A Challenge for Visual Journalism: Rendering The Labor Behind News Images Visible The Chicago Sun-Times’ decision to shut down its photography department to satisfy audiences “consistently seeking more video content with their news” is sad but not surprising. As an anthropologist who studies the changing culture…
The Dark Side of DIY in Photojournalism and Photographic Ethnography With the decline in photojournalists, will we continue to see riveting portraits like this one? Florence Johnson, a migrant mother from the 1930s, courtesy of Wikipedia. Though DIY (do-it-yourself) is generally celebrated as empowering and…
Anthropologists Not Needed in Florida Speaking at The Mark Bernier Show, Florida Governor Rick Scott expressed an unfavorable opinion of anthropology: We don’t need a lot more anthropologists in the state. It’s a great degree if people want to get it, but we don’t need them here….
Part III: Eating Watermelon, Parsing Chaos Research takes perseverance and grit, but there is no denying that it comes with certain pleasures, too. In Palestinian society, research feeds both mind and body. Once, I was interviewing two young men who were in a hurry to go on an afternoon…
Part II: So Many Interviewees, How Shall I Choose? This summer I’m doing interviews with Palestinian journalists and refugees in which I ask them to interpret and critique U.S. news articles. Why, you might ask, did I choose journalists and refugees as my commentators? Why didn’t I try…
Part I: Re-Starting A Conversation This summer, after two years away, I’m back in my old field site, far from the Massachusetts university where I’ve just completed my first year of teaching. On the ride from Tel Aviv airport to Jerusalem, I take an informal…