Experimental Indices: Situational Assemblages of Facial Recognition
by Asko Lehmuskallio and Roland Meyer
Abstract:
Facial recognition technologies are increasingly used outside of constricted, laboratorylike settings. While supporters of the technologies contend that they help in identifying threats by linking specific bodies to hard evidence, we argue that the indexical relations they exhibit are best described as experimental, pointing to specific situational constellations within which they were initially created. By revisiting key moments in the development of (semi-)automated facial recognition technologies from the late 1960s to the present, we identify varying situational assemblages of facial recognition that depend on different understandings of indexicality. These experimental indices rely on historical dynamics, including significant government interest in the development of facial recognition technology, expansion in the scale of experimental settings, and dissolution of the formerly strict boundaries between the social spheres of private image-sharing, commercial image distribution, and institutional image forensics for identification. In coupling experimental indices with the development of facial recognition technologies, we hope to show a way forward to comparing the histories of other evidential technical images too.
Keywords: face recognition; photography; surveillance; indexicality; automation; technical images; passports
How to cite:
MLA (9th edition):
Lehmuskallio, Asko, and Roland Meyer. “Experimental Indices: Situational Assemblages of Facial Recognition.” MAST, vol. 3, no. 1, Apr. 2022, pp. 85–112.
APA (7th edition):
Lehmuskallio, A., & Meyer, R. (2022). Experimental indices: Situational assemblages of facial recognition. MAST, 3(1), 85–112.
Chicago (17th edition):
Lehmuskallio, Asko, and Roland Meyer. “Experimental Indices: Situational Assemblages of Facial Recognition.” MAST3, no. 1 (April 2022): 85–112.
Licensing:
This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
Copyright:
Authors retain the copyright and full publishing rights without restrictions and may reuse/republish their article as part of a book or other materials, providing acknowledgment is given to MAST as the original source and place of publication. Authors can also post a copy of their accepted/published article on their websites and on their Institutional repository, citing that the article was originally published in MAST.
© 2022 Asko Lehmuskallio and Roland Meyer
Issue: vol. 3 no. 1 (2022): Special Issue: Automating Visuality
Section: Article
Guest Editors: Dominique Routhier, Lila Lee-Morrison, and Kathrin Maurer
Submitted: Feb 15th, 2021
Accepted: Feb 1st, 2022
Published: Apr 25, 2022
