Mothers and the Phenomenology of the Memorable Photograph

Jonathan Yahalom

doi:10.29173/pandpr20107

Abstract

This article explores the phenomenology of mothers as they return to memorable photographs.[i] It reviews research on three mothers who articulate the lived experience of photographs, and how such experience might reveal basic ontological aspects of motherhood. The phenomenology of a mother’s memorable photographs discloses an aporia of human relationships that involves the connectedness she has with her children, and the awareness that her children have become separate individuals. These two themes – separateness and coexistence – are indissolubly at odds. Each constitutes a mother’s potential lived experience of photographs as viewed in front of her. A concluding discussion reviews how each of these contradictory themes provides the necessary context for the other to arise, mutually presupposing the other. [i] The Duquesne University IRB approved the research conducted in this article (Protocol #11-27). The author would like to thank Eva Simms, Patrick Howard, and two anonymous reviewers for helpful feedback while preparing this article. This article is indebted to the three mothers who participated in this research.

Highlights

I once considered myself critical of the rituals of photography
My study on the lived experience mothers have of memorable photographs requires me to recognize photography does not necessarily cheapen experience
Memorable photographs disclose an aporia of human relationships situated between mutually dependent axes of coexistence and separateness

Summary

Introduction

I once considered myself critical of the rituals of photography. From my perspective few photographers seemed to appreciate the object they were documenting. Marianne Hirsch’s (1997) Family Frames helps unpack the significance of the operator who documents significant moments, bestowing subsequent generations with “post-memory” of the life that preceded them. Each of these works illuminates that photography is steeped with meaning and significantly affects our lived experience by modulating one’s stance in the world. Given how much these pioneers recognize photography’s importance in modern life, I wish to explore one specific way that photography is lived: mothers and photography—mothers who revisit memorable photographs and continue to take new ones. The following article seeks to provide phenomenological insight as to how this facet of photography is lived

Method

The Impossibility of Separation and Coexistence

Future Research