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The Ghost in the Image
Our century has seen the proliferation of reality shows devoted to ghost hunts, documentaries on hauntings, and horror films presented as found footage. The horror genre is no longer exclusive to fiction and its narratives actively engage us in web forums, experiential viewing, videogames, and creepypasta. These participative modes of relating to the occult, alongside the impulse to seek proof of either its existence or fabrication, have transformed the production and consumption of horror stories.
The Ghost in the Image offers a new take on the place that supernatural phenomena occupy in everyday life, arguing that the relationship between the horror genre and reality is more intimate than we like to think. Through a revisionist and transmedial approach to horror this book investigates our expectations about the ability of photography and film to work as evidence. A historical examination of technology's role in at once showing and forging truths invites questions about our investment in its powers. Behind our obsession with documenting everyday life lies the hope that our cameras will reveal something extraordinary. The obsessive search for ghosts in the image, however, shows that the desire to find them is matched by the pleasure of calling a hoax.
The Ghost in the Image offers a new take on the place that supernatural phenomena occupy in everyday life, arguing that the relationship between the horror genre and reality is more intimate than we like to think. Through a revisionist and transmedial approach to horror this book investigates our expectations about the ability of photography and film to work as evidence. A historical examination of technology's role in at once showing and forging truths invites questions about our investment in its powers. Behind our obsession with documenting everyday life lies the hope that our cameras will reveal something extraordinary. The obsessive search for ghosts in the image, however, shows that the desire to find them is matched by the pleasure of calling a hoax.
168 pages, Paperback
Published November 16, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review
September 3, 2023
This is an academic book, but a fascinating one. Although academically trained myself, I’ve never had much of an appetite for theory. My own work has always been eclectic, but I can understand the need to establish method and to use technical terms to do so. Once you get beyond that introduction, however, this book gets very interesting. Cecilia Sayad discusses how the development of image technology, from photographs on, leads to the blurring of image and reality.
She discusses this in the first instance by looking at spirit photography and its modern manifestation of reality television ghost hunting. She then moves on to the Amityville and Enfield franchises and how they blur reality (as experienced by individuals) and the fictionalizing of these in books and movies. The fiction becomes part of the reality in such situations. Her next chapter explores “found footage” movies, such as the Paranormal Activity franchise and how such stories take on a reality of their own.
The next chapter moves on to video games which, as I admit elsewhere (Sects and Violence in the Ancient World) aren’t part of my world. Her conclusion, which addresses the Slender Man creepypasta meme nicely brings her point full circle. Our images become our reality, breaking through the frame into everyday life. I learned quite a lot from this exploration, but it is pretty academic in its treatment of a captivating subject.
She discusses this in the first instance by looking at spirit photography and its modern manifestation of reality television ghost hunting. She then moves on to the Amityville and Enfield franchises and how they blur reality (as experienced by individuals) and the fictionalizing of these in books and movies. The fiction becomes part of the reality in such situations. Her next chapter explores “found footage” movies, such as the Paranormal Activity franchise and how such stories take on a reality of their own.
The next chapter moves on to video games which, as I admit elsewhere (Sects and Violence in the Ancient World) aren’t part of my world. Her conclusion, which addresses the Slender Man creepypasta meme nicely brings her point full circle. Our images become our reality, breaking through the frame into everyday life. I learned quite a lot from this exploration, but it is pretty academic in its treatment of a captivating subject.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review