Global health photography behind the façade of empowerment and decolonisation

Autor: Arsenii Alenichev, Koen Peeters Grietens, Jonathan Shaffer, Sonya de Laat, Nassisse Solomon, Michael Parker, Halina Suwalowska, Patricia Kingori
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2024
Předmět:
Zdroj: Global Public Health, Vol 19, Iss 1 (2024)
Druh dokumentu: article
ISSN: 17441692
1744-1706
1744-1692
DOI: 10.1080/17441692.2024.2394811
Popis: Global health photography has historically been commissioned and, therefore, dominated by the gaze of Western photographers on assignments in the Global South. This is changing as part of international calls to decolonise global health and stimulate ‘empowerment’, spawning a growing initiative to hire local photographers. This article, based on interviews with global health photographers, reflects on this paradigm shift. It highlights how behind the laudable aim of ‘empowerment’ of local global health photography there is a simultaneous exploitation of precarious photographer labour and the emergence of ‘glocal’ photography elites. The paper argues that empowerment of local photographers can become a euphemism for reducing image production costs and maintaining control over the image content, while extending the scope of mainstream global health visual culture without challenging it. Finally, the article amplifies the growing concern that uncritical engagement with institutionalised empowerment becomes a warrant for the reproduction of local inequalities behind the fashionable façade of cooperation and care.
Databáze: Directory of Open Access Journals
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