As learned in “The Archives of the Planet: The life and works of Albert Kahn” reading, Khan was a successful businessman that believed learning about cultures different from one’s own could lead to understanding. This is shown in the way he brought together people with various cultural backgrounds and encouraged conversation among them through the “Around the World Circle.” In a way, his larger “Archives of the Planet” project did the same thing — it was a collection of various cultures used to foster understanding and appreciation among viewers. The archives were gathered by sending cameramen around the world to capture “the most trivial facts of human life… rather than to seek out the outstanding and the exceptional” with the cinematograph and color photography. When reading this, I thought it essentially sounded exactly like transport films — going around the world capturing foreign places, and bringing them back to France. However, upon reflection, I realized that although the basic function of ‘bringing the world to Paris’ may still hold true, “The Archives of the Planet” was different because of the way the archives were used in an educational way.  Khan’s project was more intentional with trained cameramen instructed to gather “judgment-free representations” of cultures that soon would not exist. This documentation was critical as if not for the photographs and films, the indigenous cultures would go unknown. It functioned to teach viewers of the archives about non-dominant people and cultures and encouraged them to have an appreciation for differing ways of life. This is an important way of thinking as it fosters empathy and understanding, which I feel was Kahn’s intention from the start.

Although Kahn’s project was not ill-intended, nothing can truly be a “judgment-free representation.” As mentioned in the article, some of the cameramen had aesthetic viewpoints and personal motivations. I think this serves as a reminder that, after all, these archives are seen through a European lens. No matter how hard Kahn tried to generate an objective point of view, the archives have some bias embedded within them. Besides the cameramen, though, some of the technologies used had their own biases. For example, color photography required a lot of light. What if something that defined one of the small indigenous cultures documented was done indoors and was not able to be captured because of the camera's limitations? Being aware of how and who captured the archives is critical to eliminating the problematic tendencies of the photographs and films and can reinstate the original purpose of “The Archives of the Planet:” to look at underrepresented parts of the world and recognize that they are not so different after all.