Photography as Communication

The key points of this lecture were:

• Photography as communication
• Structuralism
• Binary oppositions / divides
• Process model of communication
• Codes

Anthrapologist Claude Levi-Strauss was the first to study the concept of myths, taboos and totems. He discovered the unconscious foundations in primitive societies including cooking, manners and other forms of social practice.


Communication has an effect on both the sender and the receiver, it doesnt take place in isolation.

Structuralism - Binary Oppositions - Structuring oppositions in myth systems defined in terms of opposition. For example black and white, hot and cold, primitive and modern.

Eikoh Hosoe #28,Embrace1969

Structure and language

‘aims at revealing how we understand each other by… (following) conventional rules – how we ‘signify’ to each other… Sim and

‘ language organises and constructs our sense of reality – different languages in effect produce different mappings of the real’ Storey (2006) p88Van Loon (2004) p63

Process Model of Communication

A photographer makes or takes a photograph in a particular way (using a series of signs) with a particular purpose in mind, the photograph is viewed in a context (newspaper, exhibition, family album) by a viewer who perceives and understands the codes used, and responds to the message.

Noise – disruption of signal between transmission and reception between sender to receiver. Problems with model – efficiency of communication not content or meaning. No account of feedback or context (where, when) or other forms of classification.

Photographic Codes

Cultural - Details that determine style or genre

Intertextuality -  Refers to other images e.g homage and parody

Aesthetic -  Treatment, what to include / leave out, composition

Technical - Lighting, camera angle, black/white, colour, darkroom techniques, quality