Interpretation

Connotation is the feeling or ideas that are suggested or implied from an image. Denotation is the contrast to Connotation. It is the specific meaning of an image which do not include feeling or ideas that an individual may associate with it. The denotation is the signifier (things that give the image meaning). The connotation is the signified (a persons thoughts on the image). Although Images, words and sounds can be read in different ways by different people.

When asked to find a complex image, I struggled for quite a while. It wasn’t until recently while I was listening to ‘Rage against the Machine’s‘ self titled album, and I looked at the album cover which always intrigued me. A photo of a burning monk. I wanted to know more about this photograph and the story behind it. So I took the opportunity to discover the context behind the photo and write a blog about it.

In this Photograph, A man can be seen on fire with a jerrycan behind him, in what looks to be a busy intersection with a large crowd of bystanders. This is the denotation, or what is literally there.

Malcom Browne captured this photo in 1963 in Vietnam. The man in this photograph was a Buddhist monk named Thich Quang Duc. He committed suicide by self-immolation in a busy street in Saigon. He burned himself to death to protest the treatment of Buddhists by the (at the time) president of Vietnam. Now with this context, we can start to associate feelings and ideas to the image, as we understand the motives of the Monk.

The interesting part is how some people interpret this image. Without context it may be seen as violent and brutal. This relates to the linear transmission model which consists of: Sender > Message > Receiver. The sender being Malcom Brown (the man who took the photo), the message, to protest against the discrimination of Buddhists in Vietnam, and the receiver, which was the world. The problematic element of the linear transmission model is that the receiver may decode the message differently than how it was intended. Not every person is informed on why this monk committed suicide by lighting himself on fire, or even why he’s on fire to begin with. Fire is seen by many as destructive and chaotic.

While an image may have an intended meaning to it, not every person may see it the same way as another. We all interpret things differently.