Illustrate and discuss denotation and connotation in relation to three photographs of your own choice.
For general guidance about what is expected in your essays for this module,
see the
general criteria.
Please remember to avoid footnotes and to include an
alphabetical list of 'References' which have been cited in the text
(not a Bibliography of anything you have read for the essay). This list should include
author's names, date, book titles (in italics), place of publication and publisher.
Within the text always cite author's surname, date and page number. Double-space your
text and number your pages. For more detailed notes on writing essays in this
department, click
here.
Advice for this particular assignment:
Obviously you need to demonstrate your own understanding of what the terms
'denotation' and 'connotation' mean, and your awareness of the problematic nature of the distinction (I have
argued that there is no denotation without connotation and that the distinction is an analytical one).
Note that the distinction we are making here is the 'literary' one rather than the philosophical one.
Most importantly, remember that denotation is about what
the photograph depicts and that connotation is about what meanings it has for its viewers. You can only
investigate these questions by checking how different people interpret each one. In what ways do they
agree (usually this is more denotative)? In what ways do they disagree (usually more connotative)?
Some photographs will reveal these patterns better than others so you may need to try with more than 3
to start with. You also need to show that you are aware of academic discussions of denotation and connotation.
One of the most important theorists to refer to here is Roland Barthes (see below).
Definitions of key terms can be found in Chandler and Munday (2011).
Note also that this is an assignment for which the
inclusion of relevant pictorial illustrations is essential. These should
be inserted electronically into your Word document rather than cut-and-pasted in.
You can scan such illustrations in from print sources, save them from
disk-based sources, download them from online sources (such as my Powerpoint slides) or even create them from
scratch in a graphics package. Use them to help you to make points more effectively. Label each one,
'Figure 1' etc. and add a caption.
Some suggested reading
- Alvarado, Manuel, Edward Buscombe & Richard Collins (Eds) (2001)
Representation and Photography: A Screen Education Reader. Basingstoke: Palgrave
- Barthes, Roland (1977)
Image-Music-Text. London: Fontana
('The Photographic Image' and 'Rhetoric of the Image')
- Bolton, Richard (Ed.) (1989)
The Contest of Meaning: Critical
Histories of Photography. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
- Burgin, Victor (Ed.) (1982)
Thinking Photography. London: Macmillan
- Caivano, Jose Luis (1999) 'The Representation of the Visual World in Photography', in Semiotics: Bridging Nature & Culture,
Actas del VI Congreso de la Asociaci?n Internacional de Semi?tica, CD-ROM (M?xico: Universidad Nacional Aut?noma de M?xico);
[WWW document] URL
http://www.fadu.uba.ar/sitios/sicyt/color/1999IASS.pdf
- Chalfen, Richard (1987)
Snapshot Versions of Life. Bowling Green, OH:
Bowling Green State University Popular Press
- Chandler, Daniel (2007)
Semiotics: The Basics (2nd Edn.). London: Routledge
- Chandler, Daniel and Rod Munday (2011)
Dictionary of Media and Communication. Oxford: Oxford University Press
- Clarke, Graham (1997)
The Photograph. Oxford: Oxford University Press;
brief extract 'How Do We Read a Photograph?' [WWW document] URL
http://users.aber.ac.uk/dgc/Modules/MC10220/reading_photos.html
- Edwards, Sue (1998): 'Photographs as an Interpretation of the World'
[WWW document] URL
http://users.aber.ac.uk/dgc/media/Students/sse9701.html [this is a student essay and should not be cited]
- Elkins, James (Ed) (2007)
Photography Theory. London: Routledge
- Feininger, Andreas (1974)
Photographic Seeing. London:
Thames & Hudson
- Messaris, Paul (1997)
Visual Persuasion: The Role of Images in
Advertising. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
- Nichols, Bill (1981)
Ideology and the Image. Bloomington, IN:
Indiana University Press (Chapters 1 & 2)
- Scott, Clive (1999)
The Spoken Image: Photography and Language. London: Reaktion
- Snyder, Joel & Neil Walsh Allen (1975) 'Photography, Vision and Representation', Critical Inquiry 2(1): 143-169.
Reprinted in: Thomas F Barrow, Shelley Armitage & William E Tydeman (Eds) (1982)
Reading into Photography: Selected Essays, 1959-1980. Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Press, pp. 61-91; and
Philip Alperson (Ed) (1992)
The Philosophy of the Visual Arts.
New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 289-305.
- Sontag, Susan (1979)
On Photography. Harmondsworth: Penguin
- Tagg, John (1988)
The Burden of Representation: Essays on
Photographies and Histories. Basingstoke: Macmillan
- Trachtenberg, Alan (Ed) (1980)
Classic Essays on Photography. New Haven, CT: Leete's Island Books
- Wagner, Jon (Ed.) (1979)
Images of Information: Still Photography in the
Social Sciences. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage
- Wells, Liz (Ed.) (1997)
Photography: A Critical Introduction.
London: Routledge
- Wells, Liz (Ed) (2003)
The Photography Reader. London: Routledge
- Ziller, Robert (1990)
Photographing the Self. Newbury Park, CA: Sage
Note: Treat with extreme caution sources labelled with this symbol!