photo and dream
AMST 3010 Fall 2014
Tuesday & Thursday 11:40-12:55
Lincoln Hall Room 107
Photography and The American Dream
Professor: Bill Gaskins gaskins@cornell.edu
Office Hours Tuesday 3-5PM
221E Tjaden Hall
Who are ‘the poor’ in the United States? Who are the largest recipients of federal welfare and entitlement spending? Why is there an unprecedented, simultaneous and dramatic increase in wealth and poverty in the United States at this point in its history? What role does photography play in our understanding and misunderstanding of poverty in what many proclaim the greatest country in the world? In this course we will explore the intersection of photojournalism, the reader/viewer and their roles in the perceptions and persistence of poverty in the United States.
In this course students will explore the myths and realities of “The American Dream” through a reading and analysis of photojournalistic representations of poverty that appear in contemporary editions of The New York Times, New York Daily News, and USAToday. Moreover, the course will consider key moments in the reportage of poverty in the United States through television, cinema, magazines, politics and popular culture. Through the collection of the Johnson Museum of Art,
Cornell University Libraries and other primary sources of visual culture, the course will engage with the complexities and contradictions of poverty. The capstone of this course will be a public exhibition and discussion of the editorial content of the newspapers and what they reveal to the students.
Required Readings
The photograph is an interdisciplinary document that requires an interdisciplinary approach to its production and reception. In this course, interdisciplinary means that history, culture, politics and ideological agendas must be accounted for when making, viewing and interpreting photographs. This list of texts are required readings to expand your perspective on the issues impacting the topics of
the
Tuesday & Thursday 11:40-12:55
Lincoln Hall Room 107
Photography and The American Dream
Professor: Bill Gaskins gaskins@cornell.edu
Office Hours Tuesday 3-5PM
221E Tjaden Hall
Who are ‘the poor’ in the United States? Who are the largest recipients of federal welfare and entitlement spending? Why is there an unprecedented, simultaneous and dramatic increase in wealth and poverty in the United States at this point in its history? What role does photography play in our understanding and misunderstanding of poverty in what many proclaim the greatest country in the world? In this course we will explore the intersection of photojournalism, the reader/viewer and their roles in the perceptions and persistence of poverty in the United States.
In this course students will explore the myths and realities of “The American Dream” through a reading and analysis of photojournalistic representations of poverty that appear in contemporary editions of The New York Times, New York Daily News, and USAToday. Moreover, the course will consider key moments in the reportage of poverty in the United States through television, cinema, magazines, politics and popular culture. Through the collection of the Johnson Museum of Art,
Cornell University Libraries and other primary sources of visual culture, the course will engage with the complexities and contradictions of poverty. The capstone of this course will be a public exhibition and discussion of the editorial content of the newspapers and what they reveal to the students.
Required Readings
The photograph is an interdisciplinary document that requires an interdisciplinary approach to its production and reception. In this course, interdisciplinary means that history, culture, politics and ideological agendas must be accounted for when making, viewing and interpreting photographs. This list of texts are required readings to expand your perspective on the issues impacting the topics of
the