Mexican photojournalism: the visual narrative of La Jornada newspaper (1984-2000), a way of telling stories
| Date | 01 April 2019 |
| Published date | 01 April 2019 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/CC-03-2018-0004 |
| Pages | 45-51 |
| Author | Susana Rodríguez |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Collection building & management |
Mexican photojournalism: the visual narrative
of La Jornada newspaper (1984-2000), a way of
telling stories
Susana Rodríguez
UNAM, Mexico
Abstract
Purpose –This paper aims to broadly address a PhD research stream that the author has been conducting to date, whose historical objective is press
photography, specifically the published images in La Jornada newspaper. A visual speech of the various contexts lived in Mexico at the end of the twentieth
century. In the following lines, the author will present her methodology proposal with the aim of learning and analyzing the speech created by press
photography and its relation to historical reality. A journalistic speech generating a language describing events, but at the same time a language manipulated
by the subjectivity of the author –the press photographer. A historical timeline of which the photojournalist was part and which influenced the manner
historical reality was perceived by the receiving social group.
Design/methodology/approach –It is important to clarify that this database does not intend to replace the estimations which could be obtained by
directly and individually analyzing each photograph. However, this instrument has allowed the author to collect a great quantity of readable graphicand
textual information, as well as to describe the characteristic attributes of each image as a documentary unit. In other words, the author intends to address
the visual events as a part of the historical events, as claimed by the Mexican historian Ricardo Pérez Montfort. This to provide an in-depth study on how
historical, social, cultural and political phenomena were registered by press photography; not omitting history, this specific moment, punctually requires
photography and written journalism as a vestige. The latter not only with the purpose of going further on the functions of photography but also on the
significance of the photographic phenomenon and the visual speech within social and cultural history of a country.
Findings –Furthermore, the author will present, to the extent possible, some elements which have allowed the identification of the manner in
which the editor(s) of the newspaper impacted the presentation of visual speech, as well as the interests and visions of the social group they
represent. This is a way to go further on different assumptions, such as the person taking the picture, the person editing it –after reaching the
editorial and ideological line of the newspaper –as well as the person publishing the picture; a new manner to address editorial work and
photojournalism on written media. To achieve the aforementioned aim, this essay comprehends the intertextuality and visual production, as well as
the contexts lived throughout the six-year Presidential terms of office of Miguel de la Madrid Hurtado, Carlos Salinas de Gortari and Ernesto Zedillo
Ponce de Le
on, through diverse published images in La Jornada newspaper from 1984 to 2000.
Originality/value –This research not only addresses the generated material by the photojournalists of La Jornada newspaper during this
period but also includes, as a part of the oral history methodology, the testimonies of some assistant directors, people in charge of the
photography department, the editor, the designer and photographers who stood out in the newspaper. In addition, the author has a database
which has allowed to collect, store and connect information present in each of the photographs publishedon different covers and back covers
of the newspaper. It comprises 15 categories which have been nurturing the database (reviewed dates, journalistic and photographic genders,
reporters, pages, published photographs, photograph format, themes of the photographs, places, characters, titles of the photographs,
photograph caption, credit, photograph composition, angle and time). It is important to clarify that this database does not intend to replace
the estimations which could be obtained from directly and individually analyzing each photograph. However, this instrument has allowed the
author to collect a great quantity of readable graphic and textual i nformation, as well as to describe the characteristic attributes of each image
as a documentary unit.
Keywords Oral history, History México, La Jornada, Photojournalism, Social history, Visual story
Paper type Research paper
Themainargumentthatjustifies this work is based on the
premise that journalistic photography, as a testimony,
registers a fraction of reality and can leave a mark or
transcend as a social document and can even be identified
as a reliable historical source of a fact informative. While as
a premeditated act of memory, the cultural representation
of the worker of the lens can materialize in the photo, as
well as the political and ideological line of the editors and
the media that requests and publishes the material. A kind
of reading of the discursive constructions is made by the
pressphotographerinimageandonasensitivepaper,such
as the photographic one.
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on
Emerald Insight at: www.emeraldinsight.com/2514-9326.htm
Collection and Curation
38/2 (2019) 45–51
© Emerald Publishing Limited [ISSN 2514-9326]
[DOI 10.1108/CC-03-2018-0004]
Received 8 March 2018
Revised 15 April 2018
Accepted 2 June 2018
45
To continue reading
Request your trial