Readings
When you click the Amazon logo to the left of any citation and purchase the book (or other media) from Amazon.com, MIT OpenCourseWare will receive up to 10% of this purchase and any other purchases you make during that visit. This will not increase the cost of your purchase. Links provided are to the US Amazon site, but you can also support OCW through Amazon sites in other regions. Learn more. |
Required Texts
Sontag, Susan. On Photography. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1977. ISBN: 9780374226268.
———. Regarding the Pain of Others. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002. ISBN: 9780374248581.
Alloula, Malek. The Colonial Harem. Minnesota, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 1986. ISBN: 9780816613847.
Berger, John, and Jean Mohr. Ways of Seeing. New York, NY: Penguin Books, 1990. ISBN: 9780140135152.
Newhall, Beaumont. The History of Photography: From 1839 to the Present. New York, NY: Bulfinch; 5 edition, 1982. ISBN: 9780870703812.
WeeK # | Topics | Readings |
---|---|---|
1 |
Introduction: The Power of Photography |
Benjamin, Walter. "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction." Illuminations. New York, NY: Harcourt Brace Jovanovitch, 1968, pp. 217-251. Newhall. pp. 9-71. |
2 |
Histories |
Berger. Ways of Seeing. pp. 7-34. Newhall. pp. 9-71. |
3 |
Anthropology and Photography |
Newhall. pp. 85-139, 141-197. Rosenbaum, Ron. "The Great Ivy League Nude Posture Photo Scandal." The New York Times, Sunday Magazine, January 15, 1995. Recommended Pinney, Christopher. "The Parallel Histories of Anthropology and Photography." In Anthropology and Photography, 1860-1920. Edited by Elizabeth Edwards. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1992, pp. 74-95. |
4 |
Albums and Family Photographs: Western and Eastern |
Katriel, Tamar, and Thomas Farrell. "Scrapbooks as Cultural Texts: An American Art of Memory." Text and Performance Quarterly 11, no. 1 (1991): 1-17. Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Barbara. "Kodak Moments, Flashbulb Memories: Reflections on 9/11." (PDF) The Drama Review 47 (2003). Sontag. On Photography. pp. 3-85. |
5 |
Photography as Fragment, Photos as Evidence: Portraits, ID Photos |
Kuhn, Annette. "Remembrance." In Illuminations: Women Writing on Photography from the 1850s to the Present. Edited by Liz Heron and Val Williams. Durham, NC: Duke University, 1996, pp. 470-478. Newhall. pp. 199-267. Sontag. On Photography. pp. 85-end. Recommended Simon, Taryn. The Innocents. New York, NY: Umbrage, 2003. |
6 |
Mug Shots, Memorial Books Visual Anthropology |
Slyomovics, Susan. "Memory of Place." In The Object of Memory. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998, pp. 1-28. |
7 |
Aerial Photography |
Collier, John, Jr., and Malcolm Collier. Visual Anthropology: Photography as Research Method. Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Press, 1987, pp. 29-63. Gladwell, Malcolm. "The Picture Problem." The New Yorker, December 13, 2004, pp. 74-81. Whyte, William H. The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces. Project for Public Spaces Inc., March 1, 2001, pp. 94-111. ISBN: 9780970632418. |
8 |
Nature Photographs: True or False? |
Lutz, Catherine, and Jane Collins. "The Photograph as an Intersection of Gazes: The Example of National Geographic." Visual Anthropology Review 7, no. 1 (1991): 143-149. Brower, Kenneth. "Photography in the Age of Falsification." The Atlantic Monthly (May 1998): 92-111. |
9 |
Fashion Photography and Paparazzi |
|
10 |
Photography and Gender |
Berger. Ways of Seeing. pp. 36-81. |
11 |
Photography and Orientalism |
Nochlin, Linda. "The Imaginary Orient." The Politics of Vision. New York, NY: Harper & Row, 1989, pp. 35-59. Alloula, Malek. The Colonial Harem. Minnesota, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 1986. |
12 |
Iraq Photos Conclusions and Copyright Law: Who Owns the Image? |
The Abu Ghraib Investigations: Official Reports. Public Affairs. New York, NY, 2004. Sontag, Susan. "The Photographs Are Us." New York Times Magazine, May 23, 2004. ———. Regarding the Pain of Others. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2003. Berger. Ways of Seeing. pp. 83-end. |
13 |
Student Presentations |