WP1: Statement of Purpose

Analyzing documentary photography was something new to me before this class. I was of the attitude that my interpretation of what a photographer is communicating was something that was only important for me. However, I have since realized that analyzing something and putting it in a form that others would be able to look at and analyze is simply furthering the communication of the piece. I took this new approach when looking at the photograph I chose as mine to explore.

The photo I have selected is entitled “At Beecher Street School, whose student body consists of half Americans of Italian descent and half of Americans of Polish descent, Southington, Conn. The Queen of the May was Emily Schwak, of Polish extraction; the King, Philip D'Agostino, of Italian” and was taken by Fenno Jacobs in May of 1942.

The context of my argument surrounding this piece includes not in what medium and what type of time period I will be describing my thoughts and my analytical approach to the photograph. I will be communicating in the form of typed text in a blog alongside multimedia elements that I will choose to best accompany my argument. These could take the form of video, audio clips, or pictures that further exemplify aspects of either the photo or my own argument. The build-up of this one final blog that will encapsulate all that I have worked on includes other blog posts that have begun with my initial observations and led up to a more specific rhetorical analysis. This time period-how my argument is chronologically presented and then summed up-is tied in with the people that will be receiving my argument.

As a blog, my argument and future writing piece is practically available to the entire world. My primary audience includes the teacher of this class, classmates from my class now, future students who will take this class, and possibly also former students who have taken this class and are keeping up with the current bloggers. This is important to consider because they will be looking at my argument with the knowledge of what the teacher expected of me and they will know how I was supposed to form my argument and other such knowledge about the assignment. Other people who will have access to this will be anyone who has shown interest in the photograph that I am analyzing or has expertise in the knowledge of the photograph. This is important to consider because of the knowledge they will have about the photograph that I may have stated incorrectly in my analysis or that they have differing opinions. Another group of people are those who have interest in or knowledge of the historical background of the photo such as: Italian and/or Polish immigration, World War II, or the May Day celebration. This is important to consider also because of their possibly differing or better knowledge of these aspects of the photograph that I will be discussing.

My sense of purpose for this argument stems from my motivation for writing the assignment and for the goal of communicating my analysis. My motivation includes that creating a rhetorical analysis of a documentary photograph is an assignment for the class, but my own interest in the topic has influence. I am interested in not only photography but more specifically from the photograph I am interested in the cultural meaning behind the clash of differing ethnic groups brought together in the United States. The goal of my communication is to best prove my rhetorical strategies employed by the photographer. These rhetorical strategies stem from the arrangement of elements in the photo and consequent vectors of attention, differing focus on the two groups of people presented in the photo, and how the photographer chose to present the coloration of the elements in the photograph. My intention of communicating these things is to-in the best way possible- explain the photographer’s own purpose.

WP1: Prewriting 3

The photograph is of “Beecher Street School, whose student body consists of half Americans of Italian descent and half of Americans of Polish descent, Southington, Conn.” This information was pertinent when I first analyzed the photograph so that I was able to determine what kind of people are in the photo and what their purpose is. However, I soon realized that just looking at the people and making assumptions based on whatever information I have previously required is not enough.

In researching the background of Italian and Polish immigration, I found interesting similarities and differences in why each group of people came to the United States and how each group has found a place in the country. Starting with Italy, I found that the majority of the Italian emigrants that would come to the U.S. would come between the years of 1870 and 1920. The country of Italy was unified by this time but life in Italy had not corrected itself. Poverty and violence were everyday things and the promise of America that had spread in Europe was welcomed by Italians. Similarly, in this time period Polish emigrants were also arriving in America to escape economic difficulties. However, during the 40s and 50s-in which time the photograph is taken-people were emigrating from Poland for political refuge due to the Soviet takeover of the country.

Looking at the reasons for why certain groups of people emigrate from a country is important because in turn it has a lot to do with how they establish their lives and communities in the new country. Italian immigrants came to America to set up a new life and they wanted to become a part of America while still retaining their Italian heritage. Parents wanted their children to go to American schools and to establish themselves as strong individuals in the American culture. Italians also established themselves in the industrial world and created a successful name for themselves. Likewise, Polish immigrants also wanted to establish a new and better life for themselves. Most already knew English and adapted to American life.

This has changed my perception of the photograph in the aspects of the children, the signs they are holding up, and also the girl in the patriotic outfit. The children are at an American school, yet the school is comprised of only Italian and Polish students. The signs take on a different meaning to me, because they show how the Italian and Polish people are trying to assimilate into the American culture that, at the time of 1942 that the picture was taken, was focused on the war that the country was in. Likewise, the girl in the middle is also becoming a part of the American culture because of the outfit she is wearing that is patriotic in every way.

I also learned more about the May Day celebration, which I originally thought was the religious holiday that honors Mary. However, upon further research, I found that because the picture includes that the May Day crowning is of a queen and a king, the celebration is actually just May Day that began as a celebration of International Worker’s day, although it is not celebrated that way in the United States. This information was very interesting to me because of the number of Italian and Polish immigrants that were workers in the United States. This changes the reason for the celebration and why a simple celebration of Spring would be important to the Italian and Polish children at the school on Beecher Street.

Works Cited

Library of Congress (2004). Immigration...Italian. Retrieved 16 February 2010 from Library of Congress: http://memory.loc.gov/learn//features/immig/italian.html

Grocholska, Julitta (1998). Polish Immigration to the U.S. Retrieved 16 February 2010 from Polonia Today: http://www.poloniatoday.com/immigration1.htm

Chase, Eric (). The Brief Origins of May Day. Retrieved 16 February 2010 from International Workers of the World: http://www.iww.org/projects/mayday/origins.shtml

WP1: Pre-Writing 2

In the “Beecher Street School” photograph, the photographer Fenno Jacobs’ choice to take the picture without posing the individuals or requiring them to look at the camera has several effects. For the most part, the vectors of attention are all in the direction of the side of the photograph. The one exception is the boy in the blue striped shirt who seems to be looking either at the camera or a bit to the side; it is difficult to tell just where his eyes are looking exactly. The children in the back row who are looking off to the side are also aligned in a row which draws the eye to look at each individual in an ordered, linear fashion, starting from the little boy. This is an appeal to pathos because it creates a feeling of curiosity and interest in what is going on that is not seen. The eye wants to continue on to look at the side of the photograph that is not really there in order to find out what has the attention of all these people. This is brought about even more so because the girl sitting in the chair, separated from the others, is also looking in this direction.

What Jacobs decided to allow the audience to be able to view also creates an appeal to the pathos of curiosity and interest. The framing of the photograph is specific as to how many people are seen and it is interesting that the picture skims the tops of the children’s heads when there is so much space at the bottom of just showing the gravel road or street. Jacobs may have done this to display the setting of the photo so the audience is not left guessing where the children are standing watching the crowning. Also, the picture is framed in a way that both signs advertising "Breakfast and Lunch" and "Victory Gardens" are displayed in their entirety. This is conducive to showing a part of the lives of the students and their place in their community at their elementary school. However, the boy is partially cut off and one can only infer that there are more children standing next to him because of the crowd that is behind him.

The vectors of attention and the fact that the line of children continues beyond the framing of the photograph contribute to the feeling of curiosity of what is going on that someone looking at the photograph would feel. This also contributes to the mood of the photograph that the children are waiting restlessly and excitedly for something to happen in this celebration of the crowning that they are witness to. The coloration of the photograph also adds to this mood. The hues that are the most noticeable are the reds, blues, whites, and yellows because they are the brightest and mostly saturated. All of these are colors that naturally induce an excited and happy feeling. The bright blues and yellows on the signs make them stand out particularly even though they are behind the girl who is wearing an outfit of three of the aforementioned colors all located in one area. This brings special attention to this girl and her purpose as the singled out child sitting in the chair.

WP1: Pre Writing 1

This photograph is of “Beecher Street School, whose student body consists of half Americans of Italian descent and half of Americans of Polish descent, Southington, Conn.” and was taken in May of 1942. The people in the photograph are the students that go to this school, who seem to be watching the festival in which the May royalty is announced, and the title of the photograph tells us that “The Queen of the May was Emily Schwak, of Polish extraction; the King, Philip D'Agostino, of Italian.” This information further indicates that the school is indeed split in half in the case of its ethnic population that half are of Italian heritage and half of Polish. This influenced me quite a bit when I first looked at the photograph because of the assumptions that I made about the students that are shown in the photograph.

Right away I noticed the girl sitting on a chair in the middle because she is in the foreground of the photo and she also seems to be the object that is most in focus in the photograph. The other characters in the background are slightly blurry but they are still a major spot of attention. Although the girl is separated from the other students, I still assume that she is part of their class. However, from the information that the title gives a description of, I also assume that she is as student who is of Polish descent and the other students behind her are of Italian descent. This is a judgment of physical characteristics and I could be wrong but it is just my assumption from my own knowledge.

Even though the one girl is separated from the others, I do not sense that there is an unfriendly reason for this, that it is simply a matter of cultural and background differences. This is not to say that I think this is always that case, that the students of two different ethnicities do not ever mingle or get along, but from this point of view, it seems that the girl is by herself among a group of students that are different from her and she may have chosen to just remain sitting on her own. However, I cannot see the rest of the street and the road that is on either side of the girl so I do not know for certain whether or not she is surrounded by others or if there are just people grouped up behind her.

The students in the back seem to be of the Italian group that the picture description mentioned, as I said before. One of the first things I noticed when I looked at them was that they are holding up two signs, one of which I’m not clear on what the purpose is. The victory garden sign’s purpose is obvious when the date the picture was taken is taken into context. The United States had entered WWII and efforts to support the economy in a time of warfare were widespread across the country. The breakfast-lunch sign is less obvious to me as to the meaning, I’m not sure if it is related to the victory garden or if it is something separate.

This picture to me captures a moment that the children are waiting for something to begin or to continue in this festival that is celebrating the queen and king of the May. The weather to me seems to be warm and maybe a bit breezy because the children don’t look uncomfortable because of heat if not just because of the sun in their eyes. This photograph exudes the anxiousness that one feels when waiting for something exciting to happen, and I look forward to continuing to analyze this photo.

Weekly Blog Post 7

As someone who is obsessed with keeping memories and mementos of both important and seemingly-unimportant parts of my life, photography is something I greatly appreciate and have used for this purpose. However, my interest (although not my experience or type of knowledge) extends beyond this into photography of nature and things around us as a form of capturing feelings and messages. As a young child, picture books with illustrations were not as interesting to me as ones with photographs. For my eleventh birthday I was given my first camera that was all my own, and I used up rolls of film like they were growing in my backyard.

Over the past four or so years, I haven’t taken as many pictures of everyday things or friends in high school as I wanted to and wish I would have but I have always taken rolls upon rolls, eventually memory cards upon memory cards, of pictures when I go on vacation. At some point, my dream was to be a professional photographer but that was lost along with many others for no apparent reason and I have not even tried to learn more about photography.

However, if someone came to my door right now and said they would train me as a photographer for National Geographic I would say yes in heartbeat. I was given a subscription to the magazine about two years ago and renewed it myself because I loved it, most of all because of the photography and that they are parts and things in the world that not many people get to see and that I am dying to see.

For the purpose that we will be looking at photographs for, I am excited to look at photographs analytically. In previous English classes, we’ve touched on the influence of rhetorical strategies in photography but never looked at it as its own aspect of communication because they were all literature and strictly writing composition classes. I look forward to learning how photographers use their craft to get their message so I can better appreciate what I am looking at because of what somebody else thought that what they were looking at was significant.