how the self in documentary is in constant states of becoming at the same time as the films are themselves brought into existence.

About the Author:
Adam Vaughan is a Lecturer in the Department of Film and Media at Southampton Solent University. In addition to performance and documentary cinema, his research interests include queer cinema, diversity in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and critical explorations of identity in film. He has contributed chapters to edited collections about the film Call Me By Your Name, migration in 21st-century European documentary, contemporary LGBTQIA+ film portrayals and the historical biopics of Derek Jarman.

Press Reviews:
A timely and reflective addition to the literature on personal cinemas, Adam Vaughan’s lucidly written book locates and illuminates crucial strategies and processes of documentary performance, embodiment, reflexivity, and becoming. This is a fruitful treatment of a range of important and diverse case studies from international nonfiction film of today. ― Professor Laura Rascaroli, University College Cork

See the publisher website: Edinburgh University Press