image

nationality

American

university professor

University of Chicago

Critical Inquiry

innovator in the field of

media theory

occupation / innovator as

art historian

university teacher

scientific organization

American Academy of Arts and Sciences

is not just an inert object but an animated being that exerts a certain force in this world. This force cannot be reduced to interpretation but must be taken up as a relationship that binds the image to the spectator, object to subject, a relationship that is transformative of the social context in which it unfolds.

W.J.T. Mitchell argues that we need to reckon with images not just as inert objects but as animated beings that exert a certain force in this world. Mitchell emphasizes that this force cannot be reduced to interpretation but taken up as a relationship that binds the image to the spectator, object to subject, a relationship that is transformative of the social context in which it unfolds. The 'complex field of visual reciprocity,' he writes, 'is not merely the by-product of a social reality but actively constitutive of it. Vision is as important as language in mediating social relations, and it is not reducible to language, to the sign, or to discourse. Pictures want equal rights with language, not to be turned into language' (842-843).' (mahmood)

W.J.T. MitchellThinkers

W.J.T. Mitchell