Family Photos

When reading Camera Lucida and the account of Barthes searching for his mom's "identity" through old photographs, I began thinking about the typical family photos where people smile for the sake of smiling and gather uncomfortably bunched together. It is interesting to consider why families desire these kinds of photographs and why they want to be captured in posed and unreal kinds of moments. Do these photographs lack identity similar to the photos of Barthes mom or do they have the potential to give false impressions of a family's existence?