Tag Archives: Tim McLaughlin

http://imageonpaper.com/2014/04/24/the-people-of-india/

The People of India | Image on Paper

From Volume I “Mishimi Hill Tribe, Assam”
From Volume I “Mishimi Hill Tribe, Assam”

At its worst the classification system sought to announce a theory of racial types. Certain groups were categorized as criminal tribes or castes.

At its best, the project was a formative compendium of ethnographic detail completed by sympathetic and intelligent observers who sought to understand the cultures they were living among.

via The People of India | Image on Paper.

Not ethnic mixing but a timely reminder of how the colonial viewpoint and racial-type photography and the documentation of otherness, no matter how well-intentioned, is problematic and often ends up saying more about the photographer than the cultures depicted.