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Visual sociology is an area of sociology concerned with the visual dimensions of social life.
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| Sociology |
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Visual sociology is an area of sociology concerned with the visual dimensions of social life.
Visual sociology can be theoretically framed around three themes. Luc Pauwels suggests that the framework is based on the origin and nature of visuals, research focus and design, and format and purpose. [1]
There are at least three approaches to doing visual sociology:
In this context, the camera is analogous to a tape recorder. Film and video cameras are particularly well suited as data gathering technologies for experiments and small group interactions, classroom studies, ethnography, participant observation, oral history, the use of urban space, etc. The tape recorder captures things that are not preserved in even the best researchers' field notes. Similarly, tape recordings preserve audible data not available in even the most carefully annotated transcripts: timbre, the music of a voice, inflection, intonation, grunts and groans, pace, and space convey meanings easily (mis)understood but not easily gleaned from written words alone. By opening another channel of information, visual recordings preserve still more information. For instance, the raised eyebrow, the wave of a hand, the blink of an eye might convert the apparent meaning of words into their opposite, convey irony, sarcasm, or contradiction. So, regardless of how one analyzes the data or what is done with the visual record, sociologists can use cameras to record and preserve data of interest so it can be studied in detail.
Visual recording technology also allows us to manipulate the data. Visual recording can be used to represent other forms of recording technology and non-digital multimedia. [2] Visual recordings have long been employed by natural scientists because they make it possible to speed up, slow down, repeat, stop, and zoom in on things of interest. It is the same in the social sciences, recordings facilitate the study of phenomena that are too fast, or too slow, or too infrequent or too big or too small to study directly "in the life." Most importantly, through editing visual sociologists can juxtapose events to produce meanings. Sociologists may also be able to put cameras in places where one would not put a researcher: where it is dangerous, or where a person would be unwelcome, or simply to remove the observer effect from particular situations, e.g., studying social behavior among school children on a playground.
Photo elicitation is another technique of data gathering. This methodological tool is a combination of photography as the visual equivalent of a tape recorder, and ethnography or other qualitative methods. Photo elicitation techniques involve using photographs or film as part of the interview—in essence asking research subjects to discuss the meaning of photographs, films or videos. In this case the images can be taken specially by the researcher with the idea of using them to elicit information, they can belong to the subject, for example family photographs or movies, or they can be gathered from other sources including archives, newspaper and television morgues, or corporate collections. Typically the interviewee's comments or analysis of the visual material is itself recorded, either on audio tape or video, etc.
Photo voice is a related research method in which researchers give those being studied still or movie cameras. Research participants are taught to use the image making technology but are then responsible for making photos or movies which are subsequently analyzed either by the researchers or the participants, or both. The first use of photo voice was by Wang and Burris (published in 1994), where they defined it as "a method through which knowledge would be generated by people who were normally passive objects in the research process." [3]
In any case, in this first sense visual sociology means including and incorporating visual methods of data gathering and analysis in the work of sociology. This method has recently been transferred to other academic disciplines, notably having been pioneered in contemporary religious research. [4] [5]
Visual sociology attempts to study visual images produced as part of culture. Art, photographs, film, video, fonts, advertisements, computer icons, landscape, architecture, machines, fashion, makeup, hair style, facial expressions, tattoos, and so on are parts of the complex visual communication system produced by members of societies. The use and understanding of visual images is governed by socially established symbolic codes. Visual images are constructed and may be deconstructed. They may be read as texts in a variety of ways. They can be analyzed with techniques developed in diverse fields of literary criticism, art theory and criticism, content analysis, semiotics, deconstructionism, or the more mundane tools of ethnography. Visual sociologists can categorize and count them; ask people about them; or study their use and the social settings in which they are produced and consumed. So the second meaning of visual sociology is a discipline to study the visual products of society—their production, consumption and meaning.
A third dimension of visual sociology is both the use of visual media to communicate sociological understandings to professional and public audiences, and also the use of visual media within sociological research itself.
In this context, visual sociology draws on the work of Edward Tufte, whose books Envisioning Information and The Visual Display of Quantitative Information address the communication of quantitative information. Qualitatively, visual sociology can be analyzed through content analysis, semiotics, and conversation analysis. [6] Visual sociology considers the logics of presentation of sociological and anthropological documentarians and ethnographers like Robert Flaherty, Konrad Lorenz, Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, and Frederick Wiseman. Visual sociology also requires the development of new forms—for example, data driven computer graphics to represent complex relationships e.g., changing social networks over time, the primitive accumulation of capital, the flow of labor, relations between theory and practice. Visual methods have been popular in various disciplines and fields, such as tourism [7] and event studies. [8]
Ethnography is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures. Ethnography explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject of the study. Ethnography is also a type of social research that involves examining the behavior of the participants in a given social situation and understanding the group members' own interpretation of such behavior.
Participant observation is one type of data collection method by practitioner-scholars typically used in qualitative research and ethnography. This type of methodology is employed in many disciplines, particularly anthropology, sociology, communication studies, human geography, and social psychology. Its aim is to gain a close and intimate familiarity with a given group of individuals and their practices through an intensive involvement with people in their cultural environment, usually over an extended period of time.
Qualitative research is a type of research that aims to gather and analyse non-numerical (descriptive) data in order to gain an understanding of individuals' social reality, including understanding their attitudes, beliefs, and motivation. This type of research typically involves in-depth interviews, focus groups, or observations in order to collect data that is rich in detail and context. Qualitative research is often used to explore complex phenomena or to gain insight into people's experiences and perspectives on a particular topic. It is particularly useful when researchers want to understand the meaning that people attach to their experiences or when they want to uncover the underlying reasons for people's behavior. Qualitative methods include ethnography, grounded theory, discourse analysis, and interpretative phenomenological analysis. Qualitative research methods have been used in sociology, anthropology, political science, psychology, communication studies, social work, folklore, educational research, information science and software engineering research.
Quantitative research is a research strategy that focuses on quantifying the collection and analysis of data. It is formed from a deductive approach where emphasis is placed on the testing of theory, shaped by empiricist and positivist philosophies.
Grounded theory is a systematic methodology that has been largely applied to qualitative research conducted by social scientists. The methodology involves the construction of hypotheses and theories through the collecting and analysis of data. Grounded theory involves the application of inductive reasoning. The methodology contrasts with the hypothetico-deductive model used in traditional scientific research.
Narrative inquiry or narrative analysis emerged as a discipline from within the broader field of qualitative research in the early 20th century, as evidence exists that this method was used in psychology and sociology. Narrative inquiry uses field texts, such as stories, autobiography, journals, field notes, letters, conversations, interviews, family stories, photos, and life experience, as the units of analysis to research and understand the way people create meaning in their lives as narratives.
Field research, field studies, or fieldwork is the collection of raw data outside a laboratory, library, or workplace setting. The approaches and methods used in field research vary across disciplines. For example, biologists who conduct field research may simply observe animals interacting with their environments, whereas social scientists conducting field research may interview or observe people in their natural environments to learn their languages, folklore, and social structures.
Jaber Fandy "Jay" Gubrium is an American sociologist and social psychologist. His research perspective is the narrative ethnography of caregiving, especially care constructed in organizational context. He is a professor emeritus in the University of Missouri Department of Sociology.
Video ethnography is the video recording of the stream of activity of subjects in their natural setting, in order to experience, interpret, and represent culture and society. Ethnographic video, in contrast to ethnographic film, cannot be used independently of other ethnographic methods, but rather as part of the process of creation and representation of societal, cultural, and individual knowledge. It is commonly used in the fields of visual anthropology, visual sociology, visual ethnography and cultural studies. Uses of video in ethnography include the recording of certain processes and activities, visual note-taking, and ethnographic diary-keeping.
The sociology of the Internet involves the application of sociological or social psychological theory and method to the Internet as a source of information and communication. The overlapping field of digital sociology focuses on understanding the use of digital media as part of everyday life, and how these various technologies contribute to patterns of human behavior, social relationships, and concepts of the self. Sociologists are concerned with the social implications of the technology; new social networks, virtual communities and ways of interaction that have arisen, as well as issues related to cyber crime.
John Collier Jr. was an American anthropologist and an early leader in the fields of visual anthropology and applied anthropology. His emphasis on analysis and use of still photographs in ethnography led him to significant contributions in other subfields of anthropology, especially the applied anthropology of education. His book, Visual Anthropology: Photography as a Research Method (1967) is one of the earliest textbooks in the field and is still in use today. He is also notable as someone who overcame significant learning and hearing impairments to succeed on a larger stage.
Netnography is a specific type of qualitative social media research. It adapts the methods of ethnography to understand social interaction in contemporary digital communications contexts. Netnography is a specific set of research practices related to data collection, analysis, research ethics, and representation, rooted in participant observation. In netnography, a significant amount of the data originates in and manifests through the digital traces of naturally occurring public conversations recorded by contemporary communications networks. Netnography uses these conversations as data. It is an interpretive research method that adapts the traditional, in-person participant observation techniques of anthropology to the study of interactions and experiences manifesting through digital communications.
Photo-elicitation is a method of interview used in research which incorporates photographs in the interviews. The method is participatory-oriented and is used in different research areas such as visual sociology, marketing research, and public health. In the method, images are used to prompt and guide in-depth interviews and to evoke reactions from the interview participant. The types of images used include photographs, video, paintings, cartoons, graffiti, and advertising, among others. Either the interviewer or the subject may provide the images.
Visual research is a qualitative research methodology that relies on artistic mediums to produce and represent knowledge. These artistic mediums include film, photography, drawings, paintings, and sculptures. The artistic mediums provide a rich source of information that has the ability to capture reality. They also reveal information about what the medium captures, but the artist or the creator behind the medium. Using photography as an example, the photographs taken illustrate reality and give information about the photographer through the angle, the focus of the image, and the moment in which the picture was taken. Nevertheless, some argue that visual research is not comparable to traditional methodology.
An interview in qualitative research is a conversation where questions are asked to elicit information. The interviewer is usually a professional or paid researcher, sometimes trained, who poses questions to the interviewee, in an alternating series of usually brief questions and answers. They can be contrasted with focus groups in which an interviewer questions a group of people and observes the resulting conversation between interviewees, or surveys which are more anonymous and limit respondents to a range of predetermined answer choices. In addition, there are special considerations when interviewing children. In phenomenological or ethnographic research, interviews are used to uncover the meanings of central themes in the life world of the subjects from their own point of view.
Luc Maria Alfons Pauwels is a Belgian visual sociologist and communication scientist, Professor of Communication Studies at the University of Antwerp, Belgium, and director of its Visual and Digital Cultures Research Center (ViDi). He is known for his work on visual research methods.
Biographical research is a qualitative research approach aligned to the social interpretive paradigm of research. The biographical research is concerned with the reconstruction of life histories and the constitution of meaning based on biographical narratives and documents. The material for analysis consists of interview protocols (memorandums), video recordings, photographs, and a diversity of sources. These documents are evaluated and interpreted according to specific rules and criteria. The starting point for this approach is the understanding of an individual biography in terms of its social constitution. The biographical approach was influenced by the symbolic interactionism, the phenomenological sociology of knowledge, and ethnomethodology. Therefore, biography is understood in terms of a social construct and the reconstruction of biographies can give insight on social processes and figurations, thus helping to bridge the gap between micro-, meso-, and macro- levels of analysis. The biographical approach is particularly important in German sociology. This approach is used in the Social Sciences as well as in Pedagogy and other disciplines. The Research Committee 38 "Biography and Society" of the International Sociological Association (ISA) was created in 1984 and is dedicated "to help develop a better understanding of the relations between individual lives, the social structures and historical processes within which they take shape and which they contribute to shape, and the individual accounts of biographical experience ".
Visual ethnography is an approach to ethnography that uses visual methods such as photography, film and video. There are many methods available to conduct visual ethnography. According to Sarah Pink, visual ethnography is a research methodology that brings “theory and practice of visual approaches to learning and knowing about the world and communicating these to others”. As a methodology, visual ethnography can guide the design of research as well as the methods to choose for data collection. Visual ethnography suggests a negotiation of the participants’ view of reality and a constant questioning on the part of the researcher.
Leon Anderson is an American sociologist, academic and researcher. He is a Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Ohio University and Utah State University.
Video Data Analysis (VDA) is a curated multi-disciplinary collection of tools, techniques, and quality criteria intended for analyzing the content of visuals to study driving dynamics of social behavior and events in real-life settings. It often uses visual data in combination with other data types. VDA is employed across the social sciences such as sociology, psychology, criminology, business research, and education research.
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