Visuality is an increasingly contested phenomenon. Rarely stable and never “pure,” the visual is always intertwined with other senses and expressive forms and is often implicated in multiple power relations. Whether as part of social and cultural practices, or as utilized in social scientific inquiry and investigation, the visual exerts a power that continues to challenge and be challenged by other ways of knowing. This power is especially apparent when we consider visuality in its digital manifestations: as visually based media expand their purview across social, cultural, and geographic space we find they are often in “friction” with established norms, structures, and modes of expression.

In this themed issue of the Journal of Aesthetics and Culture, the authors have been invited to explore these issues, under the rubric of “Visual Frictions.”