Bilden av ledaren - en tolkning av fotografier i årsredovisningar
The visual representation of management (board of directors, chief executive officer and executive management) in annual reports is an area of scholarship that has not been explored much. In the present study a sample of 87 annual reports from business enterprises within a Swedish context, comprising about 300 photographs, was analyzed using an explorative method of analysis based on semiotics and grounded theory. The influence of the context on images raises a question discussed in the study: Should the photographs in the annual report be categorized as portraits, advertisements and others or should the annual report be regarded as a genre of its own? The photographs showed patterns of homogeneity regarding gender, dress, gestures, colours, pictorial compositions et cetera. The position of the (male) CEO is privileged, but he is also connected to the group through various means like dress and style, thereby further underscoring management as a male enterprise and demonstrating the importance of the suit and necktie in creating homosocial bonds. The language of dress could be understood using theory of the language of the body. Anthropologist Jorun Solheim argues the body speaks through mimesis, imitation, and by establishing borders. In the theory about the open body, Solheim further argues that the (symbolic) female body is without borders and the masculine body is closed and impermeable. In the photographs, the suit and tie are covering and closing the body and simultaneously, through mimesis, articulating an (ideal) masculine body. The study is expected to contribute to the creation of a frame of reference and add to the existing body of literature through applying Solheims theories in the analyses of dress.