Human Rights In Camera

Sliwinski Sharon

From the fundamental rights proclaimed in the American and French declarations of independence to the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Hannah Arendt's furious critiques, the definition of what it means to be human has been hotly debated. But the history of human rights – and their abuses – is also a richly illustrated one. Following this picture trail, "Human Rights In Camera" takes an innovative approach by examining the visual images that have accompanied human rights struggles and the passionate responses people have had to them.

Sharon Sliwinski considers a series of historical events, including the 1755 Lisbon earthquake and the Holocaust, to illustrate that universal human rights have come to be imagined through aesthetic experience. The circulation of images of distant events, she argues, forms a virtual community between spectators and generates a sense of shared humanity. Joining a growing body of scholarship about the cultural forces at work in the construction of human rights, "Human Rights In Camera" is a novel take on this potent political ideal.

About the Author

Sharon Sliwinski is assistant professor in the Faculty of Information and Media Studies and the Centre for the Study of Theory and Criticism at the University of Western Ontario.

Reviews

"Written with an admirable combination of intellectual sophistication and simplicity of expression, 'Human Rights In Camera' successfully bridges the fields of visual culture and political theory while crafting an original approach to a topic of not only scholarly interest but broad public importance. It is an at once wide-ranging and fine-grained analysis of the complexly interrelated roles of pictures and aesthetic judgment in the conceptualization, development, application, and failures of human rights. Arresting and illuminating, this book definitely breaks new ground" – Mark Reinhardt, Williams College

"Sliwinski's book marks a decisive break with the commonplace and received ideas about the history – and theory – of human rights and images. She pursues the way 'human rights have come to be imagined and idealized on the wings of aesthetic experience', and she pushes this insight to the limit in a series of remarkable and even dramatic readings of visual images. She does nothing less than rewrite the history of human rights as a matter of looking: 'when we speak of human rights we must first of all speak of the spectator of human rights', she says, and goes on to make this major shift so obvious and convincing that we are left wondering why it took so long for us to notice. This book joins groundbreaking work by the likes of Ariella Azoulay and Jacques Ranciere in a new, and crucial, spectatorial turn in the study of human rights. It will surely be provocative, controversial, unnerving, and widely read" – Thomas Keenan, Bard College

"Presents a refreshing angle and a rich historical account, one that departs from the standard 'Enlightenment origins' tale of the evolution of human rights" – Times Higher Education

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