Photo-elicitation

Collier, Malcolm. (2007). The applied visual anthropology of John Collier: A photo essay. In Sarah Pink (Ed.), Visual intervention: Applied visual anthropology. New York, NY: Berghahn Books.

In this chapter, the author introduces some works of John Collier Jr, to whom we are indebted for the use of photography in anthropology and sociology research, in particular, photo-elicitation, a method he developed. Looking at the Vicos Project (in the mid-1950s), in which close to nine-thousand still images and hours of 16 mm films were taken in Vicos, Peru, the author wrote:

The visual ethnography was intended to provide both information for immediate use and also a baseline record for later comparative evaluation of the impact of the project. (p. 35)

The author noted that in the late 60s, John Collier turned his attention to cross-cultural schooling and at the same time, started using super 8 film equipment in response to the limitations of still photography. With this respect, the author wrote, "The shift to film placed more emphasis on observation and analysis of social interactions and process through time and space" (p. 44)

[This essay indicates that J. Collier, perhaps many others in that period, regarded visual images as a mirroring representation of the reality like a documentation]

In concluding the use of visual images by J. Collier, the author wrote:

"While in earlier years John Collier Jr's photographs were more classically documentary in character, intended to make statements to viewers for applied purposes (what I understand this term as an exploration of the potential of photos to reveal something that painting cannot do), by the 1960s they became explicitly tools for obtaining information and understanding about the circumstances in which they were made. The camera became a more systematically directed tool for data gathering and less of an expressive device. The resulting images were often less individually compelling but the collective informational content became a far more extensive and complete source of information on the circumstances in front of the lens" (p. 49)

[This indicate that the use of photos was predominantly objectivistic and positivistic. The photos were to provide vivid reality themselves. They were a tool for data gathering.]