Visual methods and the visual culture of schools

Abstract

This article examines visual methods for understanding the visual culture of schools. It adopts an institutional culture perspective to equate the visual culture of schools with the ‘hidden curriculum’ of schooling. A range of visual sub‐cultures is touched upon including architecture, non‐teaching space and postures of teaching and learning. The possibility of conceiving the visual culture of schools as a holistic entity raises the problematic of devising broader more encompassing visual‐centric methodologies combining mixed methods and cross‐disciplinary approaches.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to thank Stephen for allowing me to publish his photographs in Figure 4. Also thanks to Gerhard Jaeger for allowing reproduction of Figure 7 from his ABC collection website: www.abc‐web.be

Notes

1. In the history of English school architecture, Robson occupies a formative position. He was the first architect to be employed specifically to design schools for the London School Board and during a 30 year period was responsible for the erection of some 250 buildings.

2. Proxemics is concerned with spatial relationships as an indicator of cultural behaviour. Kinesics is concerned with posture/gesture/body language as a signifier of culture.

3. For a discussion of the socio‐semiotics of visual communication see Jewitt and Oyama (2001).

4. Video software analysis is part of global upsurge in interest in using software to analyse qualitative data. In the UK ‘Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis’ (CAQDAS) is a networking project based at the Department of Sociology, University of Surrey, UK and funded by the ESRC.