Inequalities, images and insights for policy and research

Drawing upon a growing interest in the impact of visual culture and the
use of visual data within the health and social sciences, the introduction
to this interdisciplinary collection of papers examines what visual methodologies
and visual ‘evidence’ can bring to the study of social inequalities.
It sets out the specific contributions by authors in order to identify
their different methodological approaches, theoretical interests and analytical
concerns and to explore the implications and possibilities of their
visual methodologies for those researching and working in the policy arena.
With a particular emphasis on the dialogues between context, text and
image, the paper highlights the insights generated by the collection into
the forms and experiences of inequality that have shaped and continue
to shape societies, communities, families and individual lives. It also suggests
how the visual might contribute to extending understanding of the
ways social inequalities are imagined, constituted and reinforced.