Abstract
As social media has continually taken more of a presence in people’s lives, sharing images through visual platforms such as Instagram has increasingly become a primary form of communication. While most people use Instagram to share photos with family and friends, the platform also presents possibilities for circulating content to a wide, even global, audience. In conjunction with the ubiquity of smartphones, the ease and widespread use of Instagram ostensibly provides opportunities to not only extend the boundaries associated with different types of photographic subjects, but to actively present counternarratives, subvert negative stereotypes, and challenge problematic visual tropes. Yet somewhat surprisingly, a relatively limited amount of empirical research has examined these possibilities. Even amid widespread use by a diversity of people across a range of contexts, it is highly plausible that images posted on image-based social media platforms are further contributing to, if not exacerbating, the marginalization of people, cultures, and landscapes associated with particular geographic locations. Through an in-depth content analysis of more than 500 photographs on Instagram, this research examines the extent to which historically persistent tropes of Africa are evident on this widely used platform, including in relation to any given photographer’s country of residence. The results suggest that many of the historically embedded, problematic tropes associated with depictions of Africa continue to be perpetuated in ways that present ongoing, if not greater, difficulties when it comes to challenging what are already deeply embedded stereotypes.
Presenters
Lawrence WoodProfessor, School of Media Arts and Studies, Ohio University, Ohio, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Instagram, Social Media, Photography, Africa, Stereotyping, Othering, Tropes, Content Analysis
