Simulating Wildlife Experiences: A History of Natural History in the BBC

Abstract

This study places the BBC series Walking with Dinosaurs (1999) in the context of the history of wildlife filmmaking in the BBC, which began in the 1950’s. Despite Walking with Dinosaurs’s use of digital animation, as opposed to mechanical objectivity, a comparison of the intentions and epistemic notions of the creators of the program to those of their predecessors reveals a historical continuity in epistemic values, as well as in ideas regarding what positions natural history programs should hold in the circulation of knowledge between the scientific community, television, journalists, and the public. The BBC sees itself as a semi-autonomous creator of knowledge on the topic of natural history. Wildlife filmmakers in the corporation consider the unique value of the kind of knowledge-of-nature that they produce to consist of experiential and holistic qualities which they do not consider scientific knowledge to embody. Previous BBC attempts at tackling prehistoric life were frustratingly stuck in a descriptive, scientific mode. Walking with Dinosaurs represented a breakthrough in the desire to create experiential and holistic knowledge on prehistoric life, as well as a progression in the already established BBC practice of presenting science as unfinished business rather than a set of established facts, and to act as an arbiter in scientific debates.