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...a medium for conveying information, photographs have taken on a psychological function in everyday life by serving in the creation, maintenance, and transmission of personal mythology.
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WHILE seemingly the most unmediated of visual representations, photographs have always been carefully constructed to convey the particular worldview of their creator. Photographs serve as records of events and also function as fundamental tools for sharing not only past experiences but values as well. Individuals use photographs to create and reinforce personal myths, which may include those of happiness, familial harmony, prosperity, social standing, conformity to norms and ideals, and social respectability. Whether or not the images actually correspond to the lived reality of the creators, the veracity of the records adds to their power and believability.
Throughout time and in all geographic areas, people have told stories which explained their place in the world. Mythologies develop and evolve in order to provide the knowledge essential to function in a society, defining the values and taboos of the culture. Myths attempt to answer the mysteries of life. In order to facilitate remembering and transmission, these cultural lessons are enshrined in narratives, which are told and re-told to successive generations.
Just as myths develop for societies and cultures, they also develop on the more intimate scale of the family and the individual. These personal myths serve the same function as cultural myths: to guide individuals through their lives. (1) Myths serve to construct models through which the individual makes sense of the world. They address concerns of identity, direction, and purpose in an individual's life, functioning to interpret knowledge and experience, aiding in processing new information, and providing understanding to those unknowable, essential questions of life. Through the repeated telling of familial stories, myths are unconsciously transmitted between generations, providing family members with a sense of history and defining their place in that history. While family myths may be conveyed spontaneously, stories are more likely to be told when prompted. In the modern age, one of the stimuli most likely to evoke narratives is the personal photograph. Indeed, photographs have become the primary record-keeping practice which informs and perpetuates personal mythologies in the modern world.
FOR NEARLY 170 years, particularly since the introduction of Kodak's first camera, which put the means of representing oneself within reach of the vast majority of society, very little in life has remained unphotographed. Photography has become the primary means...
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