Over the last thirty years, the rapid evolution of digital technologies has brought about the emergence of new types of images and new viewing apparatuses, introducing unprecedented forms of visualization and spectatorship. The volume reconstructs the origins of the concept and the development of that broad field of study that has established itself internationally, bringing about a genuine iconic turn in the human and social sciences. It then presents the essential theoretical and methodological coordinates for a critical analysis of the visual cultures of the present and the past.