(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 2007) Fitzgibbons, Ryan Patrick; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Ronald Tobias; Paul Monaco (co-chair)
American wildlife broadcast film has exhibited a preference for exotic fauna, leaving much of North American wildlife underappreciated. The American preference for the exotic finds its roots in the early African hunting films of Cherry Kearton, John Hemment, and Martin Johnson. These films became manifestations of the Pristine, a conceptual realm of untouched wildness filled with aesthetically-pleasing megafauna. Since then, visions of the Pristine, through the exotic wildlife and landscape, have remained popular in American broadcast viewing, as seen in Animal Planet's programming. Exotic wildlife broadcast film encourages viewers to engage in the roles of tourist, refugee, and conservationist. These roles, in turn, foster an understanding of nature that is dominated by seemingly plentiful megafauna, disconnected from humans and valued through a nature-importing model.
