Melinda Hinkson

Melinda Hinkson is Associate Professor of Anthropology and Australian Research Council Future Fellow at the Alfred Deakin Institute, Deakin University, and visiting fellow in the School of Archaeology and Anthropology, The Australian National University. Among her recent publications is Remembering the Future: Warlpiri life through the prism of drawing (Aboriginal Studies Press, 2014).

Imaging Identity »

Media, memory and portraiture in the digital age

Edited by: Melinda Hinkson
Publication date: August 2016
Imaging Identity presents potent reflections on the human condition through the prism of portraiture. Taking digital imaging technologies and the dynamic and precarious dimensions of contemporary identity as critical reference points, these essays consider why portraits  continue to have such galvanising appeal and perform fundamental work across so many social settings. This multidisciplinary enquiry brings together artists, art historians, art theorists and anthropologists working with a variety of media. Authors look beyond conventional ideas of the portrait to the wider cultural contexts, governmental practices and intimate experiences that shape relationships between persons and pictures. Their shared purpose centres on a commitment to understanding the power of images to draw people into their worlds. Imaging Identity tracks a fundamental symbiosis — to grapple with the workings of images is to understand something vital of what it is to be human.