when i first started working at this medical library i was heartily disturbed when i would pass by books with graphic images on the covers. if the book is about a particular technique – let’s use open heart surgery for example – there will often be a picture of it on the cover. intellectually i know that this is what medicine is about, but it’s still quite something else to be presented with the very real, very photographic visuals.
to combat my visceral reaction my mantra has been, “don’t look at the pictures, just look at the text.” but just like those awful “family circus” comics, my eye is drawn to the images whether i want to look at them or not. a curious thing is happening as a result; i am beginning to feel less repulsion and more curiosity as i spend more time around these books. i still have a long way to go with the dental books that come in, however. check back with me later to see how i’m progressing.
When I worked at the TX Med. Assoc. Library, it was the pediatric and esp. pediatric dermatology journals I couldn’t look at. What is with the publishers and the creepy photos they use to adorn the covers of those journals? Well, then Sept. 11 hit, then the anthrax mailings and guess what Victoria was pulling for the member doctors all the time? Yep, journals with pictures of kids with all kinds of infectious diseases that could be used as bioweapons. Why is it that only kids get their pictures taken when they have anthrax infections or smallpox? Don’t we have any pictures of adults with icky skin lesions?? Kind of got over the eww factor after awhile, but it wasn’t easy. Able to look at the dentistry yet?
I don’t think I’ve gotten more comfortable with the dentistry images, but I have learned how to more quickly avert my eyes. Those dentistry publishers really crank up the color saturation in those up-close shots of red, red gums.