Using Visual Evidence

?‥?Using Visual Evidence is a book about visual literacy. It both advocates and equips the scholarly use of visual images as visual evidence. Here, the visual is not mere illustration. It is the text..
.History is an artificial means of analyzing something which no longer exists. But it leaves its imprint through evidence, and frequently that evidence is visual. Initially, all societies gave the visual image a predominant role in the communication of information, but after the rise of the book, the printed word superseded the visual image, relegating it to a supporting role..
.Recently, however, the image has come roaring back into a dominant position. Yet sadly, scholarship has remained focused mostly on the written word..
.This is unfortunate, because images are made by human beings and therefore have embedded in them much information about their makers. They are primary sources not only for the study of what has been shown, but also for the study of the people, cultures and societies that made them. This remains true from the earliest graphic arts through to the complex media of today..
.This book enables a rediscovery of the visual skills of the past in order to facilitate the investigation of history and the understanding of the present. It is composed of specially-commissioned chapters by international authorities on the use of visual evidence all the way from painting to political prints, photographs, documentary, feature films, television, news and advertising. All combine to support the point that with visual evidence, the image is the text.?‥?..

Dr Richard Howells is Reader in Cultural and Creative Industries, Kingi??s College, London.

.Professor Robert W. Matson is Professor of History at the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown. .