SO far in your life, you must have heard of the phrase ‘a picture speaks of a thousand words’. However, in our modern times, this particular phrase has taken up a much more significant role in the process of information dissemination. According to Kress & van Leeuwen (2006), the dominant role of the linguistic mode is now less prevalent as the literate culture is now going through a transformation with the emergence of visual communication.
Shriver (1997) also agrees with this to the extent of listing out the five different ways of incorporating pictures (visual communication) with words (linguistic) while Walsh (2006) states that images offer unique aspects that words alone cannot satisfy.
Photography or more so photojournalism is a pre-existing art form that is now becoming more and more popular, especially in covering world event such as war and disaster. It is a medium for story-telling that combines both images and writing to more thoroughly explore a given subject (Rudolph, 2009). Horton (2000) calls it one of the most glamorous and exciting media professions.
Soldiers at war. (Source: deviantart.com)Nevertheless, photojournalism is constantly debated upon by those who sometimes argue the ‘authenticity’ of a pictorial narration or as Rudolph (2009) says how ‘true’ to the scene are the photographs in question. One of the main concerns is that what we see is already a filtered out version of what is really happening out there, a product of self-censorship by editors (ABC, 2007). If this is true, then photojournalism is at a very dangerous situation that made it seem much less credible than what it is supposed to be.
Photojournalism is now on a proverbial crossroad, its fate lie with image-making technologies and also public cynicism that might just spell its untimely demise. Therefore, it is vital for photojournalist to produce images of issues and happenings around the world while preserving the ethical code of a good journalist – reporting the truth and nothing but the truth. This is because the heart of photojournalism is essentially to report human experience accurately, honestly and with an overriding sense of social responsibility (2001).
References
ABC.net 2007, Media Report, viewed on 9th June 2009, < http://www.abc.net.au/rn/mediareport/stories/2007/2051819.htm>.
Horton, B 2000, Associated Press guide to photojournalism, McGraw-Hill, US.
Kress, G & van Leeuwen, T 2006, Reading images: the grammar of visual design, Routledge, New York.
Newton, JH 2001, The burden of visual truth, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, US.
Rudolph, EK 2009, What is photojournalism, viewed on 8th June 2009, <http://www.drellenrudolph.com/essay17.html>
Schriver, KA 1997, Dynamics in document design: creating texts for readers, Wiley Computer Pub., New York.
Walsh, M 2006, “‘Textual shift’: Examining the reading process with print, visual and multimodal texts,” Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, vol.29, no.1, p.24-37.
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