Methodological Approaches to Disclosing Historic Photographs

18 Methodological Approaches to Disclosing Historic Photographs Eric Margolis and Jeremy Rowe NOTES ON HISTORIC provenance: they were made by known or PHOTOGRAPHS important photographers; they are accompa- nied by collateral information, such as writ- Our research draws from the genre often ten documentation; or they are well-known called ‘historic’. In a real sense all photo- and have been studied by generations of graphs are historical; they are two-dimen- scholars. Other photographs are drawn from sional representation of scenes captured with the much larger category of ‘vernacular’ pho- lenses, and frozen in a fraction of a second. tographs. Such images come from more From the instant of exposure, the photograph obscure sources and usually offer little docu- recedes into the distance of time. However, mentary information to provide a ‘warranta- for the purpose of analysis and discussion, ble’ understanding of the photograph, other this chapter uses a conventional historians’ than that provided by the image itself. We definition of ‘historic’ photographs as being may be provided with only observable infor- 50 years or older. mation such as the size, format, and subjec- Like the photographs in Barrett’s descriptive description. Collateral information such tive and explanatory categories discussed as date, location, photographer’s name, sub- below, people tend to accept historical photo- ject, or reason for being made have been lost graphs at ‘face value’, as accurate, indexical or are unavailable to the researcher. reflections of reality. Historic images have The vernacular genre, as popularly been concentrated in libraries, museums and described, includes indigenous or ‘native’ archives, and have become increasingly pop- photographs, typically made by unknown or ular for illustrating books and used in ‘docu- amateur photographers that tend to depict mentary’ motion pictures. There are also less common subjects, objects, family, and events visible, but very active markets for sale and of daily life. There are literally millions of private collection of historic images. Some these vernacular historical photographs, historic photographs come with extensive which are becoming more accessible and 55632-Margolis-18.indd632-Margolis-18.indd 333737 33/14/2011/14/2011 44:04:14:04:14 PPMM 338 THE SAGE HANDBOOK OF VISUAL RESEARCH METHODS widely available to researchers. Access to photographs originally made for reasons vernacular historic photographs previously other than research. In either case, by them- required time-consuming and costly trips to selves photographs provide only ‘thin’ archives. Increasing numbers of large-scale descriptions, but this information can prove digitization projects, the resulting online helpful in constructing our own ‘thick’ access to these collections, and social media descriptions (Geertz, 1973). Erving Goffman and sharing sites like Flickr, Photobucket and (1976) emphasized the human ability to Picasa are making millions of vernacular make categorical inferences about the images readily available to researchers. glimpsed world in ‘real life’ and the glimpses Many sites also solicit and share input provided by photographs: about the images that can assist in identifica- tion and interpretation. Additionally, traffic To glimpse a world ... is to employ a set of categories more or less distinctive to glimpsing and often in buying and selling photos has moved from entirely adequate for the job they are designed to swap meets and estate sales into regional do (22).1 trade shows and conferences like the National Stereoscopic Association, the Daguerreian In the essays that introduce Goffman’s (1976) Society, and Papermania, and to large-scale study of the portrayal of gender in advertis- online auction sites like eBay and Delcampe. ing images, he makes the point that photo- These images, and where still extant, the graphs − posed or candid − are of the same associated data concerning their provenance, nature as a glimpse of ‘real life.’ constitute a significant resource for all the human and cultural sciences with tremen- We are all in our society trained to employ a some- dous untapped potential for researchers. In what common idiom of posture, position, and glances, wordlessly choreographing ourselves rela- what follows we explore ways to investigate tive to others in social situations with the effect the meanings of historic photographs. that interpretability of scenes is possible. ... however posed and ‘artificial’ a picture is, it is likely to contain elements that record instances of real things (21). INTRODUCTION: TO GLIMPSE A WORLD THAT WAS Visual ethnography has an academic interest in analyzing historical photographs to learn Clifford Geertz saw the strength of ethnogra- as much as possible about the way the world phy as its ability to ‘put us in touch with the was. The study of historic photographs builds lives of strangers’ and to ‘see things from the upon the same foundational issues as other other’s perspective’ (Geertz, 1983). In con- visual research techniques. There are also fronting our own history we similarly try to different analytic approaches, such as the fathom the lives of strangers. Traditionally, ‘postpositivist’ and ‘hermeneutic’ paradigm historic research primarily incorporated communities (Kuhn, 1970). Berger and Mohr document analysis and oral history. But as (1982) noted the connection of photography culture has become more visually literate, both to the modernist project of positivism photographs, graphics, and other images and to the discipline of sociology: offer the historian/ethnographer an addi- The camera was invented in 1839. August Comte tional window on the ‘webs of significance’ was just finishing his Cours De Philosophie Positive. that Geertz (following Max Weber) said Positivism and the camera and sociology grew up comprised culture (Geertz, 1973: 5). Some together. What sustained them all as practices was researchers have adopted and use cameras the belief that observable quantifiable facts, recorded by scientists and experts, would one day as recording mechanisms to provide their offer man such a total knowledge about nature own images for analysis. Others, the and society that he would be able to order them authors included, emphasize ‘found object’ both (99). 55632-Margolis-18.indd632-Margolis-18.indd 333838 33/14/2011/14/2011 44:04:14:04:14 PPMM DISCLOSING HISTORIC PHOTOGRAPHS 339 This chapter presents two approaches to pho- ‘naturalistic’, or ‘superstitious and naïve’) that tographic research, each presented in the photographs have a special causal and structural relationship with the reality that they repre- voice of one co-author. In general we believe sent (282). that potential synergies exist in approaching photographic research from perspectives of We don’t necessarily agree with Mitchell’s both postpositivist evidence from indexical concern that positivist beliefs in images have and iconic sources, and interpretivist/herme- been killed off by postmodernists like Victor neutical approaches that draw on symbolic Burgin. As discussed later, Errol Morris, dimensions that are essential in the examina- among others, maintains a firm distinction tion of photographs. Each brings tools and between words and photographic images in lenses for viewing and analysis of photo- his analysis, and argues that photographs do graphs that are neither mutually exclusive have a ‘special’ relationship with what stood nor individually exhaustive. before the lens. While Margolis leans toward theoretical Currently, there are two vibrant meta- hermeneutic approaches, Rowe applies a physical conceptions of photographs. The postpositivist evidentiary process that he first we’ll term ‘postpositivist’ in that, while terms photographic forensics. In a previous confident in the indexical relationship co-authored piece about an album of Arizona between a photograph and the material world Indian school photographs, the co-authors in front of the lens, assertions about photo- found that each technique added value to the graphic meaning have two limitations: analysis: the whole was clearly more than the sum of the two parts (Margolis and Rowe, 1 These assertions are statistically probable, not 2002). This chapter continues the dialogue certain. between and about the two approaches to 2 They must be subject to rigorous testing and photographic analyses, providing general must be in principal falsifiable if they are to background to each approach, and brief be considered scientific (Philips and Burbules, examples that catalyze the discussion. 2000). Today, there is a growing awareness of the limitations of the strict positivist position that The photographic researcher/critic makes considers photographs as merely a ‘mirror ‘warranted’ statements backed by evidence − with a memory’ (as daguerreotypes were but the warrants can be extended or even labeled soon after their introduction in 1839). overturned at any time by new evidence. Similarly, few argue that cameras function The second conception emphasizes ‘inter- merely as ‘pencils of nature’, a popular pretivist’ views. In contrast to the postposi- implication in the nineteenth century. tivist perspective that considers photographs Englishman William Henry Fox Talbot pro- as documents that convey descriptive or duced the first book illustrated with photo- explanatory representations, merely reflect- graphs in 1844. Talbot laid the foundation for ing reality, or even representing ‘the thing in this interpretation with his introduction:

Load more