Journal of Anthropological Films

The release of our current issue on 22 April, coordinated by a new editorial team, coincides with Earth Day 2025. We present here five films that take a close look at natural resource extraction around the world, involving gold, oil, sand and stone. The films were not prompted by a specific call but emerged as a common theme from the submissions we received, reflecting the heightened concern with ecological issues amongst many ethnographic filmmakers and anthropologists today. In our contemporary era that is profoundly characterised by anthropogenic environmental impact, these films highlight the social inequalities and power imbalances affecting the global majority, causing certain populations to experience the effects of environmental harm more directly and acutely than others. However, the films featured here do not portray such communities as passive victims; rather, they illuminate people’s creative and impassioned forms of resistance, their drive to educate and mobilise against these larger forces, and their assertion of their own rights and agency while fighting for a fundamental sense of respect and accountability towards the natural world we all share.

Our cover image is a digital rendering of an unrealised project by Spanish architect and sculptor Eduardo Chillida, depicting his planned intervention into Tindaya Mountain on the Canary Islands. The image is courtesy of Isaac Marrero Guillamón, one of the filmmakers whose work is featured in this issue.