Learning to see with Deleuze: understanding affective responses in image-viewer research assemblages

Abstract

I describe an approach to analysing the affective flows produced in sociomaterial assemblages of visual images and humans in research processes. The approach combines Deleuzian understandings of assemblage, repetition and difference, and of lines of articulation and flight, with interpretative techniques drawn from visual social semiotics. I use examples from my research into images shared by professionals on Twitter to illustrate how this approach can reveal not only the forces, intensities and hidden logics that lead to particular responses, but also the ways in which these responses impact on research decisions and interpretations.