Comical Conflations
Racial Identity and the Science of Photography
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12910329 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Tanya Sheehan (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2011 |
| Volume | 4 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 133-155 |
| Publication date | 2011-06-28 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Photography and Culture (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1751-4517 • E-ISSN: 1751-4525 |
| Publisher | Taylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.2752/175145211x12992393431160 |
| OpenAlex | W2069969338 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 29 |
Comical associations between the science of photography and ideas about race were common on both sides of the Atlantic in the decades after the medium's invention. Some humorists observed that no bourgeois sitter would welcome the sight of his “negative” or blackened self; others illustrated the cosmetic character of race by depicting the effects of photographic chemicals on human skin. This essay takes these racial jokes seriously by reading them as historically specific social commentary. Beginning with an analysis of the first book of photographic humor, Cuthbert Bede's Photographic Pleasures (1855), it shows how this genre both reinforced and challenged popular conceptions of whiteness, blackness, and the photographic medium
Aesthetics · Art · Art history · Bourgeoisie · Character (mathematics · Identity (music · Photography · Politics · Race (biology · Reading (process · Sight · Sociology · Visual arts · Gender Studies · Literature, Film, and Journalism Analysis · Philosophy · Photography and Visual Culture · Visual Culture and Art Theory
James Cowles Prichard's Anthropology
Uncle Tom's cabin, or, Life among the lowly
The Idea of Race in Science
Blind memory
Picturing Empire
White‐Washing the Black‐a‐Moor
American Slaves in Victorian England
Love and Theft
Things of Darkness
Cuthbert Bede and the photographic scene in the 1850s
The optical stranger’
Uncle Tom Mania
Narratives and Spaces
Hard at Play
Heartfelt Thanks to Punch for the Picture
White Over Black
Imperial Persuaders
Hunting with the Camera
The Leopard's Spots
Imperial Leather
| Unique citing works | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0.5 |
| Citation span | 2024 - 2024 (1) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 1 |