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The Penn Global Documentary Institute (PGDI) documents human migration using film, photography, virtual reality, and other media. The Penn Global Documentary Institute collaborates with communities across the globe to document their stories using film, photography, virtual reality, and writing.

Telling Global Stories Through Local Collaborations

Penn Global Documentary institute’s network of faculty, students, and partners embrace the latest innovations in scholarship, teaching, and media production to create collaborative, interdisciplinary, multimodal works that tell impactful stories. In addition to global collaborations, PGDI foregrounds the role of student contributions to research and multimodal scholarship. As a result, PGDI’s award-winning films, books, and other works have been featured in international festivals and exhibits and have been distributed by the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), Discovery+, and other platforms.

filmaid kenya co-productions

Penn faculty and students have joined forces with FilmAid Kenya on many different initiatives including, most recently, creating an open online filmmaking course.

virtual reality lab

Since 2017, the Virtual Reality Lab has created immersive documentaries in partnership with cultural organizations locally and globally.

jewish communities of africa

Through film, photography, and historical writing, PGDI  works with Jewish communities across Africa to tell the stories of connected communities with very different histories.

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