Jacob Isaac Badcock

‘A Place Called Away?’ Photography and the Limits of Environmental Justice at Agbogbloshie, 2008-2022

PhD supervisor: Dr Hanna Hoelling and Professor Alison Wright
Working title for PhD: ‘A Place Called Away?’ Photography and the Limits of Environmental Justice at Agbogbloshie, 2008-2022

Jacob Badcock

My research focuses on the ethics of photography in Agbogbloshie, a scrapyard and informal e-waste processing hub located in Accra, Ghana. Since 2008, Agbogbloshie has attracted the attention of photographers, pollution scientists, and environmental justice advocates concerned with the growing global e-waste crisis. Alongside other research methods, photography has portrayed Agbogbloshie as a "hell," often exaggerating the scale and nature of e-waste pollution in the area. This depiction ultimately supported a police and military-backed demolition of the site in July 2021, reminiscent of the slum clearance practices employed by the former colonial government in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. 

The central question of my research is: How can photography document environmental crisis zones without turning them into a spectacle or enabling the repressive aims of the state? To investigate this question, I draw on various photographic archives related to Agbogbloshie and the greater Accra area. These include colonial photography, activist photography, amateur photography, photovoice, medical photography, and image data produced for scientific research.

Publications 

  • Badcock, Jacob. 'Performing the ‘Mask’: Kongo Astronauts (Eléonore Hellio and Michel Ekeba) on Postcolonial Entanglements - A Conversation with Hanna B. Hölling, Emilie Magnin, and Valerian Maly.' In Performance: The Ethics and the Politics of Conservation and Care, Volume I. Routledge, 2023.
  • Badcock, Jacob, ‘Photography After Discard Studies’, Burlington Contemporary, Issue 7, (November 2022).
  • Badcock, Jacob. ‘Extractivism: Ben Asamoah’s Sakawa (2018) and the Problem of e-Waste’, ed. Eray Çaylı, Journal of Visual Culture Magazine, (September 2022).
  • Badcock, Jacob, and Owusu-Nepaul, Jovan. ‘In the Wake of Colston: Wake Work After Woke Work’, Cambridge Journal of Law, Politics, and Art, Issue 1, (Summer 2021), pp.137-141.

Conference papers and presentations 

  • Badcock, Jacob, and Perryman-Owens, Elsa, “Burning Matters: The Limits of the Image in a World on Fire,” Association for Art History Annual Conference, University of York, 9-11 April 2025.
  • Badcock, Jacob, “Measuring Exposure, Exposure to Measuring: Photovoice and the Civil Contract of Photography at Agbogbloshie.” Association for Art History Annual Conference, University of Bristol, 4 April 2024.
  • Badcock, Jacob. “Permanent Error: Photography, Colonial Land Relations, and the Problem of e-Waste in Ghana.” The Materials of Modernity, Newnham College, University of Cambridge, July 16, 2022.
  • Badcock, Jacob. “The Problem of e-Waste in Ghana.” Past Imperfect: Conversations in Ecological Form, University College London, November 17, 2021.
  • Badcock, Jacob. “Cannibalising Hegel.” Violence, Aesthetics, Anthropocenes: Colonialism, Racism, Extractivism, London School of Economics, April 1, 2021.

Teaching 

  • 2024-2025. University College London, History of Art, Postgraduate Teaching Assistant, HAART006: History of Art Survey (1): Premodernity to c.1600.
  • 2022-2023. University College London, Bachelor of Arts and Sciences, Senior Postgraduate Teaching Assistant, BASC0020: Art and Interdisciplinarity.
  • 2022-2023. Slade School of Fine Art, Senior Postgraduate Teaching Assistant, SSFA0006: Critical Studies: Wasting, Systems, Power.
  • 2021-2022. Slade School of Fine Art, Postgraduate Teaching Assistant, SSFA0005: History and Theory of Art: The Invention of African Art.

Awards

My PhD is fully funded by the London Arts and Humanities Partnership (LAHP) Open Studentship Award. 

Contact 
jacob.badcock.20@ucl.ac.uk

Qualifications 

BA, History, First Class Honours, University of Warwick (2014-2017). 
MA, History of Art, Distinction, The Courtauld Institute of Art, (2017-18).

Department/faculty roles

I am a member of the History of Art Equality, Inclusion, and Diversity (EI&D) Committee.

External roles 

I am the coordinator of the department’s Critical Race reading group.