Abstract (eng)
This master thesis examines the photography program of the Farm Security Administration, an agency of the New Deal of Franklin D. Roosevelt from 1935 to 1943. It is mainly concerned with the question of the political intentions of the program, as well as the social and cultural values transported in the photographs. Additionally it observes the living conditions of the (mainly poor and rural) people shown on the pictures. The regarded sources are the FSA–photographs of the Library of Congress, as well as recorded statements of photographers and photo–documentary books. The first chapter deals with the contextual background of the program. It is concerned with the New Deal as such, as well as with a cultural movement of the 1930s, the so–called cultural nationalism, which tried to find the “American roots” in culture. The second chapter is concerned with photographs as historical sources and the genre of social documentary. The two short documentary films of Pare Lorentz under the FSA are briefly expressed. The third chapter describes the photography program; its foundation, its photographers and most importantly its methods, intentions, choice of photo subjects and its distribution. The fourth chapter examines pictures of the Southern States of the US and focuses on the question of the visual representation of racial issues and segregation. This examination revealed examples, where social hierarchies are visually represented, but also other ones, where the aesthetic or ironic character of the picture was more emphasized. The fifth chapter analyses photographs of the Southwest and tries to reveal pictures showing the consequences of a major ecological crisis in the 1930s, the Dust Bowl, the name given for a region in the US, which was stricken by severe sand storms, which made the land barren and infertile. This led thousands of people to migrate to the West. These photos concentrate on the representation of poverty, but also reveal a pictorial language of the classical pioneer voyage to the West. In the end, it shows that the political intentions of the program and its photographs were mainly concerned with the attempt to convince the public of the need of federal programs for the poor, as well as to serve as a justification against the several political opponents of the New Deal–program.
The presented master thesis contains 60 photographs of the Library of Congress.