REFRAMING FAMILY PHOTOGRAPHY
University of Toronto, Canada, SEPTEMBER 28–30, 2017
A conference hosted by the Toronto Photography Seminar
What
is family photography? Scholars have often understood the genre as
simply snapshots of domestic scenes—images that reflect and produce
normative notions of family. Yet, family photographs are more complex
than we think: they can also include images taken by a wide spectrum of
producers, including the press and the state; they frequently circulate
between private and public spheres, linking personal memories with
national and even global histories; and, just as importantly, they don’t
just illustrate families, but also shape the very idea of family, as
racialized and gendered social structures. Foundational thinkers
including Roland Barthes, Pierre Bourdieu, Jo Spence, Marianne Hirsch,
Martha Langford, Deborah Willis, and others, have offered influential
terms for investigating family photographs, respectively, as: an
affective punctum; middlebrow art; means of reinforcing domestic
ideology; conduit for postmemory; integrally linked to orality; a form
of resistance; and at the heart of identity formation.
This
conference will re-examine the genre and develop new ways of
investigating the cultural politics of family photography. This critical
task is all the more timely not just because of photography’s
transformation with the digital turn, but also because of recent
historical shifts that have altered the composition and very meaning of
kinship—including Cold War dislocations, the visibility of queer and
trans* family belonging, transnational adoptions, and immigration under
the auspices of family reunification.
We are seeking papers that
critically reframe family photography in light of these historical
shifts. To what extent do domestic images confirm or contest official
discourses of racial, sexual, and gender diversity? How do family photos
produce ‘the family’ and function as one of the many technologies of
the self? How do family photographs offer a counter-archive of normative
modes of kinship? What problems do orphan images—photographs that lack
context—pose for interpretation, and what methods might we develop to
understand their significance? How might the reproduction and
circulation of family photos, or their loss due to sudden or violent
dislocation, help connect and constitute diasporic communities? How has
the digital turn altered the look and meaning of family photographs? How
might we situate family photography within the history of photography
more generally? What are the implications for the recent interest in
institutional collecting of family photos? How have contemporary artists
contributed to new ways of understanding family photography? These are
just some of the key questions that this international conference on
REFRAMING FAMILY PHOTOGRAPHY will explore.
Confirmed speakers include:
Tina Campt (Barnard College)
Nicole Fleetwood (Rutgers University)
Richard Hill (Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Studies, Emily Carr University of Art and Design)
Marianne Hirsch (Columbia University)
Martha Langford (Concordia University)
Laura Wexler (Yale University)
Deborah Willis (NYU)
Deadline:
Please
submit a 300-word abstract and a 1-page CV by September 1st, 2016. To
submit and/or for information, please contact Thy Phu or Elspeth Brown:
[log in to unmask].
Schedule:
September 1st, 2016: 300-word abstract and a 1-page CV.
October 30th, 2016: The selection committee will notify applicants of its decision.
September 1st, 2017: Drafts of 10-page papers to be submitted to discussants.
September 28th-30th, 2017: Conference.