Back to basics? Portraits of the first Covid-19 lockdown in Portugal

Abstract

In this essay, we analyse pictures taken by participants of a research study on their daily lives during the initial lockdown period in Portugal, as the result of the emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic. Photographs have the power to freeze a moment in time that, despite being represented in two-dimensions, is multi-layered. These images reveal the profound impact of the pandemic on people’s lives, affecting the most basic elements of their existences, related to the organisation of time, the use of space and the maintenance of relationships. We argue that there is a ‘back to basics’ effect, not only in biographical terms but also sociologically, in the mobilisation of core concepts of the discipline to give depth and shape to the macro narratives (centred on numbers and trends) of the pandemic.