John Grierson Quotes
For three hundred years we have had our focus on the individual. We have distinguished him from the objective world as the Middle Ages did not think of doing. We have given him the world and the universe as a playground for exploration and discovery.
Grierson, John. "Education and the New Order." Grierson on Documentary, edited by Forsyth Hardy, Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1947, p. 276.
The societies that had regularly produced the great advances in the sciences were those that allowed its citizens much liberty—liberty of thought, expression, association, etc. Where religious dogma controlled thought and expression, great scientific achievements were far less probable or less productive. Imagine, what Galileo might have achieved if the Church had not curtailed his efforts. When Islamic society was open, the sciences flourished whereas they were stifled in Christian Europe, but once Islam closed and liberty was no more, Islamic science degenerated to its low point of the 21st century.
John Grierson CBE was a pioneering Scottish documentary maker, often considered the father of British and Canadian documentary film. In 1926, Grierson coined the term "documentary" in a review of Robert Flaherty's Moana.
