Race and Visibility: How and Why Visual Images of Black Lives Matter

Abstract

While there is some literature analyzing moving images and their effects relating to Black Lives Matter, there hasn't been an extensive analysis of the still images associated with this movement. This article analyzes one of the most widely circulated and remarked upon photographs from the Black Lives Matter movement in comparison to several other images associated with the movement so as to illuminate the image's rhetorical function and consequence as well as to theorize the role of images in contemporary discourses about race. Specifically, our analysis demonstrates how an image may serve to shift/change the narrative of an emerging movement and of the perception of African American citizens by making visible realities and experiences not otherwise readily seen or articulated.

ORCID

Victoria J. Gallagher https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7671-9845

Notes

¹ Merelman (1995) identifies four forms of cultural projection: syncretism, hegemony, polarization, and counterhegemony.

² Nakayama and Krizek (1995) identify whiteness as a strategic rhetoric that reiterates white dominance in society.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Candice L. Edrington

Candice L. Edrington is currently a doctoral candidate at North Carolina State University, where she studies Communication, Rhetoric, and Digital Media. Her research primarily focuses on public relations strategies, social movement studies, and visual rhetoric. E-mail: [email protected]

Victoria J. Gallagher

Victoria J. Gallagher is a full Professor at North Carolina State University in the Department of Communication. Dr. Gallagher's primary area of publication and scholarship is rhetorical criticism, particularly of civil rights-related discourse, commemorative sites (museums and memorials), visual and material culture, and public art.