Visually mediating Kashmir: The circulation of photographs on digital media platforms
Friday 31 January 2025, 12pm
Pitt Rivers Museum Lecture Theatre
Silvia Genovese (University of Edinburgh)
This paper critically evaluates contemporary documentary photographs of Kashmir, taken by Kashmiri women photographers and circulated on digital platforms. I demonstrate how these platforms have been transformative in creating new avenues for Kashmiri women—long marginalised in the photographic field— to circulate their work. I also show how digital platforms foster the emergence of vernacular photographic practices within traditional genres like photojournalism and documentary photography. These practices complicate conventional understanding of conflict representation, moving beyond explicit moments of protest to encompass the everyday experiences of Kashmiri women photographers. Ultimately, I argue that these photographic narratives offer a nuanced perspective on life in a conflict zone like Kashmir, while reconfiguring the relationship between documenting practices and political forms of contestation.
Pitt Rivers Museum Research Seminar in Visual, Material and Museum Anthropology, Hilary Term 2025
Fridays, 12pm-1.30pm (Weeks 1-8)
In person at the Pitt Rivers Museum Lecture Theatre.
