Why do we look at lynching photographs? What is the basis for our curiosity, rage, indignation, or revulsion? Beginning in the late nineteenth century, nearly five thousand blacks were put to death at the hands of lynch mobs throughout America. In many communities it was a public event, to be witnessed, recorded, and made available by means of photographs. In this book, the art historian Dora Apel and the American Studies scholar Shawn Michelle Smith examine lynching photographs as a way of analyzing photography's historical role in promoting and resisting racial violence. They further suggest how these photographs continue to affect the politics of spectatorship. In clear prose, and with carefully chosen images, the authors chart the history of lynching photographs--their meanings, uses, and controversial display--and offer terms in which to understand our responsibilities as viewers and citizens.
FREE Two-Day Shipping for students on millions of items. Learn more |
| |||||||||||||||
 Sell Back Your Copy for $4.69
Whether you buy it used on Amazon for $7.26 or somewhere else, you can sell it back through our Book Trade-In Program at the current price of $4.69.
Used Price$7.26
Trade-in Price$4.69
Price after
Trade-in$2.57 |
Book Description
Special Offers and Product Promotions
- Buy $50 in qualifying physical textbooks, get $5 in Amazon MP3 Credit. Here's how (restrictions apply)
Frequently Bought Together
Editorial Reviews
From the Inside Flap
"A lucid, smart, engaging, and accessible introduction to the impact of lynching photography on the history of race and violence in America. "--Grace Elizabeth Hale, author of Making Whiteness: The Culture of Segregation in America, 1890-1940
"With admirable courage, Dora Apel and Shawn Michelle Smith examine lynching photographs that are horrifying, shameful, and elusive; with admirable sensitivity they help us delve into the meaning and legacy of these difficult images. They show us how the images change when viewed from different perspectives, they reveal how the photographs have continued to affect popular culture and political debates, and they delineate how the pictures produce a dialectic of shame and atonement."--Ashraf H. A. Rushdy, author of Neo-Slave Narratives and Remembering Generations
"This thoughtful and engaging book offers a highly accessible yet theoretically sophisticated discussion of a painful, complicated, and unavoidable subject. Apel and Smith, employing complementary (and sometimes overlapping) methodological approaches to reading these images, impress upon us how inextricable photography and lynching are, and how we cannot comprehend lynching without making sense of its photographic representations."--Leigh Raiford, co-editor of The Civil Rights Movement in American Memory
"Our newspapers have recently been filled with photographs of mutilated, tortured bodies from both war fronts and domestic arenas. How do we understand such photographs? Why do people take them? Why do we look at them? The two essays by Apel and Smith address photographs of lynching, but their analysis can be applied to a broader spectrum of images presenting ritual or spectacle killings."--Frances Pohl, author of Framing America: A Social History of American Art
"With admirable courage, Dora Apel and Shawn Michelle Smith examine lynching photographs that are horrifying, shameful, and elusive; with admirable sensitivity they help us delve into the meaning and legacy of these difficult images. They show us how the images change when viewed from different perspectives, they reveal how the photographs have continued to affect popular culture and political debates, and they delineate how the pictures produce a dialectic of shame and atonement."--Ashraf H. A. Rushdy, author of Neo-Slave Narratives and Remembering Generations
"This thoughtful and engaging book offers a highly accessible yet theoretically sophisticated discussion of a painful, complicated, and unavoidable subject. Apel and Smith, employing complementary (and sometimes overlapping) methodological approaches to reading these images, impress upon us how inextricable photography and lynching are, and how we cannot comprehend lynching without making sense of its photographic representations."--Leigh Raiford, co-editor of The Civil Rights Movement in American Memory
"Our newspapers have recently been filled with photographs of mutilated, tortured bodies from both war fronts and domestic arenas. How do we understand such photographs? Why do people take them? Why do we look at them? The two essays by Apel and Smith address photographs of lynching, but their analysis can be applied to a broader spectrum of images presenting ritual or spectacle killings."--Frances Pohl, author of Framing America: A Social History of American Art
About the Author
Dora Apel is Associate Professor and W. Hawkins Ferry Chair in Modern and Contemporary Art at Wayne State University. She is the author of Memory Effects: The Holocaust and the Art of Secondary Witnessing (2002) and Imagery of Lynching: Black Men, White Women, and the Mob (2004). Shawn Michelle Smith is Associate Professor of Visual and Critical Studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is the author of American Archives: Gender, Race, and Class in Visual Culture (1999) and Photography on the Color Line: W.E.B. DuBois, Race, and Visual Culture (2004).
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Authors
Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Americans lynching Americans,
By
This review is from: Lynching Photographs (Defining Moments in American Photography) (Paperback)
One thing that has managed to avoid the standard history books of the United States is the way that African Americans were denied basic human rights from the end of slavery times until federal legislation finally was passed by the congress during the Lyndon Johnson administration. My parents lived during this difficult time, and they always knew that "lynching" of fellow African Americans was a very real "current" event to them, that would occur, mainly in the south, or would occur to their relatives if, for whatever reason, the local white community determined that they deserved to be tortured and murdered without the due process of law. One of my neighbors, Emett Till, a 14 year old boy from Chicago, while visiting relatives in Money Mississippi, was "lynched" by a group of white men in 1955, when he was perceived as a "threat" to the local white community. These men who did the lynching were tried by an all white jury and never convicted of their crimes, and had the nerve to boast about what they did (torture and lynch) this teenager days later in the national media. To this day, none of these murderers have spent any time in jail. So, it would benifit all of us if the practice of lynching in the United States were be part of standard American high school teaching. This book, along with the book "Without Sanctuary", must be part of "standard" high school education in the United States.
2 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
For a book about photography, few photos,
By
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Lynching Photographs (Defining Moments in American Photography) (Paperback)
I collect macabre coffee table books. For instance, I have "An Exquisite Corpse" which is about the Black Dahlia murder. I enjoy reading things like this, but they are for my front table.
I wanted to buy "Without Sanctuary" but thought I would buy something less expensive first. I liked what I saw, but for a book called "Lynching Photographs," there were few photos. It's informative enough, but I expected a more visual experience.
1 of 40 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Hung up on lynching.,
By Geronimo (New Paltz, N.Y.) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Lynching Photographs (Defining Moments in American Photography) (Paperback)
Yeah, well, how many books could there be about this topic? Morbidly fascinating. Nothing like having a well-rounded library, Dewey.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
So You'd Like to...
Look for Similar Items by Category
- Books > Arts & Photography > History & Criticism
- Books > Arts & Photography > Museum Exhibition Catalogs
- Books > Arts & Photography > Photography > Collections, Catalogues & Exhibitions
- Books > Biographies & Memoirs > True Accounts > True Crime
- Books > History > Americas > United States
- Books > New & Used Textbooks > Humanities > History
- Books > New & Used Textbooks > Humanities > Visual Arts > Photography
