These are the exact instructions from my professor:
Writing Visual Evidence (450-550 words): 10%
Presented with an instance of photographic evidence, we ask: “evidence of what?”
For this assignment you will select a single example of photographic evidence and compose a brief 450-550-word essay illuminating and querying that image in relation to the themes of this class so far. Your paper should offer a speculative reading based on careful visual analysis and some online research. Your submission should conclude with a set of hypotheses and questions, along with proposals for a plausible research plan suggesting how one might (given the time) pursue additional research.
Some questions to consider:
What or who does the photograph depict?
Why was it taken?
By whom was it taken?
For what audience?
To what intended end?
What other meanings or purposes are possible?
Instructions:
1. Follow this link (https://dp.la/search?q=evidence&page=1&type=%22image%22&page_size=100&list_view=grid) to visit the website Digital Public Library of America (DPLA), which aggregates and renders searchable hundreds of institutional digitized image collections (and so millions of images). This link will preselect for you a set of 6,231 images whose metadata includes the keyword “evidence. From that highly (deliberately) arbitrary pool, I ask that you select a single image as a case study. In selecting this case study, I encourage you to dig deep within this resource, following your own interests and instincts. Feel free to utilize additional search terms within DPLAs database in making your selection (so long as your selection is a photograph and carries the tag evidence). There is no expectation that you will be able to offer a definitive historical context for this selection: its original context and meanings may remain a mystery. Please keep a record of your search methodology and include a link to your image’s source page in your submission.
2. Read the short methodological essay “Reading the Visual Record” by Elspeth Brown. This essay offers a clear pathway for constructing a brief essay in the historical visual analysis of photographic images and evidence.
(I will attach this essay below)
3. Follow Brown’s recipe of description, deduction, and interpretation to produce a suggestive visual analysis of your chosen image, followed by a brief prospectus offering two (hypothetical) avenues for further research. Please be sure to connect this analysis to concepts developed in our class readings and discussions. Consider the questions: Evidence of what? For and against whom? Please cite and make productive use of at least two assigned course readings.
Here again is your link: https://dp.la/search?q=evidence&page=1&type=%22image%22&page_size=100&list_view=grid (Links to an external site.)
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