The image is well composed, and the colours make it aesthetically pleasing. I don't know how it could be improved to extend its ethnogrpahic import. Although it could be a little sharper.
The image and caption both comment on the flowing and cyclical nature of toxics - both materially and culturally. Materially, because the pollution is carried by a river. Culturally, because the public discourse around river pollution comes back with the seasons. Perhaps this could be highlighted a bit more in the caption.The presence of the worker in the river also draws attention to the labour involved in dealing with toxics. The fact that it is an algal bloom as well - the presence of life - also shows how toxics are a more-than-human issue.
It is a photo taken by the ethnographer in May 2016, and presents us a snapshot from the city of Nashik and "Godovari River". In the photo, we actually do not see anything such a river but a puddle children around/in it. We also see trees and murals; the place hidden behind the trees is hard to guess. The angle of the photo, therefore, draws us to the waterbody and people/children there.
This visualization depicts that a river that had been running for 139 years got dried in Summer 2016. Though, the reiver still carries a form of water, this time, only wastewater. The ethnographer underlines how this river has been a common source utilized by the people to meet their daily needs of water. We also learn that people has continued to approach river filled with wastewater to meet their needs... At the first sight, I felt the depseration, and then, began thinking about that "water scarcity" is not only about "lack" but also creates a form of "excess" (e.g., wastewater).
The author may want to add a couple of concepts to emphasize how a river is rendered into a toxic sewer stream
They author may like to tell more about the place he took the photo: his reading of the murals, the built environment, etc.
This visualization shows us how a river becomes a toxic place as it ran dry but home only to wastewater.
This image places hope and solidarity in the center of a struggle against toxicity. The subjects are standing, smiling, touching eachother, some have arms crossed. They form a wall, a semi-circle, a confrontation, but appear welcoming because of their expressions. It seems that the message of this photo is less to inform readers of the article about details of the incident and is more to reassure. If you are reading this publication, you are not alone. Here are more than two dozen people, smiling in the face of encroaching toxicity, who are on your side.
I think I'd like to know more about the nature of the publication the photo appears in. Contextualizing the photo will help me to understand its message. Who is the intended audience of this newspaper? And who actually reads it, intended audience or not? Who writes for and publishes this newspaper?
The photo was published in a newspaper and appears to be a snapshot of a team of academics or activists in a courthouse. It was found by the ethnographer. Its composition is of a group photo, landscape orientation, and not professionally photographed. It has a snapshot feel, not everyone is looking at the camera, and some people are craning their necks to be seen. It seems that not much attention was paid to composition or aesthetic, which is not a critique, but a rather important clue as to the nature of the circumstances in which the photo was taken.
