Like many people across the world, I am a visual person. When I flip through the pages of a newspaper or magazine, the very first thing I notice on the pages are the pictures. From there, my eyes wander to the caption, the title of the article, and finally the article itself. While reading the passage, I go back and forth between the text and the picture or pictures that go with it. I try to imagine myself being a part of the whole, standing somewhere in the background where I will most likely not be seen, looking at the events as I imagine they must have unfolded. To me, a picture makes something seem more personal and tangible, more real. Yet, the picture and the words that describe it are only able to tell me so much. What happens to that
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The author explores the limitations of pictures and what they entail, causing us to rethink what a picture is actually presenting, since it only shows us what the photographer wants us to see. Sontag’s discussion also included the different ways in which photographs had been used and how they reflected the violence that was exhibited during war. By providing the reader with these examples, Sontag set up a basis for her argument that pictures can greatly influence how a person perceives violence that they could not witness firsthand. Through visual proof, the atrocity of the violence can be conveyed on a greater scale, where there is no language barrier (Sontag 20). However, while visual evidence has its own authenticity, without any further explanation, it can be meaningless and its true identity skewed. A photograph can have a hidden meaning, and every person looks at photographs through their own unique lens. Therefore, a photograph can exhibit the power that words alone cannot, but without words, the truth about a captured point in time is never truly known. The same argument can be brought forth in the inverse direction. A specific description of an event can lose its authenticity if there is no visual
The author explores the limitations of pictures and what they entail, causing us to rethink what a picture is actually presenting, since it only shows us what the photographer wants us to see. Sontag’s discussion also included the different ways in which photographs had been used and how they reflected the violence that was exhibited during war. By providing the reader with these examples, Sontag set up a basis for her argument that pictures can greatly influence how a person perceives violence that they could not witness firsthand. Through visual proof, the atrocity of the violence can be conveyed on a greater scale, where there is no language barrier (Sontag 20). However, while visual evidence has its own authenticity, without any further explanation, it can be meaningless and its true identity skewed. A photograph can have a hidden meaning, and every person looks at photographs through their own unique lens. Therefore, a photograph can exhibit the power that words alone cannot, but without words, the truth about a captured point in time is never truly known. The same argument can be brought forth in the inverse direction. A specific description of an event can lose its authenticity if there is no visual