The Role of Non-Professional Photography in Compiling the Oral History of the Performance of Ayatollah Madani's Altar Martyr in the Holy Defense

The oral history of war is considered a part of war studies and many research centers are established and supported in the countries of the world for this purpose. The value of memories and oral history of war developments in the present era is such that even specialized fields have prepared for this purpose. One of the branches related to the oral history of war is the use of photos and images for oral history, and despite the novelty of this issue in the past few years, it has gained many fans in research centers and war researchers; as far as to explain the problem and methodology of the relationship between photos and oral history, research works, authorships and educational workshops have been set up. In Iran, war research institutions have paid attention to this issue, and it seems that the use of images in oral history has an effective role in promoting research on the imposed war. Of course, in addition to the images of war photographers and professional photos, non-professional and amateur images have the potential and capacity to contribute to the oral history of war, and the analysis of the content of war photos can unravel some of the blind spots of the oral history of the war in various issues. One of the active and effective groups in the imposed war are the altar martyrs, and among them, Ayatollah Seyyed Asadullah Madani during the short period of his presence in the imposed war (31 Shahrivar 1359 to 20 Shahrivar 1360), conducted many activities in the fronts, war support and cultural issues, and there are many memories in this regard. But for various reasons, there are no professional pictures and photos of his actions and performance in war zones and war support, and some non-professional and amateur pictures compensate for this gap. In this regard, the present article, using the library-document method and interviews with the relatives of Martyr Madani, tries to address the issue of the role of non-professional images in explaining the oral history of Martyr Madani's performance in the imposed war, and in this way, while explaining the necessity of using non-professional images in the oral history of Martyr Mehrab's actions in the war, refers to the problems of non-professional photography related to him, the oral history of the existence of required pictures of Martyr Madani in private homes, and some examples of the use of non-professional pictures in explaining the oral memories of Martyr Madani.