Juxtaposition Matters

 

So I’m reading through Ways of Seeing by John Berger, and it has this essay that talks about how things look different depending on what we put them next to. The captions we put on pictures change how we see the image. Often the image becomes supportive material for the caption, rather than the caption explaining the image.

I was flipping through the suggested news stories on my phone when I saw one with the title:

STUDY FINDS KOOTENAI COUNTY RESIDENTS 49 POUNDS OVERWEIGHT.

Below the headline was a picture of a blonde young woman with a round face and chubby cheeks. After reading the article I discovered that the woman in the picture was a trainer at a local gym who was being cited for her expertise on keeping a healthy weight. She is likely quite fit herself.

Yet when you put her headshot next to the headline of the article, it looks like the journalist is using her image to illustrate the point that residents of our county are overweight.

If I were her, I’d call and complain.

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