Making the criminal visible

This chapter focuses on the ideas developed in the history and theory of photography to address the ways in which a specific type of bodily identity is produced and negotiated – that of the criminal. It also focuses on the ways in which the camera is used in the act of making the criminal visible. The chapter offers a brief account of how police and law enforcement agencies have turned to the camera in making the criminal visible. This overview is then used to foreground the ramifications of contemporary policing and criminal identification practices through the concept of "potential criminality". The full account and argument are found in Capturing the Criminal Image: From Mug Shot to Surveillance Society. The chapter focuses nearly exclusively on examples from the United States; however, the larger arguments here have relevance in relation to any social institution that uses the camera to document and record bodies.