本书在文化研究的视域内，遵循表征的诗学（符号学理论）与政治学（话语理论）两种研究路径，借用了彼得·汉密尔顿所使用的“支配性摄影范式”的概念，旨在梳理平民影像与平民意识在1978-2016年间国内纪实摄影中的流变历程，并尝试回答平民影像的流变与转型时期社会进程的互动关系，探讨不同历史时期的视觉建制如何影响规约摄影家的表征实践。

From the perspective of cultural studies, this book follows the two research paths of poetics of representation (semiotic theory) and political science (discourse theory), borrows the concept of "dominant photography paradigm" used by Peter Hamilton, aims to sort out the rheological process of civilian images and civilian consciousness in domestic documentary photography from 1978 to 2016, and attempts to answer the interaction between the rheology of civilian images and the social process in the transition period, and explore how the visual establishment in different historical periods affects the representational practice of protocol photographers.（AI翻译）