Abstract
In this short talk I spoke about the relationship between the two films and contemporary social activist filmmaking particularly in the area of environmental justice campaigns. Environmental justice is a term that began to emerge in the 1980s and brought together issues around environmental degradation and social injustice. Both of the films screened relate to this conjunction of environmental degradation and the unfair impacts of industry on minority groups and on industrial workers. One of the films looks back to the history of mining accidents in Central Europe, and the other at the long history of the marginalisation of a northern indigenous people, the Sami, more commonly known as the Lapps. Both films together demonstrate the effects of industrial development on landscapes, and the indifference of industry and governments about the quality of life of the people affected. As films they are thus both part of the project of social documentary to make issues of environmental and spatial justice more publically visible.