Point-and-Shoot Cameras x The Punctum

To make sense of the recent resurgence in point-and-shoot cameras, we’re returning to French philosopher and cultural theorist Roland Barthes! We begin with a conversation about the major technological shifts that have occurred in photography between 1980 (when Barthes published Camera Lucida) and today. Hannah then leads us in a theory section all about "the Punctum." Together, she and Marcelle parse Barthes' understanding of what makes photography distinct from other mediums and how Time is entangled with our emotional relationship to snapshots captured on camera. If you've never heard of "the Punctum," let this episode be your introduction to one of Barthes' more moving contributions to our theory tool belt!

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Works Cited:

Barthes, Roland. Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography. Trans. by Richard Howard. New York: Hill and Wang, 1981. 

Cooke, Alex. “The Rise and Fall of the Point-and-Shoot Camera.” FStoppers 6 November 2025. https://fstoppers.com/historical/rise-and-fall-point-and-shoot-camera-715387. 

McLennan, Tara. “Hashtag ‘Sunset’: Smartphone Photography and the Punctum of Time.” The International Journal of the Image 7.1 (2016): 33-43. https://doi.org/10.18848/2154-8560/CGP/v07i01/33-43 

Murashima, Claire. “Why Gen Z loves the digital compact cameras that millennials used to covet.” NPR 10 December 2024. https://www.npr.org/2024/12/09/nx-s1-5209770/gen-z-digital-compact-cameras-millennials-trendy. 

Music Credits:

“Shopping Mall”: by Jay Arner and Jessica Delisle ©2020

Used by permission. All rights reserved. As recorded by Auto Syndicate on the album “Bongo Dance”.

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