Dorothea Lange: Documenting Human Erosion

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses the photographer Dorothea Lange and her use of photography to document social issues such as the problems of poverty and the unemployed during the Great Depression. The author describes how Lange's work raises to a high level the tension between recording fact and deliberately creating symbols, and looks closely at how and why three of her most famous photographs, "White Angel Breadline," "Migrant Mother," and "Waiting To File Claims" became symbols of the Depression. Through Lange's photographs and dedication to bettering social conditions, she was able to accomplish her goal in improving American society. This paper contains figures.

From the Paper:

"It was during 1933 that Lange began her foray into the social world of depression. Lange observed the increasing number of unemployed workers in the streets of San Francisco and one day decided to take pictures of them. Compelled by the visible human anguish of the Great Depression, she traveled through the streets to a bread line that had been recently set up by White Angel, a wealthy woman living in San Francisco. She took several photographs that day but the most telling was the one of an "unshaven, hunched-up little man, leaning on a railing with a tin can between his arms, his hands clenched, the line of his mouth bitter, his back turned to those others waiting for a handout."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Becker, Karin. Dorothea Lange and the Documentary Tradition. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1980.
• Clark Kerr. "Face To Face With Paul and Dorothea." UC Berkeley. http://berkeley.edu/lange/lange.html
• Crecia C. Swaim. "Dorothea Lange and Documentary Modes of Expression." Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute. http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/2006/3/06.03.10.x.html#e
• Elliot, George. Dorothea Lange. Garden City: The Museum of Modern Art, 1990.
• Heyman, Therese. Celebrating A Collection: The Work of Dorothea Lange. Oakland: Oakland Museum, 1978.

More papers on Dorothea Lange: Documenting Human Erosion:

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• Cause and Effect Essay # 4208 : "The Propaganda Behind Dorothea Lange's "Migrant Mother" Photograph"

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