Description
We have become accustomed to talking about civilian casualties with reference to the legal codes and moral norms that regulate the harm inflicted upon civilians, but surprisingly little attention has focused on how we see this harm in various visual forms—from tables, charts and graphs through to images, video and artwork. Drawing on Judith Butler, Jacques Rancière and Jenny Edkins, this paper will outline the theoretical foundations that underpin an ambitious new research project on visualizing civilian harm, which examines what civilian harms we see and how we see these harms. Focusing on three visual representations from the recent conflict in Afghanistan, this paper will examine how these visualizations worked to reinforce particular notions about what counts as acceptable violence, circumscribing who can be seen as a civilian and what counts as a harm whilst also obscuring the actual violence that was inflicted on Afghan civilians. At the same time, this paper will consider the counter-visualizations that were constructed in response, focusing on how these visual representations could disrupt a normative framework that renders civilian lives so losable in certain situations.
