The Visual in Histories of Education: A Reappraisal

This introduction to the special issue on Images and Films as Objects to Think With presents a historiographical reflection on how images are being approached in the field of educational history. In recent years, much of the work has been situated at the intersection of visual and material studies; images are considered objects with which humans interact, carrying affects and particular materialities that condition their experience; they are taken as historical artefacts that bring out a plurality of meanings, which continue to grow with each new reading or approach. This introduction presents the articles that are included in this special issue as well as a final commentary written by Lynn Fendler that engages in a dialogue with them. The articles move away from considering the visual as a transparent source with a stable meaning, and open up different possibilities for working with and through it.
They also problematise and expand the archives in which historians work; by looking at various surfaces in which images are exhibited and circulate, such as books, reports, art shows, films, magazines, and collective memories, these studies point to the “affective and effective histories” that images tell, and invite new research agendas for a visual history of education.