Images, Information; Images of Information

A short introduction to the concept of image-based research

Have you ever thought over the question why the saying “A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words” was coined just like that, and not the other way round? Intuitively, informative power of images is “something” we can (somehow) not question. There is a number of reasons for that. Firstly, images activate numerous modes of nonverbal communication making communication “richer”. Secondly, images trigger building  meanings by denotation “faster” than words, making communication more efficient. Thirdly, images “speak” with universal signs, which makes communication easier. Finally (although I skipped fourthly and so on), images are omnipresent in contemporary culture. Visual imagination and visual sensitivity can be of more help in exploring sociological phenomena than questionnaires and interviews ( visual sociology). Images make quite a career in social practices of conveying information (visual journalism), not to mention research work (visual anthropology). I’d like to encourage you to “stop” now and then in order to do some “reading” of visual data around you. It can be an interesting experiment.

Recomended reading:  visual literacy.

____________________________________________

Whenever I go through the pictures I took in Cadiz (southern Spain, 2007), this one always makes me “stop”. I “guess” it tells quite a story (by the way, I call it “excepto”).