This study aims to give an account of the act of posing in photography in terms of the self/image relationship in order to foreground an unexplored aspect of the pose that is its potential to question (self-)recognition and/or (self-)identification. By departing from an analysis of portrait photographs belonging to different cultures and historical periods, this thesis attempts to provide a critical approach to the act of posing through a productive communication between visual and theoretical texts and provides a new approach to the subject/image relationship.