Whilst the notion of diffraction for understanding the interference patterns of waves is widely recognised in classical physics, its application as an optical metaphor and methodology in practice-based research is relatively nascent. By responding to the lines of flight emerging from, embodied within and prompted by, the performative creative process, a diffractive methodology ‘troubles’ well-worn art historical and philosophical epistemologies for knowledge production. In diffraction, the subjective or positional perspective of the researcher - e.g. their history, experience, memories and emotions – is taken into account and contributes to enacting new configurations of thought. As a practical approach, diffraction presents a hybrid methodology for thinking-with complexity and through the entangled relationships between data, materials, ideas and performative processes of making. Through a deeper appreciation of the entangled relationships between research and researcher, the diffractive structure of the ‘research assemblage’ de-centres traditional anthropocentric or representational modes of interpretation, offering more imaginative ways to ‘materialise’ affective thought. Adopted by contemporary feminist theorists such as Donna Haraway and Karen Barad, diffraction offers a different kind of critical consciousness that attends to emerging ‘differences’. Rather than simply reflecting, comparing, contrasting or using binary oppositions, diffractively engaging with material/s allow us to think transversally across multiple, disciplinary fields of knowledge - to think-otherwise and think-anew. (See: Fox & Alldred, 2021 ; Sayal-Bennett, 2018 ; Geerts & van der Tuin, 2016 ; Andersen & Otterstad, 2014 ; Barad, 2007 ; Haraway, 1992 , 1997 ).
Published in Chapter:
Trauma and Memory in Women's Photographic Practice: A Diffractive Posthuman Approach
Gail Flockhart (University of Plymouth, UK)
Copyright: © 2023
|Pages: 37
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-6684-5337-7.ch002
Abstract
Situated within the field of women's photographic practice, this chapter investigates the relationship between trauma, memory, and the embodied trace. Using practice examples, the text explores how self-performed modes of self-representation might offer insights into the complex—psychological and physiological—inscriptions left by trauma. Evaluating this relationship, the text draws on analyses by Griselda Pollock, Jill Bennett, and Margaret Iversen. The argument supports post-qualitative research methods that unfold subjective material through the ‘doing-thinking-making' process. Approached through posthuman and new materialist frameworks referencing Karen Barad and Rosi Braidotti, the chapter examines how a diffractive—rather than purely reflective—methodology can synthesise praxis and theory through affective photographic outcomes. The chapter concludes by evaluating how a diffractive approach to photographic self-representation can be productive for re-thinking the self, re-interpreting narratives of trauma, and re-imagining the way we see ourselves in our ‘becoming-with' others.