Image / Documentary Analysis

I found Knight’s descriptions of image-based research and documentary analysis to be very helpful in terms of my own research. It is likely as a result of my undergraduate work in History, but I was drawn to these two types of research from the beginning. It may have also partly been because I was nervous to try something new, actually interacting with people rather than locking myself away in some corner of the library nesting in a pile of documents; but I do really enjoy the interpretive nature of this type of research. As Knight says, “it is more about different ways of reading the same texts than it s with unearthing new ones” (Knight 110). My initial research has confirmed Knight’s observation that with newspaper archives becoming available online (usually with search engine features), research is cheap and fast.

It was helpful for Knight to point out the areas where these types of research methods are flawed. Specifically, how image-based research should include theories of ‘sign’ (Knight 103) that will not necessarily confirm what is in print (102) and that they are difficult to systematically analyze (102). The second point about it not confirming what is in print is important since I plan on doing both image and document analysis and so I should plan for them to not necessarily have supportive interpretations. His suggestion to face-to-face work with typical informants’ understanding of the images I select will be something I will consider, perhaps even as a way of breaking out and doing interactive human research!