"Visual Griots," is a socio-historical study of the meaning, function and aesthetic significance of photographs in Mali, West Africa from the 1930s to the present. Spanning the dynamic periods of colonialism, national independence, socialism and democracy, its analyses focuses on the studio and documentary work of professional urban photographers, particularly in the capital-city of Bamako and in smaller cities such as Mopti and Ségu. Although the study incorporates more than one hundred photographers, it concentrates on those who have been particularly influential in the local development and practice of the medium, as well as its international popularization and active participation in the contemporary art market. For example, forming the core of its analysis is internationally renowned artist Malick Sidibé, who is the first African photographer to have received the prestigious Hasselblad Foundation International Award in Photography in 2003 as well as the Golden Lion Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2007 Venice biennale.

To appreciate the technical and artistic innovations of photographers, such as Sidibé, and the local significance of their work, local theoretical models and their related aesthetic concepts are applied within its analyses. This approach enables the author to address the agency of photographers and clients who use the medium to explore and claim individual and social identities, to perpetuate or challenge cultural trends and values, and to effect social change. Furthermore, indigenous theory allows the analyses to illustrate particular ways in which photographers employ local aesthetic ideas and invent compositional strategies to visually communicate their patrons' underlying moral values and desires in portraiture. Moreover, this dissertation argues that though these aesthetic arrangements have specific relevance for local consumers, they transcend geographical and cultural boundaries to have value for global audiences as well.