Colonialism, Race and Photography - Essay Example

Colonialism, Race and Photography Photography is the science, art and practice of creating permanent images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either electronically by way of an image sensor, or chemically by way of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. Therfore, Photography has been used to record history ever since cameras were invented back in 1839(Sontag). However, a lens is used to focus the light reflected or emitted from objects into a real image on the light-sensitive surface inside a camera during a timed exposure. Therfore, with an electronic image sensor, this produces an electrical charge at each pixel, which is electronically processed and stored in a digital image file for subsequent display or processing. The result with photographic mix is an invisible suppressed image, that is later chemically "developed" into a visible image, either negative or positive depending on the purpose of the photographic material and the method of processing. A negative image on film is customarily used to create a positive image photographically on a paper base, known as a print, either by using an enlarger or by contact printing. Photography is employed in many fields of science, manufacturing (e.g. photolithography) and business, as well as its more direct uses for art, recreational purposes, and mass communication. During the 19th century, the camera was still owned among the rich and photographs appealed to only to a certain class in the community. This was during the time when the civilized empires used the camera as a tool to divide people into the westerners; the whites, and the Racial others who included the communities from Asia, Africa and Middle East. This was during the colonial period where photographs spread a certain message and spoke a language that distinguished class, status, and power between the object of the camera; one being photographed, and the photographer. Since photography is a form of recording history, photographs contain a spatial-temporal element, allowing pieces of visual information to be accepted easily as evidence of truth, hence having a lasting effect which the Westerners had the power to capture. For this paper, I will prove that pictures taken during colonialism can both conceal both suffering and atrocities committed during colonialism in the 19th century as well as harbor historical evidence of past events that happened. Therefore, I have discussed my paper according to analysis of photography. In the first photograph, this was taken during the Gwangju Uprising in South Korea that took place from 18th to 27th May, 1980. This uprising which resulted to many innocent deaths was as a result of the government troops of South Korea beating, firing and killing students of Jeonnam University who were holding a peaceful demonstration on the against the Doo-Hwan government in an unprecedented attack by government troops. During this period, Gwangju citizens took up arms (by robbing local armories and police stations) and ended up in a defeat where an approximate of 241 people were supposedly killed . This had resulted from a coup d’état by general Chun Doo-Hwan of the ROK army on December Twelfth in 1979 after the former president Park Chung-Hee was assassinated on October 26, 1979 after ruling for 18 years. In this, the photographer captured a scene where automobiles were burnt by either being bombed or torched by demonstrators. This reflects the inhuman acts that were committed to the owners of vehicles and the people who had been on board during the actual occurrence of the incidence. As Susan Sontag once stated in The New Yorker article, “Photography has kept company with Death ever since cameras were invented in 1839.” (Sontag 6), this can be justified from the fact that the Gwangju uprising left a trail of deaths and damages, and from the picture, we can see the amount of damage that was left during the uprising. As Sontag explains, “Photographs furnish evidence. Something we hear about, but doubt; seems proven when we’re shown a photograph of it” (pg 5), this photograph shows the kind of immorality performed by the colonial government soldiers to those who were being colonized. The photograph background also shows a developing nation by the type of infrastructure, the type of buildings and the distribution of electricity. This is also evidence on the effect that would cause derailment on the economic growth of a developing nation. This picture could also be used to show an image that would have affected the economy of South Korea since it would insinuate a country that is full of chaos. This kind of photograph depicts violence. One of the theories that can apply to these photos is that of Susan Sontag in “On Photography.” According to Sontag (pg 8), “Photographing is essentially an act of non-intervention. The person who intervenes cannot record; the person who is recording cannot intervene. While real people are out there killing themselves or other real people, the photographer stays behind his or her camera.” In the case of the above photographs, although the photographs are important today, a photographer at that time did nothing to intervene in the situation; instead, the photographer chose to take a photo. There is, therefore, violence to the above photographs. Susan Sontag discusses this in her article from the New Yorker: “Photographs that portray suffering should not be attractive, as pictures shouldn’t advocate violence. In this view, a beautiful photograph drains attention from the sobering subject and turns it toward the medium itself, inviting the viewer to look aesthetically, and thereby compromising the picture’s status as a document. The photograph gives mixed signals. Stop this, it urges. But it also exclaims what a spectacle!” (Sontag 16). These pictures call for the halting of violent activities such what they present. These pictures also depict the inability of the government to protect its citizens since the police they hired to secure the citizens were the ones who did shoot the students who were demonstrating down despite their peaceful demonstration. The second picture where the police are harassing youths in what seems like an area that is from the public view while guns are pointing at them. The photo indicates a mode of civilization from the dressing code of the youths and the type of guns the policemen are using. Also from the quality of an image that the camera used in the photography, it suggests the growing economy at that time. On the other hand, the photography indicates the kind of violence experienced by those who resist the ruling of the powerful colonials. Despite of their innocence, they are mistreated by their colonials by beating while we can observe in the photos that they are executed by using gun shooting and this shows the kind of inhuman that the colonials were to the habitats of the nations they colonized. However, high-risk exposure is posed to the women and children as they are considered feeble to resist any mistreatments. The women who looked beautiful to the eyes of some soldiers under their master responsible for colonization, went further with their inhuman acts by raping them and due to fear of being killed when they spill the beans, they ended up suffering psychologically where some women got pregnant. Chaudhary accounts for early photography in India from the historical and philosophical perspective, and explains the influence of aesthetic experiments in colonial photography on perception.He argues that, “A viewer’s relationship to a photograph at first involves sight . . . but also embodied experience of memory, desire, pleasure, and pain’ (p. 2). Therefore, women and young girls will always feel the pain of being brutalized. Additionally, by possessing the spirit of capitalism, the colonials believed they had the power to control the currency of the weak nations using their currency. Therefore, the weak nations suffered economic crisis by having a devalued currency compared to the value of the currency of their colonials hence this contributed to making the lives of those who were under colony miserable with a very low economic situations. Moreover, the photographs show existence of poor information delivery from the kind of the communicating device that the soldiers are using to reach their partners. Therefore, this is an indication that the technology had not fully evolved the photographers produced photos with poor quality that conveyed information in an inconsistence way and led to poor understanding and time-consuming in terms of feedback hence. Moreover, the photographs portray a high incidence of violation and voyeurism that the resistance faced. Killing by gun shooting and use of weapons such as swords to punish and hunt down those who resisted the ruling of colonial government. On the other hand, there is the casual labor that led to slavery of those who were colonized where some poor men, women and children are taken to work in the fields of the colonies and doing home chores for the colonies for long hours with peanut payment while others were not even paid hence did the charity work and this lead to starvation of their families, poor housing and shelter. Therefore, the victimized party felt they were denied the right and freedom to enjoy the resources of their land hence felt their absence in their own land due to presences of the colonial government that made their lives totally miserable. Dora Apel analyzes the effect of photographs on the memory, “Violence and visibility of photographs implicate a pyschological effect even to the furure gender as it has a memory effect of the suffering due to violence caused to their colleagues, (pg 24).” On the other hand, phantasmagoric aesthetic remained as a history to the colonized people who could not believe the kind of catharsis that had faced then and the fact that colonialism seemed to persist for a long time they had even lost hope with live hence torture by whipping, killing, denial of rights and freedom and any inhuman action that faced then did not become a scaring issue to them since they had lost hope with living. On the other hand, the photos portray the kind of nostalgia and good memories that those who were under the colonial government possessed. They had a comparison of their life before the arrival of the colonials where they enjoyed every treasure their land had with all the freedom. However, since the arrival of the colonies and establishment of their government made the victims feel that these people who has colonized them will persist and despite their resistance, they ended up having no other option left other than surrendering everything they had sweat for to the colonial government something that we believe it was painful and unbearable but there was no alternative. The above photographs, elicit the experience of pain and memory. These photographs take us back in time to two decades ago. The visuals of the photographs are of violence, and a viewer of these photographs will experience emotional pain, even as they fathom the painful consequences of this event. Therefore, the photographs are a sign the violence and immorality ancient time accompanied with racism that created war every moment one person of a different race was violented or even killed. Dora Ape accounts that “ with estimable sensitivity, photograph enable us examine into the sense and legacy of these intricate images. They tells us how the images when viewed from varying perceptive, disclose how photographs have carried on the effect and how political debates and popular culture, hence define how the photos create a dialectic of disgrace and atonement, (pg 132).” On the other hand, the photographs show existence of punishment or imperial violence from the victims that are killed in an inhuman was being cut using swords while others are shot using a gun in the public. Killing of all those who resisted the colonial rule in public was a form of fear creating factor to the public in order to keep them under fear and avoid even daring to resist the ruling of the colonial government. Therefore, the courage to gang up and form a resistance group to the colonial rule by the victims was minimized to zero and this assisted the colonial government to establish itself firmly and conduct its operation with no one to disrupt them. However, we realize that the colonial government had a hidden motive with the resources of the nations they had conquered that was to ship resources they tapped from resources and mineral reach nations. Unfortunately, some of the colonials had a personal motive where some of them engaged in drug trafficking in order to earn their own money something that led to much colonial governments with a personal agenda of getting very rich. Additionally, photography is portrayed as a means of communication that was preferred to pass a message of fear to the society. Camera was used as an apparatus of punishment or imperial punishment since whenever there was any violence or some killing activities taking place in the nation during the colonial rule, the photographers were invited to cover the news in photos that were then printed and then passed to the society for people to see them. Therefore, this created intense fear of the colonized people to the colonial government such that the former could not act stupid to the latter hence the colonial government used a dictatorial way of governing all those they colonized all over the world. Additionally, the photographer acted as a mirror with memory to the society such that every action that took place was recorded and conveyed to the public for them to read. On the other hand, improvement of photograph quality was a clear indication on the kind of improvement the photographers were making towards modernity that was regarded as a dream to every photographers in order to being producing quality and concise information that can be read by majority of people who include literate, semi-illiterate and illiterate. Moreover, the photographers were vulnerable to being included to the group being imperially punished while taking their photos to cover every incidence that can be caused by their curiosity to shoot quality photos that are clear and have a background view to expose every evidence that may be needed to make the photos very interesting. Therefore, we can consider the photographer’s life in critical danger while taking the photos and this contribute poor quality photographs because the photographer may opt to protect his or her life instead of going near the scene and get killed. Overall, we can conclude that photography has both pros and cons to the society as I have discussed above aided by the photography on colonialism and race practice that was conducted in ancient days before modernization of many countries. On the other hand, from most photographs, racism was highly practiced where most of those who were covered with the photographs undergoing imperial punishment of violent were from a different race. Therefore, this shows that the issue of negligence towards equality of every human being had be disregarded for a long period despite becoming rampant at moment in most countries. On the other hand, colonialism led to the destruction of properties especially where there were resistance group of people who were furious of losing their land. The destruction is caused by use of heavy machine by the colonial government to the feeble resistance group hence degradation of the economy by incurring reconstruction fee. On the othe hand, photography done by the media seam to be much contolled by the colonial government since from the information portrayed there is sort of uncovering of the real situation that was happening behing the bars that was regarded to be more evil to watch and the colonial government did not want it to be public. Therfore, this shows that the photography information is baised and could not convey the real nformation to the society for a corrective measure to be taken. Due to this ignorance, innocent people continued to lose their lives in the name of being resistance to the colonial government rule (Jacobs 2006). Therfore, to correct the mess caused due to the ignorance of the photography, it would be appropriate to have inside undercovers who are ready to bring the evil lying behind the powerful parties where ordinally person do not have the access. In the case of the photographs, although the photographs are essintial in the modern society, there is a big difference on the photographer at the ancient days and to day as the former photographers did nothing to intervene in the situation; instead, the photographer chose to take a photo rather than to save a life which is very different compared with the modern photographers. Therefore, violence and all kind of immoralities were commited at the time the photographs discussed above compared to the modern time. On the other hand, the camera is a predator, because in these photos, it has turned the people involved into objects where the photographers are able to get their photographs more easily. Work Cited Jacobs, Karen. Photography and Literature. Boulder, Colo: Dept. of English, University of Colorado at Boulder, 2006. Print Read More