Research Assignment: Compare Arnold Genthe's and Jacob Riis's Photographs of Immigrants
Arnold Genthe's "San Francisco Chinatown, 1895-1906" Photograph Collection, California Historical Society
Jacob Riis's illustrations to How the Other Half Lives (drawings were made from photographs by the author, so please use those in your paper also)
Another source for better quality Riis's images
View all images. Then choose at least 5 photographs by each photographer on the same subject (for example, women, children, crime, lodging, living conditions, labor, trade, clothes, ethnic types, etc.)
Answer the following questions:
1. In what way Riis and Genthe portray their subjects differently?
2. To what extent is the difference due to the differences in ethnic cultures they portray?
3. To what extent is the difference due to the fact that Riis was a progressivist reformer?
As you answer these questions, make sure to use examples that show how Riis and Genthe positioned their camera and subject to make a certain cultural impression. What was their choice of subjects, poses, etc.? Use footnotes to cite specific images and include urls so I can view the images along with reading your essay.
Resources
Grove Dictionary of Art (search for Genthe and Riis, articles include bibliography).
San Francisco's Old Chinatown: Photographs by Arnold Genthe, 19 December 1998 - 28 March 1999, Resource Library Magazine.
Jacob Riis, How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York (1890)
John Kuo Wei Tchen, Genthe's Photographs of San Francisco's Old Chinatown (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1984). (optional)
Maren Stange, Symbols of Ideal Life: Social Documentary Photography in America, 1890-1950 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989). (optional)
Formatting
You must include footnotes in your essay. You should accompany each description of a photograph or quote or paraphrase of an argument from an online or printed source with a footnote formatted as follows:
Image: Author (First Last), Title, url
Online Article (I.e. never published in print): Author (First Last), "Title," url
Printed Article (Inludes JStor articles originally published in print): Author (First Last), "Article Title," Periodical Title Volume (Month Year), Page Number.
Online Book: Author (First Last), Title (Year), Url.
Printed Book: Author (First Last), Title (City: Publisher, Year), Page Number.
Grading
The grade for the first draft is pass/fail:
Pass (A) - you've submitted a 3-page paper that analyzes images from both phographers
Fail (F) - no paper, no images analyzed, or no comparison of two photographers
Our comments will also include suggestions for revisions and a grade expressing where you are in terms of the second draft. So the students will see:
First draft: Pass
Second draft so far: C (and a list of suggested revisions)
Revision Guidelines
1. Include a summary of your argument in the introduction. Don't just say that the photographs were different--explain how and why they were different.
2. Make sure you analyze 10 images--5 from Riis and 5 from Genthe.
3. Avoid vague phrases, such as "Riis's photographs provide an excellent insight into the conditions of immigration." or "Riis's and Genthe's pictures are different." Explain what is the insight and how the pictures are different.
4. In footnotes, provide the author's name, title of photograph in italics, and web address. Put a period in the end of each sentence:
Arnold Genthe, Five Walking Profile Girls, http://www.californiahistoricalsociety.org/ collections/photo_collection/genthe/FN-02313-GentheCT-057.jpg.
5. If you include illustrations in the text, mark them as Figure 1, 2, etc., and then refer to them by title and figure number in the text: "In Bandits' Roost (Fig. 1) Riis shows ..."
6. Put titles of books and photographs in the text in italics: "In Jacob Riis's How the Other Half Lives ..."
7. When you quote from secondary source, you need to introduce your quote:
According to the Grove Dictionary of Art, for Riis "the camera was a weapon of propaganda."1