Re-picturing Afro People and Bodies Beyond Institutional Practices : Uncovering Meaning in Visual Counter-Narratives

Abstract: The legacy of colonial representational logics and the increasing role of visual media cemented,on a wide scale, the image of Afro people in the visual now the discourse and underlyingassumptions of poverty, lack, need and helplessness. The thesis investigates the modes of visualcounter-narratives outside of International Development institutional practices. Using aPostcolonial lens and mainstream semiology framework, it analyses 9 photographicrepresentations of Afro people and bodies produced by African, Caribbean, and European visualstorytellers, photojournalists, fashion photographers and artists. The research finds the counternarratives processes stands against the backdrop of colonial logics of alterity. The modes of representation propose a critic to the mainstream discourse of representation and make visiblecounter-narratives about Afro people in combining photographs and text. It is expressed as avisual re-writing effort where the photographers, together with the people in the picture,collaborate to renegotiate the visual space and grammar of happiness, drive, passion, creativity,heritage, and community as attributed to Afro people and bodies.