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How did you get that job? 142 THE LIST 24 May–21 Jun 2012
Name Nick Higgins
Job title Filmmaker and Academic Project Northern Lights
When did you start your job? In some sense I created my job rather than started it. I had originally taken a fairly traditional route into academia, completing an undergraduate degree followed by a PhD. Less predictable were the subjects I chose to research and the way I researched them. I first undertook fieldwork in Africa and then for many years I worked with the indigenous Maya of Mexico. At a certain point I became frustrated at the inadequacy of writing to communicate the intense experiences and people that I was encountering. Matters came to a head when I interviewed the survivors of a massacre in Acteal in southern Mexico. It was then that I decided that I should start filming what I was researching rather than only writing about it. So what does your job actually involve? My regular
job involves running a couple of unusual post-graduate degrees that I founded at the University of Edinburgh to allow students to use documentary film as a research tool. Right now though, my own research involves overseeing the creation of Northern Lights – the first ever mass participatory documentary film about Scotland. What this really means is asking everyone in Scotland to pick up their cameras and become co-directors in the creation of a unique portrait of the nation in 2012. I’ve tried to make it as easy as possible for people to get involved through working with a brilliant team that organise lots of local workshops and online resources. Everything is explained on our website – wearenorthernlights. com, where you can also watch and vote for what has been submitted so far.
Best / Worst Aspects? For this unusual project, the best and worst aspects are both the same – handing over the creative control of what is filmed to the general public is both thrilling and terrifying . . . but that is both
the potential and opportunity of what could be thought of as a form of digital democracy. Making videos about who we are and the country we live in allows people to communicate themselves and their world in a manner of their choosing and that already is proving to be fascinating.
Looking back, what advice would you give to a young Nick Higgins at the start of her career? Follow your curiosities and perhaps pick up a video camera earlier. Words never seem to quite capture the complexity of life. and finally . . . what has been your biggest achievement in 2012? Convincing the Year of Creative Scotland that now is the right moment to ask the people of Scotland to collaborate in the creation of an extraordinary film about who we are and where we are going – but we’ve only got until Thu 21 Jun to do it. wearenorthernlights.com