Dawson Dunning
Filmmaker from Otter, Montana
Host: Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand
Dates of Grant: 2008-2009

Dawson Dunning on the Gallatin River outside Bozeman, Montana (Photo Credit: Kelly Gorham, MSU News)

Dawson Dunning hails from one of Montana's smallest towns, but his passion for film and wildlife conservation has resulted in him taking on some of the planet's largest biological problems. 

Dunning, currently a graduate student in Montana State University's Science and Natural History Filmmaking program, grew up on a ranch near Otter, Montana and is currently at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand on a Fulbright Fellowship. Throughout 2009, he will study and film the tuatara, a species of reptile with a lineage dating back 200 million years, and the sooty shearwater, a seabird that has the longest known migration of any animal on the planet.

On the reasoning behind his film project, Dunning says, “Both of these species are especially important in Māori culture, which is what sparked my curiosity for the topic.  I am intensely interested in wildlife conservation, but acutely aware of the fact cultural values are crucial in protecting species and are often overlooked in the scientific community.  While biologists are studying population trends and ecology using Western scientific methods, there is a wealth of knowledge already out there about species, passed down by many generations of indigenous people and those who have lived close to the land.  The reality is that this knowledge is disappearing at an alarming rate and the more species that we allow to dwindle and disappear, the more traditional knowledge will be lost as well.

“In the coming months I will be profiling research of the sooty shearwater, or muttonbird, which has been traditionally harvested by Māori people for centuries.  In conjunction with this study we will conduct interviews with Māori, who are collaborating with researchers to have their traditional knowledge documented and archived for future generations.  I have quickly realized that my contribution to this aspect of the project will be one of my greatest services while in New Zealand.  I also hope to spread a wider message that Western science and traditional knowledge are not contrasting ideas; neither are they two sides of the same coin.  More so, they are both ways of knowing, ways of understanding our universe, and partners in conversation. 

“My work at MSU and as a Fulbright fellow has reaffirmed that I made the right decision to go into filmmaking, which allows me to combine my interest and training in science with the creative arts.  Storytelling and artistic endeavors hold much more promise in my career in wildlife conservation than lab work and scientific publications.  Documentary film is an amazing tool in that it allows me to target an audience of choice, one that I feel will learn the most from the experience.”

At the conclusion of his Fulbright Fellowship and travels abroad, Dunning plans to return to Montana to begin developing films surrounding the environment and people where he was raised and where his passion for conservation originated.

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