ABSTRACT
Several sources on the subject of women photographers, though, have questioned whether we can really attribute “masculinity” or “femininity” to photographers’ works. One of the challenges of this “uncovering” labor was nineteenth-century women’s non-existence in official records. Other important sources for the present work contained the insights of social scientists, such as Pierre Bourdieu and Janet Chafetz, on the structure of male domination, its psychology and rituals. Social science studies were important sources for explaining why women, even when they were camera club members, remained silent during meetings. The sociology of silence, and the psychology of group dynamics, helped me to interpret the transactions of early photographic societies in fresh ways. Conglomeration of social and political changes at the end of the century led more women to channel their creativity, skill, and restlessness into photography. The identification of certain values as “masculine” rather than as universal will have, hopefully, an unblocking effect on our photo-historical perspective.
