John Collier (anthropologist) - Major Projects, Contributions To Visual and Applied Anthropology

Major Projects, Contributions To Visual and Applied Anthropology

Starting with the work for Leighton in the Maritimes of Canada, Collier worked on a series of important projects. One of his more important efforts, still largely unpublished, was documentation of the still controversial "Cornell/Vicos Project." Directed by Alan Homberg of Cornell and Mario Vasquez of the Universidad de San Marcos, this project aimed to prepare the Indian community of Hacienda Vicos in the central highlands of Peru to survive successfully as a free and independent community. Collier carried out a complete visual ethnography of the community while also recording the operation of the applied project, making use of the full range of visual research methods he and Mary Collier had been developing since their first ethnographic effort with Anibal Buiton in 1946. These methods were further refined in the years following and finally published in 1967 as Visual Anthropology: Photography as a Research Method. Generally recognized as the first published use of the term 'visual anthropology', this book and its second edition (co-authored with Malcolm Collier) have remained important references in the field. As Edward T. Hall writes in the introduction to the later edition of the text, the two Colliers (John Jr. and Malcolm) almost singlehandedly established visual anthropology as an observational science in its own right.

Collier's own non-traditional education led him to an analysis and criticism of schooling in the United States, especially regarding the education of disabled children, Native American children and others outside the mainstream. Recognition of his insights in this arena led to his joint appointment as a Professor of both Anthropology and Education at San Francisco State College (now San Francisco State University). In 1969 he turned to motion picture film to explore cultural conflicts in schools for Native students in Alaska as part of a major national study of American Indian Education. In this and later film based research carried out in Arizona and California, he articulated fresh perspectives toward these groups which emphasized the positive importance of cultural diversity and approaches to schooling that would build on children's own cultural origins and energy.

In the fields of visual anthropology and visual sociology Collier is recognized as a major methodological pioneer, in particular for the development of "photo-elicitation" techniques in which photographs are used systematically in interviews to elicit information and insight. In the revised version (1986) of Visual Anthropology he argues that many, including other cultural anthropologists, have been "blind" to what can be "seen" within the nonverbal sensibility. His chief contributions to anthropology include this view that seeing and representing the visual is as important as speaking or writing words. He challenged modern anthropological viewpoints that regard theory or conceptualization as the endpoint of ethnography or anthropological analysis. Instead, he believed that the very energy of a culture could be seen. Some have theorized that, due to his deafness, he developed his visual skills to a very high degree, as is reflected in his photography as well as in his writings. He was also not afraid to use anthropology to make recommendations, especially when asked to do so by study participants. His work has been referenced and his methods used, not only in visual anthropology and sociology but also in psychiatric and educational anthropology.