The first thing that I was struck by in this article was the very first discussion about the picture where Ben Johnson had just won the Olympic race and the caption was "Heroes or Villains." When I looked at the picture to create my own meaning, what I came up with had nothing to do with race. I think that our need to continuously address white vs. black and so on, only perpetuates stereotypes and doesn't help anyone. I understand that, this article is old and race may have been a little more obvious in the time, but, reading this now, I do not even see a reason to bring up race as any subject matter in the picture. As I continued to read, and absorb the images that were given, I did not understand the aspect of race in almost any of the images. The picture where Linford Christie was holding the British flag, said nothing to me except pride for the country he was representing. My thoughts do not turn to "he can't be british, he's black."
The only place where racial stereotyping was apparent to me was in the discussion of
race and sexuality in regard to Linford Christie. I think it is ridiculous that the day after he won a gold medal, the papers were not focusing on his win, but his spandex shorts but that does not have to do with an image.
I agree with the idea that pictures gain meaning when words are attached, but I also believe that pictures can be taken at face value to some extent. I think that text guides your thoughts but it can also skew your thoughts completely. You can give almost any picture incorrect meaning if you attach words to it that might not have any relation whatsoever.
The way this article started out really made me question the rest of Hall's article as I continued reading. I realize that this article was written 10 years ago and we have come a long way from then, but it made it difficult for me to really understand his point.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I completely agree. When I was first read Hall, I was questioning his whole approach to examining the photos and their supposed "meaning." I find it truly hard to believe that photographers/producers/journalists/readers think in black-white terms, even subconsciously. I think this demonstrates, in my own opinion, how ludicrous and removed academics can become when trying to apply some thesis and reinforce it with evidence. It appeared as though Hall created this argument and then went searching for evidence and chose these examples, instead of vice versa.
ReplyDeleteThis is not only harmful, as you pointed out, in this context but harmful on a much larger scale but it appears to be focusing on a problem when one does not exist, which only perpetuates this thinking in terms of black-white. Academics need to be careful when attempting to create a thesis and then finding evidence for support, instead of finding evidence to then create a thesis.
-David Lindgren