Some of the most celebrated and well-known photographs in existence are of war. When we think of ... more Some of the most celebrated and well-known photographs in existence are of war. When we think of ‘war photography’, we tend to recall a small number of iconic images which have endured in the public imagination. By contrast, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were the most mediatised conflicts in history, and yet from the vast corpus of imagery produced, arguably none have come to define these wars in the public imagination. Why?
Following an established belief in the negative impact of media coverage during the Vietnam War, accounts of the media in war position the objectives of the military and the media as incompatible. They typically adopt a simplistic understanding of the sources of photographic effect which draws a straight line between the event—of which the photograph is considered an unproblematic trace—and its political impact. Such an approach cannot fully account for the vagaries of the news photograph as a political vessel.
The media policy put in place for the 2003 invasion of Iraq and subsequently introduced in Afghanistan marked the beginning of a more experimental approach to media- military relations characterised by synergy rather than opposition, and one in which the photograph—as a vessel of political communication—operated primarily as a connotative symbol rather than as a denotative index of particular events. By combining elements of Cultural Studies literature with empirical data, this dissertation seeks to ask what War Studies can learn from understanding the role and functioning of the image in war and finds that the field of vision remained firmly sublimated to established political discourse which resonates more closely with American national mythology than it does with particular news events.
Since its invention in the mid-nineteenth century, photography has existed in a symbiotic relatio... more Since its invention in the mid-nineteenth century, photography has existed in a symbiotic relationship with conflict in which the camera has served both humanitarian and militaristic impulses. On the one hand, Mark Twain’s ‘incorruptible Kodak’—‘the only witness ... I [King Leopold II] couldn’t bribe’—casts the camera as a redemptive check on violent excess. On the other, its use on the battlefield for target acquisition—and particularly its elision with flight—reveals its utility as a military technology. In-between there lies a more ambiguous use for photography in conflict settings: its deployment for psychological effect.
Interrogates the claim that the victory of the Sri Lanka Army over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil... more Interrogates the claim that the victory of the Sri Lanka Army over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 2009 constituted the 'first counterinsurgency victory of the twenty-first century', instead arguing that Eelam War IV is better characterised as an example of 'hybrid warfare'.
Some of the most celebrated and well-known photographs in existence are of war. When we think of ... more Some of the most celebrated and well-known photographs in existence are of war. When we think of ‘war photography’, we tend to recall a small number of iconic images which have endured in the public imagination. By contrast, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were the most mediatised conflicts in history, and yet from the vast corpus of imagery produced, arguably none have come to define these wars in the public imagination. Why?
Following an established belief in the negative impact of media coverage during the Vietnam War, accounts of the media in war position the objectives of the military and the media as incompatible. They typically adopt a simplistic understanding of the sources of photographic effect which draws a straight line between the event—of which the photograph is considered an unproblematic trace—and its political impact. Such an approach cannot fully account for the vagaries of the news photograph as a political vessel.
The media policy put in place for the 2003 invasion of Iraq and subsequently introduced in Afghanistan marked the beginning of a more experimental approach to media- military relations characterised by synergy rather than opposition, and one in which the photograph—as a vessel of political communication—operated primarily as a connotative symbol rather than as a denotative index of particular events. By combining elements of Cultural Studies literature with empirical data, this dissertation seeks to ask what War Studies can learn from understanding the role and functioning of the image in war and finds that the field of vision remained firmly sublimated to established political discourse which resonates more closely with American national mythology than it does with particular news events.
Since its invention in the mid-nineteenth century, photography has existed in a symbiotic relatio... more Since its invention in the mid-nineteenth century, photography has existed in a symbiotic relationship with conflict in which the camera has served both humanitarian and militaristic impulses. On the one hand, Mark Twain’s ‘incorruptible Kodak’—‘the only witness ... I [King Leopold II] couldn’t bribe’—casts the camera as a redemptive check on violent excess. On the other, its use on the battlefield for target acquisition—and particularly its elision with flight—reveals its utility as a military technology. In-between there lies a more ambiguous use for photography in conflict settings: its deployment for psychological effect.
Interrogates the claim that the victory of the Sri Lanka Army over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil... more Interrogates the claim that the victory of the Sri Lanka Army over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 2009 constituted the 'first counterinsurgency victory of the twenty-first century', instead arguing that Eelam War IV is better characterised as an example of 'hybrid warfare'.
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Following an established belief in the negative impact of media coverage during the Vietnam War, accounts of the media in war position the objectives of the military and the media as incompatible. They typically adopt a simplistic understanding of the sources of photographic effect which draws a straight line between the event—of which the photograph is considered an unproblematic trace—and its political impact. Such an approach cannot fully account for the vagaries of the news photograph as a political vessel.
The media policy put in place for the 2003 invasion of Iraq and subsequently introduced in Afghanistan marked the beginning of a more experimental approach to media- military relations characterised by synergy rather than opposition, and one in which the photograph—as a vessel of political communication—operated primarily as a connotative symbol rather than as a denotative index of particular events. By combining elements of Cultural Studies literature with empirical data, this dissertation seeks to ask what War Studies can learn from understanding the role and functioning of the image in war and finds that the field of vision remained firmly sublimated to established political discourse which resonates more closely with American national mythology than it does with particular news events.
Following an established belief in the negative impact of media coverage during the Vietnam War, accounts of the media in war position the objectives of the military and the media as incompatible. They typically adopt a simplistic understanding of the sources of photographic effect which draws a straight line between the event—of which the photograph is considered an unproblematic trace—and its political impact. Such an approach cannot fully account for the vagaries of the news photograph as a political vessel.
The media policy put in place for the 2003 invasion of Iraq and subsequently introduced in Afghanistan marked the beginning of a more experimental approach to media- military relations characterised by synergy rather than opposition, and one in which the photograph—as a vessel of political communication—operated primarily as a connotative symbol rather than as a denotative index of particular events. By combining elements of Cultural Studies literature with empirical data, this dissertation seeks to ask what War Studies can learn from understanding the role and functioning of the image in war and finds that the field of vision remained firmly sublimated to established political discourse which resonates more closely with American national mythology than it does with particular news events.