An Analysis on The Role of Family Photography in Genesis of Collective and Public Memories*

(Received 2 Dec 2012, Accepted 31 Dec 2012)
Family photography is a genre of photography which is created in the context of everyday life and includes the photographs that families produce and gather through their lifetime and often keep them in their homes, workplaces and family albums, they documentsome moments in family life. These collections include the photographs which are taken by the professional photographer or by one of the members of the family, a friend or a relative. The photographs which are taken by professional photographers in photo studios, represent a picture of a family based on a pre-exist pattern and they merely show the internal issues of the family life, but the photos which are taken in special family events and in the context of family life, give us more information about the situations and conditions of family life, but all of these photos are supposed to represent a pleased picture of family life  and also with materializing to pleasant moments emphasize the importance of that moments, Therefore unpleasant events such as failures and fatalities merely record in the photographs. Emotional value and collective horizon of life experiences are the main features of family photography. Recording and protecting of memories and validation of our social identity are the most important personal functions of family photography. Family photos and albums operate as archives of memories and prompt to recall people, places and events. The makers of family photographs consider photographs as an exact and authenticated representation of what has been existed truly. For them the reality of photographs is one of the reasons of taking pictures. Whereas family photographs present a selective view of life and documentation means to document what people choose to preserve for the future.  Despite this, the importance of family photographs is to show the people`s way of thinking and living in the past. The content of family albums and family collections reflects the social and cultural values of the family and the ideology of the family which is revered in the photographs. As it mentionedbefore, family photographs are taken from everyday life, so they involve important social realities. The rules and agreements of the family correspond to the patterns and manners of a community which family is surrounded by.photos assist to memory and give us a powerful sense of re-experiencing and re-living the situations which have been existed through our lives and also they tend to tell stories from the past. Therefor family photographs apart of their role in making our memories, involve social and cultural meanings which can be applicable in other broad areas. Photographs and personal memories of people who live in the certain historical period in the common social and cultural environment, despite their differences, are shared with the collective memories and social history of that society. This inquiry within introducing the family photography and its concepts and features, try to represent a public reading of family photographs and also study the role of photographs and personal memories in genesis of collective and public memories of a society.