{"product_id":"eye-contact-9780822335726","title":"Eye Contact","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe photographs of Aborgines taken at Coranderrk Station were  circulated across the western world and were mounted in exhibition displays and classified among other ethnographic \"data\" within museum collections. This book reveals how western society came to understand Aboriginal people through these images.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Jane Lydon’s meticulous investigation of the role of photography in the cross-cultural engagement that took place at Coranderrk from the mid-nineteenth century to the early twentieth century unfolds with a narrative drive. The community at Coranderrk comes alive. We care about the residents, how they have been represented in successive periods, and how their descendants now use the photographs to reclaim the past and construct their own narratives.”—Roslyn Poignant, author of \u003ci\u003eProfessional Savages: Captive Lives and Western Spectacle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“What makes this study especially rich and important is the way Jane Lydon takes full advantage of photographic theory without imposing it reductively or simplistically. This is particularly impressive because she shows in very nuanced ways that different photographs were produced for different reasons at different times and that these photos embody various ideas about Aboriginality and science.”—David Prochaska, coauthor of \u003ci\u003eBeyond East and West: Seven Transnational Artists\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eEye Contact \u003c\/i\u003eis . . . a welcome entrant into the interdisciplinary arena of material culture study intersecting with photographic history. It clears a path through a landscape of nostalgia littered with the pictorial histories and genres of illustrated then-and-now documentation. . . . [T]his book brings out this body of photographic work to sit within a soundly researched historical context, and provides useful discussions on the ways in which the photographs meanings were constructed for specific purposes.” -- Joanna Sassoon * History of Photography *\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eEye Contact\u003c\/i\u003e is a fine contribution to visual history, colonial studies, and comparative work on visual culture and photography more broadly.” -- Corinne A. Kratz * American Ethnologist *\u003cbr\u003e“[A] rich verbal and visual text. . . . By tying colonial-era photography to the institutions within which it took place and historicizing the shifting contexts of composition, production, and distribution for the images themselves, Lydon’s beautifully produced monograph makes a significant contribution to understanding colonial photographic practice.” -- Daniel Fisher * Anthropology and Humanism *\u003cbr\u003e“I found Lydon’s book to be a resounding success: it is an enjoyable read; an important, well-timed contribution to the disciplinary fields of history, photography, and anthropology; and an especially welcome addition to scholarship that examines the power of media practices to produce and re-imagine meaning.” -- Sabra Thorner * Visual Anthropology Review *\u003cbr\u003e“This is a well written book, intelligently conceived and well argued. It is theoretically sophisticated while remaining accessible.” -- Peggy Brock * Journal of Colonialism \u0026amp; Colonial History *\u003cbr\u003e“With its eye-catching cover, bold title and eighty-eight illustrations, Jane Lydon’s \u003ci\u003eEye Contact \u003c\/i\u003eis an impressive scholarly work detailing the role that visual imagery, but particularly photography, played in developments at the Aboriginal mission at Coranderrer in Victoria from its beginnings in the 1870s to its closure in the early 1900s.” -- Anne Maxwell * Australian Historical Studies *\u003cbr\u003e\"Insightful. . . . The importance of \u003ci\u003eEye Contact\u003c\/i\u003e goes beyond the recovery of aspects of untold Australian history, in that any consideration of the function of representation of Aboriginal people is a meditation on the nature of culture in Australia.\" -- John Mateer * Melbourne Age *\u003cbr\u003e\"The Coranderrk photographs perform seemingly contradictory roles; they are both 'memorials to a vanishing race' and a vital resource for contemporary indigenous people searching for their descendants in order to keep the past alive.\" -- Mireille Juchau * TLS *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eList of Illustrations ix\u003cbr\u003e Preface xiii\u003cbr\u003e Acknowledgments xxv\u003cbr\u003e Introduction: Colonialism, Photography, Mimesis 1\u003cbr\u003e 1. \"This Civilising Experiment\": Charles Walter, Missionaries, and Photographic Theater 33\u003cbr\u003e 2. Science and Visuality: \"Communicating Correct Ideas\" 73\u003cbr\u003e 3. Time Traps: Defining Aboriginality during the 1870s–1880s 122\u003cbr\u003e 4. Works Like a Clock 176\u003cbr\u003e 5. Coranderrk Reappears 214\u003cbr\u003e Epilogue 248\u003cbr\u003e Notes 253\u003cbr\u003e Bibliography 271\u003cbr\u003e Index 295","brand":"Duke University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49406038770007,"sku":"9780822335726","price":28.8,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9780822335726.jpg?v=1730494332","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/eye-contact-9780822335726","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}