CHAPTER 14 Representing Realitywps.ablongman.com/wps/media/objects/10197/10442695/...of the Ruins”...

153 Copyright © 2011, 2008, Pearson Education, Inc.

C H A P T E R 1 4

Representing Reality

Chapter Overview

Flickr, news photos, Reuters, cell-phone images sent to friends—in all these instances, the text captures a fleeting moment of reality and represents it, frozen in time. Is this moment representative of the whole truth of any given situation or context? Or does it capture just a fleeting moment, although once transformed into the medium of the photo, the image takes on a strange kind of permanence. This chapter explores the process by which photos come to represent reality. The chapter tries to push students to “read” photos as texts, as arguments in compact, visual form.

In the first section of this chapter, “Snapshots of the Ordinary,” the book offers various perspectives on how photographs purport to represent our everyday lives. On the one hand, our lives are recorded incessantly now, from cell-phone images posted on Facebook to video blogging. On the other hand, what we do record is mediated and carefully chosen. Even the family album is increasingly as carefully directed as a Hollywood movie. The entire section can be read through the prism of Lenore Skenazy’s essay, which suggests that when we record our lives, we have a tendency to scrub them clean of the bad and boring times. What ends up in our family album are touching, inspiring moments or banal posed moments. Yet the history of the photograph as a deliberate carrier of cultural memory offers rich reading. The article by Williams, Cahan, and Osborn, the photos from America 24/7, and the piece by David Pogue all point to the way that visual rhetoric both captures and characterizes America; even with new technologies, the power of images to select and shape what we think of as “reality” remains powerful and worth studying. This section finishes with a look at the ways in which YouTube offers the same powerful lens on our everyday lives that photos have traditionally occupied.

The second section in this chapter, “Images of Crisis,” focuses on photographs that try to capture life during times of extreme conflict and tragedy. Building on Nora Ephron’s article in Chapter 3, the readings in this section examine media decisions concerning whether or not to run controversial photographs. Examining the position of Daniel Okrent, editor of The New York Times, followed by pieces focused on the Oklahoma City Bombing, we’ll look at the ethics of photo-representation, or what it means to convey suffering in visual form in the news. A powerful article and photo essay by James Nachtwey will bring this issue home to your students. Then the readings shift to focus on new trends in capturing moments of conflict: first, with the relatively new trend of citizen paparazzi, as during the London terrorist bombings, and second, the military practice of embedded journalists, those photographers who make a career of going into conflict zones. After a Lehrer NewsHour roundtable on embedded journalism, the section ends with a photo essay by photographer David Leeson, whose amazing work makes the ordinary seem extraordinary and the unreal seem somehow everyday.

154 PART IV Readings

Copyright © 2011, 2008, Pearson Education, Inc.

HOW TO USE THIS CHAPTER IN THE WRITING CLASSROOM

One important question this chapter raises is how image-oriented our culture has become and the speed with which images travel around the world to news stations, televisions, Websites, email inboxes, and cell phones. The chapter helps students think critically about this image-saturated world by developing their visual literacy—that is, by teaching them to approach visual texts as educated, savvy readers. Yet it also empowers students to formulate compelling arguments about such texts through a series of carefully constructed questions and a series of prompts for research papers. Your students will enjoy analyzing and discussing images, and you can lead them in composing compelling arguments and even research papers by synthesizing the resources in this chapter. Moreover, you can help students develop proficiency in writing in a variety of modes or genres, such as letters to the editor, blog posts, emails, reports, argumentative position papers, and research-based texts.

More specifically, you might use the first section of this chapter, “Snapshots of the Ordinary,” to introduce students to the ways in which visual texts frame and shape our notions of reality. You can also use the readings to generate discussion among students about their own production of visual texts—whether for Websites such as MySpace or Facebook or in scrapbooks and family albums. This section teaches students how to write about topics in visual culture and develop a research paper on current issues in the media.

You can use the second section of the chapter to introduce students to the most current and critical debates in journalism today and the controversy surrounding media ethics. You might also launch a discussion of how one’s perspective on a particular crisis or global conflict shapes the way one views it. This section introduces students to central debates around globalization and media studies, and you can use these readings to help students write powerful analysis papers or position papers. Consider having students write up their own Newshour round-table on the perspectives they have learned in reading the materials throughout the chapter.

Moreover, visit the extensive resources on the Envision Website as you teach this chapter in the writing classroom. Your students will benefit from examining student papers on photography, exploring the annotated bibliographies on photojournalism, and working through exercises designed to develop both visual literacy and writing proficiency.

Visit Envsion Website at www.pearsonhighered.com/envisionStudent ResourcesChapter 14: Representing RealityResources and Readings.

WRITING RESOURCES FROM PREVIOUS CHAPTERS

For step-by-step guidance on how to craft a thesis statement about photos, return to Chapter 1, and for a set of pre-writing questions focused on photographs in particular, look back at the end of Chapter 3. You can point students to these parts of Envision as they begin to compose written responses to the readings and visual texts presented in this chapter.

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CHAPTER 14 Representing Reality 155


CHAPTER OPENER CLASS ACTIVITY USING FIGURES 14.1 AND 14.2

Help students grasp the complex issues concerning photography and representation by asking them to form teams and present diverse interpretations on the photos of “Haiti: Out of the Ruins” by James Nachtwey in Figures 14.1 and 14.2. In this class activity, you can enact the multiple sides project (explained in Chapter 3) by having students take on diverse personas related to the photos: the old woman holding the rosary beside the church, the pilot of the helicopter flying above, the men in the dump truck, the unseen photographer snapping the photo, the president of Haiti responding to the crisis, the concerned relatives watching on the TV. Have each student compose a letter to the editor of your town’s newspaper presenting the persona’s perspective and making an argument about the meaning of the images. In this way, you prepare students for the work of the chapter through active learning and through writing activities based upon invention, analysis, and development of a rhetorical stance.

You might also arrange a class debate over the meaning of the image in Figures 14.1 and 14.2. Do these images convey sympathy for the people or present them as objectified images of study? How is Nachtwey’s commitment to representing suffering conveyed through his choice of frame, composition, arrangement, light, and color? Return to the lesson of Chapter 3 to refresh students on how photographs work as arguments, then divide the class in half for a debate on these images.

Resources on the Readings, SNAPSHOTS OF THE ORDINARY

SECTION OPENER CLASS ACTIVITY USING FIGURE 14.3

The image in Figure 14.3 seems both funny and outrageous. Ask students to take photos of themselves holding recording technologies in various ways to both reflect the prevalence of such devices and their perspective on how we increasingly “see through” these devices. Have student share their own versions of “photos of the ordinary” for class analysis.

Lenore Skenazy, “Don’t Smile for the Camera”

In her essay, Lenore Skenazy starts with the idea that our lives are so mediated by video that we can’t remember when our children acted poorly, if it wasn’t recorded. She defines the “Kodak moment” with a wonderful phrase: “it is the moment our life most conforms, however briefly, to the way we’d like it to be.” She then analyzes how we create a mythology of our families. She sees this as analogous to how cultures create their myths—they cut out the bad stuff.

TEACHING THE TEXT AS WRITING

Ask your students to examine the way Skenazy constructs the piece from a rhetorical perspective. Note that the essay becomes a true argument only toward the end, when Skenazy says that recording Kodak moments “do a disservice to memory.”



ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS FOR CLASS DISCUSSION:

• What is the rhetorical effect of Skenazy’s recollection of her own family’s self-editing? How does this work to connect her with the reader?

• How would you describe Skenazy’s tone? What is her ideal audience, and how does that affect her tone?

• How might digital cameras and video cameras reduce the desire to record only Kodak moments? How might they not? How could technology address this problem? Do you even see it as a problem?

SUGGESTED WRITING ASSIGNMENTS:

• Write about how Skenazy uses informal language to forge a rapport with the reader.

• Write an essay in which you argue that myths in families are more important than accuracy in recording life.

• Write a description of your family’s photo album as it would be if it more accurately depicted your family. Describe individual or imaginary photos that describe mundane or painful moments you might have recorded.

WORKING WITH THE VISUAL READING ON PAGE 487, FIGURE 14.4: “KODAK MOMENT”

What makes the image in Figure 14.4 a “Kodak moment”? What aspects of distortion, selection, and framing do students notice? Have students take and compare photos from their communities to the image in Figure 14.4. Ask students to create a collaborative blog post with images. Or, have students use Facebook and post “a photo per day” to show the different faces of their “ordinary lives.”

Michael Williams, Richard Cahan, and Nicholas Osborn, “Who We Were: A Snapshot History of America”

In an engaging essay, the authors explore the history of America through the rhetorical lens of the photograph. The process for this article was a collection of 350 images, gathered and arranged into a book as a means to offer diverse perspectives on “the ordinary” in America, throughout history. With your students, read the essay out loud, having one student read each paragraph. Then, access the book from your school library or from Amazon.com. Show students the various images in the book and have them assess how their perspective on America changes with each new piece of visual evidence.




Refer back to Chapter 2 and the strategies of argumentation to map the organization and persuasive order of the paragraphs. Then, consider the canons of rhetoric from Chapter 3. How does the piece have its own unique style through the use of “we,” through the citation of Eastman as evidence, through the short sentences in the last line?

Have students annotate the margins of the reading, the way the Seth Stevenson reading is annotated in Chapter 2 or the Nora Ephron piece is annotated in Chapter 3. Put students in pairs and ask them to compare the notes they made about the writing practices of this piece.


• Do students think of photos as artwork, such as presented in the 1943 New York Modern Museum of Art, or as documentary evidence, or something in between?

• The authors assert that photos today are “tossed away”—is this accurate for your students? What happens when some photos have longer staying power? How do these remnants shape identity? Ask students to share their most embarrassing photo-memories or problems with postings on Flickr or Facebook. Is a digital photo really disposable?


• Write an imaginary continuation of the article. What will the next ten or twenty years bring in terms of technological advances, and what will that mean for capturing “annals of everyday life” for posterity? Have students compose two or three paragraphs and then peer review their compositions in class.

• Have students examine the last line of the piece and the implicit claim within the phrase “our America.” Which audiences are addressed by the article, and which are left out? Students might write a letter to the authors expressing their perspective on this question. They should follow the model position papers in Envision, Chapter 3.

Patrick Cox, “America 24/7: A Family Photograph Album”

This essay is the introduction to an exhibit, available online at http://www. pearsonhighered.com/envision/494. Patrick Cox describes the exhibit and then theorizes why photographs are so important, that they record our lives and thus are precious. He connects the concept to his own life, talking about the moments that he’s happy to have recorded. He describes one of his favorite photographs, of his two mentors, and then he closes by critically defending the exhibit, saying that the photos capture the essence of American character and communities.

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This piece might be characterized as “sentimental humanism,” to use photography critic Sontag’s famous words. And yet the writing is clear, compelling, and detailed. You might use it as a model for students to follow when composing rhetorical analysis essays about photos.


• Why does Cox treasure his photo of Chester Franklin and Beven Varnon so much? Does he explain why photos of everyday life are so treasured? If not, why do you think they are?

• Cox writes that America 24/7 captures “the true essence of American character and communities.” Without looking at the exhibit online, make an argument as to what kinds of photos would have to be in the exhibit for that proposition to be true? Now look at photos in the exhibition online. Does the claim find support from the selection of photos you encounter on the Web? How so or how not?

• Do you think the fireman’s statement, that people want to save their family members, pets, and photo albums first, is true today? Explain with regard to people in your own community.


• Cox says that the exhibit is “like the family photo album.” Write a letter from Skenazy to Cox making an argument against this perspective. How is the exhibit not like a family photo album?

• Write an essay explaining how the traditional family photo promotes the “brand” of America or promotes our national myths. Cite from one or two additional photos available on the exhibition Website. Look back at Chapter 3 of Envision for a refresher on how to incorporate visual evidence in your writing by citing concrete elements from the visual text.

WORKING WITH THE VISUAL READINGS ON PAGES 492–494, FIGURES 14.5–14.7: AMERICA 24/7

The images in Figures 14.5–14.7 are taken from the online exhibit America 24/7 and produced in the book so that you can use them in class if you don’t have access to the Internet or a computer cluster. Have students work through the “Reflect & Write” questions in small groups of 3 or 4. Ask each group to compose different captions for the photos and share them with the class; have them also make an argument about how the words of the captions shape the visual argument for the reader.



Note the color scheme for each of the photos. How do they resemble art pieces? Ask the students in what way this color scheme suggests a careful composition process on the part of the photographer. How are they like or not like photos we might take during our daily lives?

WORKING WITH THE COLLABORATIVE CHALLENGE ON PAGE 494

The purpose of the collaborative challenge is to offer students a chance to move from analysis to research to production of visual and multimedia texts. Students can design their own photo essays, write corresponding arguments about their projects, and then present their materials to the class. In this way, they learn first-hand how a writer, composer, or photographer shapes reality into representation.

If your students have access to film equipment, then they can repeat this process with moving images, scripting a voice over or “director’s cut” to accompany their visual arguments or documentaries. Refer students to Chapter 3 and Chapter 8 for help on photo essays and designing multimedia arguments; refer them to Chapter 6 for advice on film and film-making.

David Pogue, “Photo Sharing Even the Folks Can Handle”


Consider the differences in arrangement, format, and style from the previous articles in this section. How is the visual rhetoric and tone of the piece distinct? What writing aspects characterize it as a more popular article?


• Having discussed the differences in writing conventions above, ask students which type of writing they prefer to read: more formal research essays or this type of popular article? Which type of writing will they need more in their futures? Which one builds more ethos or credibility?

• What additional technologies or photo-sharing methodologies might students add to this list? How does the ever-changing media put particular demands on students today?


• Ask students to draft a proposal to The New York Times, suggesting either artwork or photos to accompany the article as strategic visual rhetoric. What images would bring out the strongest parts of this piece? How would images as writing change the argument and stance of the piece?



• Have students rewrite the piece into a script for delivery through a BNET video online. In other words, explore how this type of information sharing could be conveyed through oral and multimedia rhetoric. Include concrete examples to make each point more forcefully.

Michael Strangelove, “There is No Shame in Watching YouTube”


The text for this piece was transcribed from Michael Strangelove’s video, available through the Envision Website at http://www.pearsonhighered.com/envision/498. Have students play the video and compare the effect of reading the piece to hearing the words played over a video-edited montage of images. How does the writing move or persuade students differently? What strategies in the writing work particularly well for each medium?


• Could this piece be seen as essentially a love poem to YouTube? Why?

• Examine the rich resources posted by Michael Strangelove about YouTube. Could this piece be considered a trailer for his larger body of scholarly work, which includes several books, a blog, and a comprehensive video-archive?

• Which videos are particularly American in their cultural references, and which ones will be familiar only to specific audiences? Do students think that the videos will survive the text of time or are they generation specific?


• Have students write a rhetorical analysis about Strangelove’s dramatic and intriguing language. Where is the argument most effective because of the language he uses? How does the language work as a rhetorical strategy to engage his readers? Analyze the title in particular.

• Next, have students conduct a rhetorical analysis of the images and video-clips in the original YouTube film, available through the Envision Website at http://www.pearsonhighered.com/envision/498.

• Ask students to go to the library and locate Michael Strangelove’s books, The Empire of Mind: Digital Piracy and the Anti-Capitalist Movement, and Watching YouTube: Extraordinary Videos by Ordinary People (2010). Compose either book reviews or annotated bibliographies of each chapter, using the techniques in Envision Chapter 5. Then, develop a research argument using these texts as secondary sources.

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Now that students have worked through the articles in this section, ask them to apply what they learned by examining the photos selected to represent particular news stories on the Websites described in the Collaborative Challenge. See http://www. pearsonhighered.com/envision/498. Discuss with the class what is meant by “inevitable selectivity.” If you don’t have access to a computer classroom, you might bring in copies of campus, local, or national newspapers and look at the photos printed on the pages. Have students reflect on what they have learned. Advanced students might make a video to post on YouTube demonstrating their understanding of how reality is always mediated by images.

DISCUSSING AND WRITING ABOUT THE SECTION AS A WHOLE

• Have students find several photographs that they have taken or their family members or friends have taken, and write two analytical paragraphs for each photograph using the interpretative frame of either Skenazy’s “Kodak moment” or the idea that photos record cultural memory, as Williams and his colleagues argue. Then, have students compose a synthesis essay in which they reflect back on the analysis of family photos they have created. Follow the guidelines in Chapter 3.

• As a class, examine the homepage for the company that promoted America 24/7. See http://www.pearsonhighered.com/envision/494. How does the presentation of the exhibition differ from the article by Patricia Cox?

• Discuss the advent of video blogs. What argument do such vlogs make about the material they capture? How do they work as forms of multimedia “writing”? Structure a class debate on the effectiveness (or not) of vlogs, with sides presenting both pro and con positions in response to these questions. Then, ask students to compose a reflective synthesis paper about the issue.

• Consult the Wikipedia page on video blogging as a very informative source (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vlog), Freevlog give tutorials for vlogging (http://www.freevlog.org/index.php/category/tutorial/), and Node 101 has a similar purpose: http://node101.pbwiki.com/. Then, begin your own vlog and contribute to this new writing form.

• Have students complete the “Perspectives on the Issue” or “From Reading to Research” questions on page 499. For the research papers, use Chapter 6 to help students work through outlines, drafting, peer review, and integrating sources.

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IMAGES OF CRISIS

Resources on the Readings, IMAGES OF CRISIS

SECTION OPENER CLASS ACTIVITY USING FIGURES 14.10–14.11

Have students examine the photos within the image of Figure 14.10. Discuss the contrast between the smiling boys and the faces of suffering people from the newspapers. What arguments are made by each image in the composite text? Then, ask students to compare Figure 14.10 to Figure 14.11. Which one seems more ethical? Which poster is more persuasive? Finally, ask students to research other recent events of crisis in which the media provided ample coverage. This could include Hurricane Katrina, the September 11 bombings, or the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. What kinds of photos are chosen for coverage in what newspapers? Are there ironic moments of contrast? Who is represented and in what ways? Generate a debate on this topic before launching into the readings. If you are teaching in a computer classroom, visit Newseum at http://www.newseum.com/ to compare different newspapers selections of images.

Daniel Okrent, “The Public Editor: No Picture Tells the Truth—The Best Do Better Than That”

As the public editor, or ombudsman, of The New York Times, Daniel Okrent faces the public much in the way the president’s press secretary has to face the press corps. In this essay, Okrent discusses how the Times made the decision to publish a disturbing photograph of dead children, victims of the tsunami in the Indian Ocean in 2004. He begins by describing an editorial meeting in which it was decided to this photo. From there, his essay moves on to argue that photographs become iconic place markers for moments in history, and he points out that they are chosen for prominence by people—photo editors and their superiors. Okrent admits that photos are biased, by definition, in the sense that they can’t capture every aspect of reality. He offers several examples, from a photo of Brazil’s president to coverage of George Tenet’s testimony before Congress to Donald Rumsfeld’s photo op in Abu Ghraib. In the end, Okrent’s purpose in this essay is not to defend the Times’s use of the cover photo about the Tsunami but rather to raise a larger point about the function of photography in representing reality.


Have students first examine and study the title—what does it mean? What are the various layers of interpretation? How does it set up the argument for the piece? How does the title also predict the use of photos in the piece? Then, examine the piece with photos and discuss how the inclusion of visual evidence changes the effect of the piece on the reader. The version printed in Envision in Depth was produced without photos for copyright reasons. There are several ways to access the photos:

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1. Sign in with free access to the New York Times online. See http://www. pearsonhighered.com/envision/504.

2. Examine the article with photos archived online by Jeanne Curran at California State University Dominguez Hills under the fair use doctrine: http://www. csudh.edu/dearhabermas/truth04bk.htm.

Another way to teach this essay as writing is to pair it with Nora Ephron’s provocative article on a similar subject from Chapter 3 (pp. 64–67), or with the annotated articles from “Surveying the Field”—a Chapter 3 selection of articles on the Envision Website. Consider, for instance, Dan Kennedy’s piece, “Witness to an Execution.”

Visit www.pearsonhighered.com/envisionStudent ResourcesChapter 3: Composing ArgumentsResources and ReadingsSurveying the Field: Annotations of Further Readings.


• Okrent writes, “The surpassing power of pictures enables them to become the permanent markers of enormous events.” Is this the case for other moments of crisis? Are there photos from 9/11 or Hurricane Katrina that students keenly remember? From school shootings such as at Columbine?

• Okrent quotes the famous photographer Richard Avedon as saying “There is no such thing as inaccuracy in a photograph. All photographs are accurate. None of them is the truth.” What do you think Avedon means by this? Why do you think Okrent might strategically use this quotation in his written argument? What purpose does it serve his essay?

• In paragraph 11, Okrent explores the idea that generic-seeming photos are not appropriate; only photos that are distinctly about a particular event are appropriate. What does he mean by the “real and specific” evidence as “a stand-in for the truth” as he says in the last paragraph?

• Read the article along with the photos Okrent originally included. See http://www.pearsonhighered.com/envision/504. How does the inclusion of visual evidence change the effect of his argument on you as a reader? Notice which photos make the strongest points and which need more explanation in the article itself.


• Review Nora Ephron’s essay from Chapter 3 (pp. 64–67) on a similar topic. Study the annotations made of Ephron’s essay and the analysis of arrangement. Perform

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the same written analysis of Okrent’s essay, annotating it, then composing an analysis of arrangement.

• Okrent writes, “Stories may whisper with nuance, headlines declaim in summary, but pictures seize the microphone, and if they’re good, they don’t let go.” Examine the photos originally published with the article and write an essay in which you defend or refute this claim.

• Create a photo essay consisting of alternating generic photographs and then real, specific photographs to make a visual argument about Okrent’s thesis. You might focus on the 2004 tsunami, on 9/11, on a historical incident from war, on a school shooting, or on a recent event of crisis in your community.

Bruce Jackson, “Some Words About Those Pictures”

This short letter provides a response to Okrent, allowing for “multiple sides” on the issue to emerge. Jackson’s piece raises a powerful point in the photo ethics debates: the question of who is represented and who is not.


Have students analyze the letter’s title. How does it play on Okrent’s piece? Ask students to analyze the first line. How does Jackson create a tone that is not hostile but open?


• What is the tone of the letter? How does Jackson use the personal voice—the “I”—to create ethos effectively?

• Why might he make a point about war dead? What is the larger implication of his argument in the letter? What argument is he making about society’s values?


• Write a letter to the public editor of The New York Times objecting to or supporting their publication of a photograph. You may use Bruce Jackson’s letter for a model. Ask the editor to explain the reasoning behind the placement of a particular photograph you find interesting or evocative. If you get a response, report it to the class.

• Research photographs of war dead, the ones Jackson says are missing. Where do you find such photos? What is the significance of where they are published?



James Nachtwey, “Haiti: Out of the Ruins”


Have students examine the opening quote by Nachtwey: “I have been a witness, and these pictures are my testimony. The events I have recorded should not be forgotten and must not be repeated.” How does this statement provide the argument and theme for the rest of the piece? What style is set forth in the diction, syntax, and tone of the quote? Compare the quote to the writing strategies in the rest of the piece. What is most memorable and powerful?


• How does Nachtwey build his ethos through concrete, vivid detail, and accounts of both individual suffering and cultural history?

• Examine the titles Nachtwey gave to the images in Figures 14.13 and 14.14. How can a writer-photographer double the power of persuasion in creating hybrid compositions? (Return to Chapter 1, for a discussion of hybrid compositions).

• Why might the author make the point through metaphor that “the Haitians write on the blank pages of a new chapter of their history?” What role does writing play in this piece? What argument is Nachtwey making about society’s values?


• Annotate the piece with indications of which lines and arguments work most powerfully for students as readers.

• Use the images in Figures 14.1–14.2, also by Nachtwey, and create a photo essay, following the guidelines in Envision, Chapter 8. Compose new captions for the images, and use the strategy of arrangement to make an argument about the way in which photographs can serve as “testimony.”

• Visit Nachtwey’s complete photo essay through the Envision Website, and write a review of his work to be published in your school newspaper.

Charles Porter, “Tragedy in Oklahoma” and Joe Strupp, “The Photo Felt Around the World”

This selection consists of two pieces about two famous photographs taken in the aftermath of the Oklahoma City bombing. First, Charles Porter analyzes the photos. He tells the story of how he came to take the photos, explaining that he had been working in the

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neighborhood, and how they came to be sent over the AP wire. Since he was an amateur photographer, not a professional, he was utterly amazed that his photograph was printed in so many newspapers and had such a wide impact on people.

Next, Joe Strupp reports on how editors at various newspapers, including the Philadelphia Inquirer, The Sacramento Bee, The San Francisco Chronicle, and The New York Daily News, made their decisions to either put the photograph on the front page or to put it inside. Some made the decision not to run it at all.


Compare the genres of writing in these two pieces. The first piece is a transcript of an interview with Charles Porter conducted with the BBC. The second piece is an account of how publishers came to decide to publish the photo. The piece by Joe Strupp concludes with key questions about photo ethics and ends with an appeal to authority with the quotation by Tom Goldstein. Ask students to conduct a rhetorical analysis of the different tone, word choice, arrangement, and thesis of each piece.


• How does Charles Porter help us notice important details about the photos—such as the fact that the fireman is not wearing gloves—as he recounts his own experience taking them and reviewing them? Do you think this is the photographer’s eye? What other details do you notice that make the photo so powerful?

• In Strupp’s essay, he quotes the editor of The Sacramento Bee as saying that he didn’t run the photo because he thought it was inappropriate to run a picture of a corpse. What does he mean by this? Discuss the difficulty facing editors who need to report on the news of deaths.

• Do you think the fact that Porter captured the photo of a baby contributed to the response being so extreme? What does this suggest about the social importance of young children in our society? What do images of children represent?


• Find a photograph or series of photographs that have won the Pulitzer Prize within the last fifteen years other than the Oklahoma City photos. See http://www.pearsonhighered.com/envision/518. Write a description of two or three of the photos. Be as complete in your descriptions as possible. Return to the guidelines in Chapter 3 for conducting a rhetorical analysis of photographs, and use the prewriting checklist at the end of that chapter to get you started.

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• Compare Porter’s photos with the photos by Stanley Foreman from the Boston fires in Chapter 3 and then compare the testimony by Forman to that by Porter. Conduct a comparative rhetorical analysis and then complete a synthesis paper on these diverse views.

• Write an essay in which you explain what you would have done if you had been a photo editor at your local paper at the time these pictures came off the wire. Would you have printed them or not and why? Base your argument on lessons you learned from Okrent’s piece and Strupp’s piece.

Mark Glaser, “Did London Bombings Turn Citizen Journalists Into Citizen Paparazzi?”

Mark Glaser reminds us about the 7/7 terrorist attacks on London in 2005 (in which 52 people were killed and many more wounded), and how survivors of the attacks used camera-phones and videophones to document a city in crisis. On the one hand, perhaps the people taking pictures of the victims were citizen journalists trying to bring the story to the world. On the other hand, maybe they were cruel and were exploiting those less fortunate. Mark Glaser recounts getting in touch with one of the survivors who did not take pictures and criticized those who did on his blog. This survivor, Justin, says that documenting the attacks like that “is inappropriate and does not contribute to fact and information.”

Glaser moves away from the anecdotal, then, and reports the numbers: the BBC received more than 1,000 photographs from the attacks in 24 hours. Blogs were important that day, as were Wikipedia and Flickr. The debate continues, with one prominent blogger, Xeni Jardin of Boing Boing, “aghast at the behavior of the citizen paparazzi.” The problem with citizen journalists, according to Glaser’s sources, is that there is not privacy anymore. Still, when a major news event happens, it’s difficult to criticize the impulse to record history. And the potential is there to bring some citizen journalists into the fold and “be an empowered member of the storytelling community,” according to a Andrew Locke of MSNBC, a major source for multimedia news.


Use the Strategies of Arrangement from Chapter 2 to discuss with students how Glaser constructs his argument. He moves from a pathos-heavy opening to narrative to argument based on sources. This is a rich piece for analysis of writing strategies. Note how Glaser links his piece on the tsunami disaster, situating it in context of other crises. He also uses subheads effectively and integrates sources well. All these techniques can be taught to students by using this essay as a model.


• What is Glaser’s thesis about citizen journalism? Provide evidence from the text to support your answer.



• Glaser quotes blogger Justin as explaining how he felt about the people taking pictures outside the subway station where the bomb had exploded. He says that no account is needed of the carnage. Do you agree? Is it possible that victims of an attack or a natural disaster are not always the best judges of how the attack or natural disaster should be covered by the news?

• How is Glaser’s piece also about the emergence of new communication technologies such as Wikipedia news, Flickr, and msnbc.com videos? What other news sources do students access to learn about the world? How are such online writing sources changing the way we encounter news events and what we learn about them?


• Analyze the subheads in this essay. Create five additional subheads that would map out the points of Glaser’s essay.

• Write a position paper in which you argue for or against this quote from Glaser’s essay: “I hope we end up with a kind of unwritten Golden Role about privacy in public spaces and give people some space.” Use a contemporary example of a crisis that has produced citizen journalism such as photos on Flickr or videos on YouTube. Discuss these examples in your paper. If possible, you can email and interview the authors of the photos or videos to quote in your essay.

• Look up the sources cited in this essay, such as Xeni Jardin’s paper Boing Boing. Create a Website with hyperlinks to each of these to show the new forms of information technology shaping our world.

WORKING WITH THE VISUAL READINGS ON PAGE 514, FIGURES 14.15–14.16: CITIZEN JOURNALISTS

The photos provided here allow students a moment of active learning as they put into practice the lessons learned from Glaser’s article on citizen journalists. Have students study each photo and then work through the “Reflect & Write” questions. You might ask students to form groups of three or four and then assign one question to each group. Then, have each group write new captions for the photos, indicating their stance on citizen journalism. If you have access to a computer classroom, ask students to build on this activity by searching Flickr or YouTube for additional photos and videos taken by citizen journalists about recent events of crisis. Each group should develop a thesis, locate supporting quotes from the readings in this section, and then present their argument about the images they have found in making a presentation to the class.



Terence Smith, “War, Live”

Terence Smith from the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer reports on the new phenomenon of embedding journalists within the military. The first section discusses how technology has changed coverage of wars. The second section discusses how media outlets are embedding their reporters in military units. The third section discusses the problems with both of these developments. For one, embedding journalists with the military means that journalists get close to soldiers, potentially compromising impartiality.


You might analyze this text with your class as a model example of the dialogue of sources (see Chapter 5). How does Smith effectively introduce each speaker and moderate the arguments? How does he also introduce his own argument? Use this to help students create dialogues of sources with their own research texts. You might also analyze the subheads for how they create a preview of the piece overall.


• In the section, “High-Tech Coverage,” what changes does Smith discuss in terms of how technology has evolved in reporting this war? What might be the consequences of such changes on viewers at home?

• How does Donald Rumsfeld’s argument in paragraph 15 reflect the point made by editors in several of this section’s selections? What is his implicit criticism of the inevitable limitations in representing reality?

• What does Robert Thompson mean by the “tyranny of the visual” in paragraph 23? What is the effect of Thompson naming this phenomenon for the reader? Paraphrase his point about it.


• Continue this dialogue of sources by researching statements about either technology in wartime or the use of embedded journalism. Take on Terence Smith’s persona in constructing the dialogue. Use quotes from your research log and structure each section with a subhead.

• Research the story of Bob Woodruff, the ABC anchor who was wounded in Iraq, or the tragic death of Daniel Pearl of The Wall Street Journal. Write a blog entry about these reporters and their mission as writers who place themselves in harm’s way. You might locate additional journalists at Freedom Forum Journalists’ Memorial at http://www.newseum.org/scripts/journalist/main.htm. ;




Ask students to work in groups on a project of their own based on the lessons about journalism emerging from “War, Live.” If you have a journalism department on your campus, you might ask students to write and then conduct interviews with specific faculty members in that department and then present their work to the class. Another group might research the history of war journalism online through Newseum. See http://www. pearsonhighered.com/envision/518.

WORKING WITH THE VISUAL READINGS ON PAGES 519–520, FIGURES 14.17–14.20, DAVID LESSON, “IRAQ”

David Leeson is a war photographer and a Pulitzer Prize winner. He came back from Iraq with post-traumatic stress disorder. In an interview with David Leeson for Digital Journalist, writer Dirck Halstead argues that those journalists who have not been wounded or killed still pay a price. In that interview, Leeson talks about how he started war photography back in the 1980s in Nicaragua. He says that he used to be prepared to die when he went out on an assignment. Also, he used to be idealistic, believing that photos can stop wars, and that’s why he risked so much. He speaks of the toll it took on his relationships at home. In 2003 Leeson went to Iraq. He was reluctant to go away, but he did, and he was embedded with the Third Infantry Division. He saw a terrible fight in April 2003, and was awarded the regimental colors by the unit—the first time in history a civilian received that honor. Leeson still believes that “there are images worth dying for.” He advises caution and to have a “sense of mission.”


• Ask students to spend time analyzing the powerful photos by David Leeson in Figures 14.17–14.20. They might work through the “Reflect & Write” questions on page 588 or apply the prewriting checklist on photographs from Chapter 3 to each one. You can break the class into four groups and ask students to report back on their conclusions.

• Take time, also, to examine Leeson’s writing that accompanies each photo. How does it differ from his words transcribed in the interview with Dirck Halstead? How do his words about each photo shape the visual argument for the reader and provide kairos?

• If you are teaching in a computer classroom, study the entire series of photos by David Leeson at http://www.digitaljournalist.org/issue0503/dl01.html. Compare the photographs printed in Envision in Depth with the ones online—what are the common features of his work? Do you see a continuity of his mission in all his different subjects?

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• Read about Leeson’s account to make a short film in Iraq and then watch his video at http://www.digitaljournalist.org/issue0405/platypus.html. How does the medium change the message? Write a response paper.

• Conduct field research, following the guidelines on Chapter 5, and interview a local reporter either in person or over email about the effect his or her reporting has had on audiences over the years and on their personal relationships. Compare your findings to Leeson’s remarks in this piece, and then write a synthesis paper, following the guidelines in Chapter 3.

• Leeson says that his faith in God helps him from being “a wreck” in the face of all that he has seen (18). Write a position paper in which you explain how people use their faith in God to deal with painful things in life.

Newshour with Jim Lehrer, “Pros and Cons of Embedded Journalism”

This selection, from the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, does not in fact list pros and cons, as suggested by the title. The thesis is at the beginning: “A partnership between the military and the media has changed the nature of war journalism.” The piece goes on to outline the arrangement. Embedded journalists, or embeds, sign a contract stipulating what they can and can’t report on. The commander of the unit can tell an embed not to report at all at times. The piece quotes Donald Rumsfeld as stressing that embed journalism only offers a narrow view, or a slice, of what reality is. The positive part of embedded journalism is exactly that: the slice of life reporting is accurate. But it has resulted in inaccurate reports, and can “distort war coverage,” in part because an embed is traveling with other human beings who become friends.


Discuss with students how the piece does not simply list the pros and cons but instead presents an essay about the complexity of embedded journalism. Look at how the quote from Donald Rumsfeld from “War, Live” is used for a different purpose in this piece. Compare the sophistication of the subheads to those used in “War, Live.”


• Describe the tone of this selection, and look at the writing of the subheads. Are they merely informative, rather than argumentative? Return to Chapter 6 for a discussion of the distinction between them.

• When you hear or have heard that a news source in the war is from an embedded journalist, what is your reaction?

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• At the end of this selection, Bob Steele of the Poynter Institute is quoted as saying that there’s nothing wrong with journalists having respect for the people in their stories, but “the key is to make sure those beliefs don’t color reporting.” Write a position paper in which you describe either the positive or negative effects of what “colored” reporting would look like in the case of a war story.

• Compare the argument of this selection to Leeson’s points in his interview and to Terence Smith’s thesis in “War, Live.” Write a synthesis essay about all three pieces.

• Research the biographies of key journalists in news stories that you read. Create a multimedia argument with a map of the globe, showing where those reporters have traveled and links to their own blogs or articles they have published. Use the Digital Journalist and Newseum at www.newseum.org to help your research, and consult Chapter 8 for instructions on writing multimedia arguments.

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• There are thousands of images of the 9/11 attacks in New York City, the London bombings of July 7, 2005, the December 2004 Southeast Asia tsunami, the Oklahoma City bombings, and other events, that depict brutally bloody and tragic moments: dead and mutilated bodies. What is the purpose of showing such images to a public? Pick one event to discuss. Create a class debate, offering multiple sides based on the many lessons you have learned in this section.

• Write a dialogue of sources between the authors of several of the essays in this section. Follow the guidelines in Chapter 5, and be sure to add your own argument.

• The essays in this section don’t mention 9/11, the September 11 bombings, but it is clearly a central event of crisis in recent history. What echoes of 9/11 do you hear in these readings and arguments? Conduct research about the debates concerning photo and video coverage of 9/11 and write a research-based argument on your findings. Use several of the essays from this section as resources in shaping your argument. Consult Chapter 6 on integrating sources.

• Susan Sontag has written a book on war and other crisis photography, called Regarding the Pain of Others. See http://www.pearsonhighered.com/envision/524. Have students locate this book in the library and use Sontag’s arguments to analyze the photos from Okrent’s editorial.

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• Examine the Flickr photo pools for events of crisis such as the London 7/7 bombing pool (see http://www.pearsonhighered.com/envision/515) and write a review of the photos you find there. Alternatively, explore the Flickr disaster pool, which includes pictures of all kinds of disasters: http://www.flickr.com/ groups/disasters/. Cast your essay as a position paper and respond specifically to one of the arguments from this section about the publication of such images

• Explore issues of the Digital Journalist, the online monthly magazine for visual journalism, at http://www.digitaljournalist.org/. What is its audience? How might the pieces be read differently in different contexts, such as in a military journal for a military audience?

• Have students pick a conflict or crisis from history, such as the Holocaust. Research photographs in the library or online at http://history1900s.about.com/ library/holocaust/blpictures.htm. How might the arguments about representing reality be different for photos of the Holocaust than for photos of contemporary wars and natural disasters? What points of ethical concern are shared across different historical moments?

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CHAPTER 14 Representing Realitywps.ablongman.com/wps/media/objects/10197/10442695/...of the Ruins”...

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