English 680V: Visual Rhetoric in a Technological Age (Purdue)

When I was first introduced to this idea that the object stares back, I always took it to mean that the object refuses our assumed ability to make meaning out of it. So to answer a question asked in class, I'd say that the object's agency is an effect of my conciousness - the object, by being present (victim), forces me to acknowledge the violence of my gaze. A victim becomes a martyr when he stares back and demands to be acknowledged.