ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author addresses dis/comforting geographies via an exploration of his own practices of engaging with place through therapeutic photography. The author seeks to position this piece at the junction of cultural geography and therapeutic photography, employing a practice-based approach to understanding dis/comforting geographies. He delineates an understanding of dis/comfort, self and place; outlines the circumstances that led to the author engagement with place-based therapeutic photography and describes the type of therapy employed. The author explains the nature of place-based therapeutic photography and thread it with concepts from photography theory (especially punctum); and provides the visual language of the images themselves. Therapeutic photography, then, is not a contrivance to create banal images of comfort; it is a mode of self-directed therapy that engages with a spectrum of experiences of being-in-the-world, the discomforting, awkward and uncanny as well as the familiar and easy.
