Documentary refuses to fit into a particular genre, form, or mode. In this class, we shall encounter documentaries in educational TV, digital stories, docudramas, activist polemics, autobiographies, and ethnographies. While many acknowledge that documentary is not mere actuality or raw footage, there remain perspectives that suggest that documentary offers us access to “the world” while fictional films create “a world.” This perceived grounded-ness of documentary provides it with a particular evidential and affective charge. In this course we will examine contested histories and theories about documentary. Does documentary promote a discourse of sobriety or helps us to express desire? In the course, we shall be watching and analyzing a wide range of documentary films with a particular focus on trauma and testimony, reenactment practices, visual anthropology, and ecological documentaries.