Beside the Sea: Visual Imagery, Ageing and Heritage

Abstract

The role of older people as inadvertent exemplars of all that was good about the nation’s past is thrown into high relief when we consider representations of Britain’s ‘maritime heritage’. Yet such mythology has a longer pedigree than may at first be apparent. Victorian pioneers of photography championed the custom, dress and extended family roles of elders in fishing villages because these displayed an older moral world distinct from the sins of the city. Subsequently, the conflation of positive ageing and seaside living fuelled the promotion of health products and lifestyles, whilst the rise of the seaside holiday prompted a more humorous re-evaluation of the ageing body as typified by saucy postcards and family snaps. Alongside and related to the phenomenon of retiring to the seaside, a fresh imagery is being wrought as nostalgic images of the country’s seafaring history play heavily on the reminiscences of older people. Meanwhile, growing numbers of retirees opt for foreign travel. Focusing on a range of photographic materials, this chapter explores the continuities in perception that have connected ageing and older people with the morally and spiritually uplifting virtues of coastal communities.