Phil Borges: Documenting our endangered cultures

February 4, 2011 by Gail
Filed under VidStyle

Photographer Phil Borges shows rarely seen images of people from the mountains of Dharamsala, India, and the jungles of the Ecuadorean Amazon. In documenting these endangered cultures, he intends to help preserve them.

ABOUT TED

TED is a small Non Profit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. It started in 1984 as a conference bringing together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment and Design. They make the best talks and performances from TED and partners available to the world, for free. These videos are released under a Creative Commons license, so they can be freely shared and reposted. Here at PLO.com I repost them for your convenience. All videos found in this section have previously appeared in the Major MindStylers section on the frontpage of my website. Enjoy.

ABOUT Phil Borges

“Spurred by the rapid disappearance of the world’s indigenous peoples and their oral traditions, Phil Borges abandoned his dentistry practice to pursue his first love, photography. For the past 25 years, he has traveled to the farthest reaches of the globe to meet with persecuted Tibetan monks engaged in non violent struggle and embattled tribespeople of the Ecuadorian Amazon who must defend their way of life by any means necessary.

Through interviews and portraiture, he documents his subjects and their tribulations with dignity, and conveys their rarely heard stories. Phil is a co-founder of Blue Earth Alliance, which sponsors photographic projects focusing on endangered cultures and threatened environments, and the founder of ‘Bridges to Understanding’, an interactive online classroom that promotes cross-cultural learning between indigenous and American youths.

By teaching teenagers how to share stories through digital filmmaking, he hopes they’ll develop the mental flexibility and cultural sensitivity to understand and appreciate belief systems outside their own. ”

The VIDEO