Images are a crucial way of disseminating ideas, creating a sense of proximity between peoples across the globe, and reinforcing notions of a shared humanity. Yet visual culture can also define boundaries between people, supporting perceived hierarchies of race, gender, and culture, and justifying arguments for conquest and oppression. Only in recent years have scholars begun to argue for new notions of photography and culture that turn our attention to our responsibilities as viewers, or an ethics of spectatorship. Visualising Human Rights is about the diverse ways that visual images have been used to define, contest, or argue on behalf of human rights. It brings together leading scholars to examine visual practices surrounding human rights around the globe.
