I appreciated how the image brought about a strong affective response. While there is an element of humour in this image (and this is nice because it forms a continuous affective arc along with the Trump image) there also exists a feeling of anger and disappointment. I like how this image can convey multiple affects that exists around the topic of toxicity and colonialsim.
I cannot shake the thought that this might function as part of a larger collage. In looking, I am immediately drawn to the violence of the Marine chopping the wood which has morphed in situ to a village scape. Everything here is abrupt visually and from my POV begs for an opening up of narrative and context. That said, it does flow with the previous image's thematics, and again the text font choice, for me, alludes to an absurdity of horrrors manifest in the relationship between USAID and the island.
I'm wondering what added analytic insight we'd get by putting this image in juxtaposition with another that somehow depicted the false death claims.
The caption of this image points to disaster studies' arguments around slow disaster and de-centering our definitions of disaster from event based understandings.
The power of this picture is entangled with the narrative of your text as well as my familiarity with the disgusting denials posited by the president after being given evidence of our national negligence. Using the picture of the cemetery does give me as a viewer an acknowledgement of the need for material and corporeal accounting in Puerto Rico. I am curious as to its affective resonance with you? Does it capture the viscerality of the lost not being counted? Is this necessary here, or are you pulling for something else?
Having used collage of existing media artifacts to construct your images, and by critiquing the media's portrayal of the Hurricane and its aftermath, I am curious about your views of media versus the current US administration. I say this because we are so often witnessing the president discount not only academic expertise, but media scrutiny as "fake" and unwarranted critique. In essence, who are allies of the people? Who are enemies? Is the media misrepresenting, or are they just not getting it right? Is media too broad a term for the level of scrutiny we are after?
Spatial (Puerto Rico) and discursive (about the hidden atrocities) dimensions are well captured in this image. I wonder if there is another way to highlight the different discourses in the U.S and Puerto Rico in this image. The red title on the lower right corner literally saids "ignoring toxicity," suggesting that these atrocities are not recognized by the public, but maybe there is a more visual and less textual way to convey that?
This image is interesting because it calls out the problem of a high medical expense through relying on infographic conventions (bar, tables, arrows, etc.) , those which medical and insurance companies themselves utilize for commercial purposes. This image calls to mind scholarly arguments about data visualization (graphesis) and the history of its conventions.
This image opens the concept of toxicity to a consideration financial burdens as a result of cancer. Theorizing "toxicity" through access (and lack of access to financial resources) is a useful way to explore how life chances accumulate more for some than others. I think it is interesting that while the critical commentary cannot directly place for whom this image would circulate, it could be potentially useful to consider how race and class may play a pivotal role in understanding this form of toxicity.
Elements of this image, from the rigged brain to the red color scheme, incited a visceral response. Even though I was not familiar with the the concept of the 'blood-brain-barrier,' I was intuitively able to grasp how this image was related to neuroscience and related risks.
