Bringing the War Home Comparative Essay Martha Rosler created a series of paintings during the time of the Vietnam War. She called the series, House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home. The series ran from 1967-72. About forty years later, during the US occupation in Iraq she reopened the series as a kind of update on what she was trying to get across. These works, created a couple of decades apart are very similar, they both portray the controversy of the media during wartime, as well as many connections between the media and politics, sexism and violence (Berkeley 1). They also portray the controversy over the role of the woman in the household. However, her second series also plays on how the media has evolved over the years and how her …show more content…
The American people should not be so desensitized towards the war. Everything in the image is portrayed in black and white besides for the drapes. She’s implying that the only thing separating the American people from the atrocities of the war is a simple piece of fabric; it isn’t as far away as some may think. She’s also implying the fact that some Americans are very materialistic, and they rely heavily on their luxury and pleasure. The woman in this image seems to be concentrating on cleaning the drapes and on nothing else. Also, her left hand doesn’t seem to be accurate, she should be holding on to a piece of fabric, but her arm isn’t over any fold in the fabric. Her hand almost looks like the nozzle of a vacuum cleaner. Rosler strategically placed the figure this way, bringing up the notion of the woman in the household, and her frustrations towards the objectification of women. She’s bringing up the controversy over the role of the housewife in the household. She also brings up an interesting juxtaposition between the work that the soldiers are doing in Vietnam and the work that the woman in this image is doing in the home. Rosler works in photomontage, which is a very affective, politically. She was disappointed with the media and the portrayal of wartime
When the mother sends her child off to church, she brushes her hair, bathes her, and puts white shoes and gloves on her. This effort put into creating an image of beauty and peace in her child shows that the mother is trying to forget about the suffering of the people who are fighting for freedom that she is doing nothing to aid. When she sees her child this way, she feels that she has
Often considered the Second War of Independence, The War of 1812 was a conflict between America and the British Empire. With ongoing battles between England and France in the 19th century (Napoleonic Wars), the infant United States who recently won their independence (1773-1783) found themselves in the middle of a ground-breaking war.
You Have Seen Their Faces by Margaret Bourke-White and Erskine Caldwell is a photo documentary of life in the South during the Great Depression. After reading You Have Seen Their Faces along with critiques of it by Rabinowitz and Snyder, I found myself more interested in the topic of how motherhood was depicted in the book. Rabinowitz brought up that middle class women felt the need to regulate the poor women because they weren 't feminine enough or motherly enough which is the main attitude involved in slumming. By observing Margaret Bourke-White’s photos I found two distinct classes of these types of images: positive and negative. I was curious as to the deeper meanings behind these two classes of photos and what this meant about Bourke-White’s perspective of her subjects. Another point of interest is how and if the captions of these photos of mothers cause the images to be interpreted differently.
There were many underlying causes of the Great War, one of the primary reasons was the creation of alliances between countries. Another reason, which was helped by the alliances, was the fact that Serbia killed the Austria-Hungary archduke, causing the two of them to go to war. Altogether many people in the world were excited to go to war, wanting to prove how strong their country is and thinking it would be a quick war.
Bao Ninh’s The Sorrow of War is a novel that is a personal view of the Vietnam War from the perspective of a Vietnamese soldier. Like the American novel “The things they carried”, this novel brings about the effects of war on people, and especially how it defeats the human capacity for things such as love and hope. Bao Ninh offers this realistic picture of the Vietnam War’s impact on the individual Vietnamese soldier through use of a series of reminiscences or flashbacks, jumping backwards and forwards in time between the events most salient in memory, events which take on a different theme each time they are examined. His main protagonist Kien, who is basically Bao himself, looks back not just at his ten years at
From the earliest times, war has existed as a painful reality. Stories are passed down from generation to generation about brave men fighting epic battles in ancient civilizations. Occasionally a different type of legend emerges: the homefront hero. In Ancient Greece and Rome, elderly statesmen prevented famine and raised supplies for their distant armies in wartime. From then on through history, those left behind, from the leaders of countries tested in resolve and commitment by wars to the ordinary citizens who rise above their routines to serve their countries, are powerful forces behind victories. World War II was no exception. While the soldiers abroad were undoubtedly true heroes of the war, the parents, siblings, and children they left behind also assisted in the war effort. No one remained truly unaffected by the war. Without the labors of women, the efforts of schoolchildren, and the institution of rationing, World War II could not have been won.
Political photography is a threat, because this genre of photography is seen as a true piece of reality and provides evidence for historical moments. Moments shown in Tank Man and Tereska Draws Her Home both portray two individuals who symbolize people who have suffered from the acts of the government and or the military. The two photographers, Jeff Widener of Tank Man and David Seymour of Tereska Draws Her Home, take different approaches documenting moments in history, from the Tiananmen Square Incident of 1989 in Tank Man to the Holocaust in Tereska Draws Her Home. Their execution in capturing these moments greatly affects the object/subject relationship and reveals their position as both outsiders, in reference to Abigail Solomon-Godeau’s Inside/Out. In addition, Widener and Seymour use their cameras as passports, exploring a part of someone’s or a country’s moment that happens to be in a vulnerable state (Solomon-Godeau). Widener uses his camera as a passport as an American to document Chinese history, a history that is not his own. Seymour uses his camera as a passport to cross over boundaries to capture his subject’s disturbed drawing, a poignant result of the Nazis’ actions (Solomon-Godeau). As a third point, Tereska Draws Her Home and Tank Man both portray crucial and violent histories that, by some individuals, are desperately trying to cover up or deny the history happened at all. Both of these photos share in the act of denials from the Holocaust to the Chinese
From 1939 through 1941 millions were faced with the violence and devastation of World War II. Life on the Homefront in the United States and Great Britain was difficult and overwhelming.World War II was one of the most bloody battles in history, and most of whom were civilians.In this paper, we will explore what life is like for people during a terrifying war.
It is not the production of food in and of itself that is Rosler’s target but the taken for granted role of a happy housewife and selfless producer that the tape intends to spotlight. Her work deals as much with the role of women as with the role of representations. In her video we also see the invisible and visible labour through her actions of using kitchen utensils in the video and behind the video in reality and the way in which her body is inscribed by domestic arts. The frustration that is seen in her actions is because a woman does not become a woman because of her sex but because of the domestic work that is labelled on her
It can be hard to fully comprehend the effects the Vietnam War had on not just the veterans, but the nation as a whole. The violent battles and acts of war became all too common during the long years of the conflict. The war warped the soldiers and civilians characters and desensitized their mentalities to the cruelty seen on the battlefield. Bao Ninh and Tim O’Brien, both veterans of the war, narrate their experiences of the war and use the loss of love as a metaphor for the detrimental effects of the years of fighting.
Rockwell’s ‘Rosie’, which appeared on the cover of The Saturday Evening Post in the 29th of May, 1943, was inspired by a real woman by the name of Mary Doyle. It shows a muscular feminine figure in front of an American flag, on her lunch break, sitting on a stump, riveter gun on her lap, factory goggles pushed up on her forehead and wearing dirty overalls. She looks confident, strong and comfortable in this environment, doing this job freely and willingly to support the US war effort. The illustration resembles a Michelangelo’s painting from
When thinking about everything our country has been through it all starts with a disagreement. It started with us fighting Native Americans, and then us moving on to fight England. Funny how some things never change. Over the years we have been in many wars, and battles. Some more memorable than others, but none the less just as scarring. Some led to great things and others didn’t, but in the end, there was always loss whether or not you won the war or lost it. So, how does war impact our country? In many ways war impacts different aspects of the economy, from social aspects to psychological impacts.
The notion of an American way of war informs how scholars, policymakers, and strategists understand how Americans fight. A way of war—defined as a society’s cultural preferences for waging war—is not static. Change can occur as a result of important cultural events, often in the form of traumatic experiences or major social transformations. A way of war is therefore the malleable product of culturally significant past experiences. Reflecting several underlying cultural ideals, the current American way of war consists of three primary tenets—the desire for moral clarity, the primacy of technology, and the centrality of scientific management systems—which combine to create a preference for decisive, large-scale conventional wars with clear objectives and an aversion to morally ambiguous low-intensity conflicts that is relevant to planners because it helps them address American strategic vulnerabilities.
The Reason for Going to War Since the beginning of the war on Iraq, over 8243 civilians, 11000 Iraqi soldiers and 642 Coalition soldiers have died. There has not been one day since a US soldier was killed and since the beginning of the occupation, 39750 bombs have been dropped and $117 billion dollars have been spent. And no weapons of mass destruction have been found.
The American “way of war” is primarily based on the American interpretation of the national fundamentals and values to include capitalism and basic freedoms surrounding financial enterprising as applied in the democratic system. Along with these ideals concerning free marketing and democracy, the American “way of war” seeks to reinforce alliances with nations that uphold similar concepts and values through international trade and commerce. In doing so, the United States intrinsically denounces political ideologies that are contradictory, such as communism.