A Mind Spread Out on the Ground

Elliott delves into the issue of consent and ownership of photographs, specifically the ways photography has been used as a tool of colonization. The title is a reference to photographer Susan Sontag’s essay arguing that photographs are mere representations of truth—like the shadows in Plato’s Allegory of the Cave—and can therefore never tell the whole truth. Elliott begins by pointing out how many times white men have taken it upon themselves to document the “disappearing Indian,” who is not really going anywhere. These white men continually exoticize and tokenize Native people rather than putting those efforts toward working against the violence they face. She then pivots to describe the ways oppressed people, especially Indigenous people, have harnessed the power of art and photography to empower themselves and their communities by “craft[ing] images of their own communities on their own terms” (331). She contrasts the imperialistic, Western, white beauty standards perpetuated by the media to the content on YouTube and other social media platforms where anyone can post pictures or videos of themselves. This power-shift from media moguls to regular, everyday people using social media or consuming YouTube videos has reflected a change in values—one where people who do not fit within imperialist beauty standards can be just as relevant. However, Elliott also brings up the issue of revenge porn, or the non-consensual distribution by men of sexual photos of women. These many examples of consent and non-consent, imperialism and progress, form an overall analysis of the double-edged sword of photography in Elliott’s modern-day capitalist society. Elliott ends with the question of the underlying motivations behind photographs and how they construct our reality.