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Ask the Chatbot Games & Quizzes History & Society Science & Tech Biographies Animals & Nature Geography & Travel Arts & Culture ProCon Money Videos
documentary
  • Introduction
  • Documentary practices and uses
  • Origins in motion studies and actualities
  • Origins of the term documentary and early works
    • Connections to persuasion and propaganda
    • Radio and television documentary
  • Vérité and direct cinema
  • Rise of the filmmaker
  • Women and documentary
  • LGBTQI+ and documentary
  • African Americans and documentary
  • Documentary exhibition and distribution
  • Documentary in digital space
References & Edit History Related Topics
Images
Eadweard Muybridge Nanook of the North A still from Vertov's Man with a Movie Camera

documentary: References & Edit History

More Articles On This Topic

  • broadcasting
    / Spoken word
  • Great Depression
    / The documentary impulse
  • history of photography
    / Documentary photography
  • Robert Flaherty
  • John Grierson
  • Pare Lorentz
  • Lumière brothers
  • Roberto Omegna
  • Frederick Wiseman

Article Contributors

Primary Contributors

  • Ralph Beliveau

Other Encyclopedia Britannica Contributors

  • The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

Article History

Type Description Contributor Date
New article added.
  • The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Apr 20, 2026
View Changes:
Article History
Revised:
By:
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