World War II – A Photographer’s Dream[1]

Learning Module 2: Activity Two

 

General Information

 

• This activity will be active from October 11 - November 2.

• You will be required to view a series of video clips in Talon Net and complete additional research. The information learned will be the basis of your comments in the online discussion
• Information in this activity provides the basis for the exam essay for this learning module.

 

Learning Objectives

 

• To gain a greater understanding of the impact of photography on making people aware of historical and social events.
• To evaluate photograph and filmed news documentaries of World War II.
• To speculate whether a photograph can tell us about those “bumps in history” that we would not otherwise and whether a photograph is the “most trustworthy source of information.”
• To explore the variety of resources that web-based technology provides such as video clips and educational websites.

 

 Step One: Introduction to Visual Sources

 

1. View the video clip, Introduction to Visual Sources.   Watch a couple of times.  Listen carefully to the statements made by the commentators and the photographs and films used as examples. Make notes on your impressions.

 

2. Do you agree with Czitrom’s statement that photographs are the “must trustworthy source of information.” (See full quote below). Why or why not?

 

“By 1930, people really think that the photograph is the most trustworthy source of information. It’s the thing they want most. It’s the thing they believe in most. There’s no question that most ordinary Americans have been socialized in a way that says that seeing is believing, and the photograph is the most accurate way to see.”

 

DANIEL CZITROM, Historian

3. What is your reaction to Buell’s comment (shown below)?  Does it take a photograph or visual media to reveal those “bumps in history” that would be missed otherwise?

 

“Photography has a certain selective nature that will take an instant and maybe lift it up out of the ordinary, and therefore make bumps in history that you wouldn’t find if it were not for photography.

 

HAL BUELL, Former Photo Editor, AP

 

 

Step Two:  World War II – Photographer’s Dream and Demonizing the Enemy World War II. 

 

• View the video clip, Demonizing the Enemy. Watch a couple times. Listen carefully to the statements made by the commentators about (1) the power of documentary photography during World War II and (2) discussion about Life’s Picture of the Week (Demonizing the Enemy).

 

• Make notes on your impressions. Then ask yourself the following questions:
  
  

World War II – a Photographer’s Dream

1.      The commentators in the video clip claim that World War II became a “photographer’s dream.”  What do they mean by this? 

2.      Why do you think that the government allowed films and photographs to be shown to the American public of the bombing of Pearl Harbor?  How do you think these images impacted American citizens?  Did the images of Pearl Harbor have any connection to public support for Japanese Internment?  If so, how and why?

Picture of the Week: Demonizing the Enemy

3.      "Public opinion wins wars," wrote General Eisenhower.  If you were living in 1942 and had friend fighting in the Pacific, how would you have reacted to the picture in Life Magazine? Would it have made you more patriotic?

 

Step Three: Evidence

 

The World Would Never be the Same...

 

View the video clip of The Holocaust and make notes on your reactions. When published in 1945, photographs of the holocaust marked a “turning point in human consciousness.”  Today do we react in the same way when we see photographs of famine and mass murder and disease in Africa or in the Middle East?  Speculate as to why or why not?