Picturing poverty : print culture and FSA photographs / Cara A. Finnegan.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Finnegan, Cara A.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

United States. Farm Security Administration.

Photography--United States--History--20th century.

Photography.

Documentary photography--United States--History--20th century.

Documentary photography.

Photograph collections.

Mass media and art.

History.

United States.

American periodicals--History--20th century.

American periodicals.

Mass media and art--United States.

United States. Farm Security Administration--Photograph collections.

Physical Description:

xxvii, 260 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Washington [D.C.] : Smithsonian Books, [2003]

Summary:

Working for the Farm Security Administration in the 1930s, government photographers set out to capture the human face of the Great Depression. Today Walker Evans's portraits and Dorothea Lange's images of families stand as iconic images from the FSA's project. Yet in their own time the pictures functioned as urgent, powerful reminders that "one-third of a nation" was in a real crisis and hurting. Focusing on these well-known photographs, as well as lesser-known ones, Cara A. Finnegan explores how popular magazines constructed complex, and often contradictory, messages about poverty. Picturing Poverty explores a moment in American history when visual images took center stage as the nation struggled with economic, political, and social strife. With compelling vision and insight, Finnegan reminds us of the importance of analyzing images and of understanding their contexts. By striving to place the FSA photographs in their original contexts, Finnegan shines new light on the meanings of images, poverty, the Depression, and the various roles of the mass media.

Contents:

Preface: A Rhetorical History of Photographs ix

Introduction: Making Rural Poverty Visible: The Depression, the New Deal, and the Historical Section 1

1 Imaging Poverty in the Historical Section 36

2 Social Engineering and Photographic Resistance: Social Science Rhetorics of Poverty in Survey Graphic 57

3 Intersections of Art and Documentary: Aesthetic Rhetorics of Poverty in U.S. Camera 120

4 Spectacle of the Downtrodden Other: Popular Rhetorics of Poverty in Look Magazine 168

Epilogue: Rhetorical Circulation and the Picturing of Poverty 220.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 248-250) and index.

ISBN:

1588341186

OCLC:

50028662