visual anthropology


visual anthropology

a recently established branch of social anthropology which investigates the visual dimensions of societies, and is based on the assumption that different cultures frequently involve a strongly visual component, i.e. they look different. The visual can be recorded in various ways, including sketches, photographs, film and videotape, and visual anthropology both employs and explores the implications of the use of such methods in sociology as well as anthropology (see Ball and Smith, 1991).