Investigating the social world through photography

• Author: Andrei Dancu
• Position: Dept. of Sociology-Philosophy, Transilvania University of Brasov
• Pages: 15-21

Page 15

The basic elements in visual communication represent the source of composition for a variety of visual messages, objects and experiences. The primary visual element, i.e. the point, is a space marker; it is the line which articulates the shape; the shape designates the basic contours, the circle, the triangle and the square; the direction orientates the movement and gives character to basic shapes; the value, the elementary aspect of all elements, refers to the presence or absence of light; the shade and the saturation define the coulour - coordinate the value adding chromatic elements; the texture, either optical or tactile, is the characteristic surface of the visual material; the scale, namely the relative size and measure of an image; the size and the dynamics, the two dimensions that give "force" to the image. These are the visual elements from which we are extracting the basic support for the construction of the visual intelligence levels. By understanding these elements, the viewer can manage to understand the visual syntax. To be visually literate means to have the ability, acquired as a result knowing the basic visual elements, to grasp the significance and the components of the image.

Those who want to use photographic materials in the area of social science - to do what is more recently known as visual sociology - reach a dead end more often than not. The photographs achieved by the advocates of the visual sociology resemble to such a great extent the ones performed by others, who assert that they make documentary photography or photojournalism, that there arises the question whether there is a difference between these subjects. There is an attempt to eliminate confusion by identifying essential differences and defining orientations of each subject, as if it is only a matter of definition.Page 16

Such labels do not refer to the essences of platonic nature, whose meanings can be deciphered through a deep analysis, but are rather representing what people considered useful to make them be. One can identify what people achieved using the documentary photography or photojournalism. However, one cannot identify the actual significance of the respective terms. Their meanings derive from the organizational framework in which they are used, from the cumulated actions of all those involved in such organizations, and the aspects vary from one period to the other and from one location to the other. In the same manner in which paintings are building their meaning in a world of painters, collectors, critics, likewise photographs are building their meanings from the way in which people involved in achieving them understand and use them.

Visual sociology, documentary photography and photojournalism are thus what they got to represent for the regular use of photographic production. They are merely social constructions. To this effect, they are like all other investigation means that we know or of which we have heard, like ethnographic reports, statistical summaries, maps a.s.o. (H. Becker, 1986). This use to designate and assign meanings directs the speech to two perspectives:

Organizational: when people designate fields of activity, as they have done with respect to these forms of image recording, they are not merely aiming at making things easier for them and the others by creating labels. They are almost always trying to achieve other purposes, as well, like: establishing certain boundaries around the activities, specifying the position of each within the organization, establishing the management, assigning tasks and duties. Thus, there arise a few questions regarding the different ways of approaching the research through photography. Who uses these terms? What is to be expected from a type of work described by such terms? How do we mean to identify a certain type of work within an organization? Conversely, what type of work and what type of people are to be excluded? More briefly, what is the purpose of such differentiations?

Historical: Where did these terms come from? How were they used in the past? How does their prior use create a current contextual framework and how is this determined historical contextual framework appropriate to enforce what can be said and done at present? "Documentary photography" represented a type of activity around the beginning of the past century, when great waves of social change reached the U.S., and photographers had a public trained for receiving images representing the bad, as well as a lot of sponsors ready to pay them to achieve such images. "Visual sociology", if one may speak about such a thing at that time, mainly consisted of roughly the same types of images that were published in the American journal of sociology. Today, neither...