“Darkening O.J.: Visual Argument in Controversy,” Cara A. Finnegan

After OJ Simpson was arrested for the murders of his ex-wife and her lover, Simpon’s mug shot was displayed on the cover of two magainzes: Time and Newsweek. The image on Time was digitially manipulated, making OJ darker and heavily shadowed (in juxtaposition to Newsweek). Although Time claimed it was a “photo illustration” that served to “show the tragic downfall of an American football hero,” other folks disagreed. Time was charged with: (1) perpetuating the stereotype of “violent” black men; (2) suggesting OJ was guilty; (3) applying digital manipulations to a “news” photo–apparently a real no-no in journalism (which I strongly disagree with, and I’m speaking from experience); and (4) unconsciouslly attempting to distance “white America” from OJ, who has been described as a “white man’s black man”–one who seemed to “transcend” race by embracing upper-class white values” (237)
Finnegan claims this raises two important issues about photographic representation and “visual argument” (her quotes, not mine). She challenges those who think the image serves as a “visual argument,” which she defines as a “set of premises, identifiable in the image, leading to a conclusion which is itself present in the image” (236). In examining the image as a visual argument, Finnegan says that we can’t possibly account for all of the series of possible readings which are different for different people in different contexts; she says visual argument suggests there is one fixed meaning (I have no idea who she’s drawing on here), and often “artificially separates images from texts and tends to avoid the issue of context…” (236). Rather, Finnegan says, “the Simpson mug shot may be read most productively not as a “visual argument” but as a site of contestation over the meaning of representation itself;” in other words, she advocates it be examined as a controversy. She defines controversy as something that “challenges accepted norms of communication and functions to “block enthymematic associations and … disrupt the taken-for-granted realm of the uncontested and commonplace” (236).
After exploring numbers one to three (above) in more detail through the use of critics, scholars, and journalists, Finnegan says, “It should be clear that the Time ocver was not read as a single, seamless visual argument. Rather, it produced a field of discourse that circulated around the mug shot image, each reading informed by a context-based understanding of the argumentative resources available in the pictures.” She said each viewer interpreted the photo one of either two ways–”associative readings” or “naturalistic readings.” Associative readings are defined as putting something into a broader context or connecting it to a web of associations. For example, aligning OJ with other AA who have been oppressed via visual representations–Uncle Tom, Mammy, etc, or light=good and dark=bad. Naturalistic readings, or what she calls the “naturalistic enthymeme” is the asumption that the camera documents actual facts. The very fact that the image of OJ was a mug shot lent itself to “truth, knowledge, observation, description, representation and record” (240) and the digital manipulation devalorized its credibility.
Again, she closes with a resistance to visual rhetorical analysis and a shout out to an analysis of controversy.