Photobus - Courses

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BA in Journalism, Film & Media
module JOMEC/MC3574
PHOTOGRAPHS REVISITED

module tutor: Daniel Meadows
e-mail: meadows@cardiff.ac.uk
tel: 02920 874 000 ext 77241
Bute rm. 0.60A
office hours: Tuesday mornings 9.30-12.00

year 2: semester two, 25 January - 30 April 2010

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use the links below (or scroll down the screen) to see the following on this page:

What you have to do
Photographic archives, a definition
Assessment
Discipline
Your progress through the module (example)
Lecture schedule
Seminar schedule
Some notes on visiting public archives
Some notes on borrowing photographs
Readings

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DOWNLOADS
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Photographs_Revisited_2010_handout
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MC3574_marking_sheet
view/download a sample module marking sheet

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WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO
You are required to tell a story about a Cardiff person (or group of Cardiff people) past or present. This story will be one of your own discovering, a narrative which reveals itself to you when you explore one or more of the many photographic archives which exist in, or around, this city. The module has a practical element and it also requires you to develop techniques of photographic analysis and criticism. These you will be encouraged to apply imaginatively to the photographs you choose to study.

Each week you will attend one lecture and one seminar/workshop. Away from the classroom you will be expected to research your project, make contacts with people outside the university, visit informants, search relevant photography archives and prepare your written material.

You may, if you wish, conduct your research in pairs so long as the work you present at the end of the module is individually distinctive. For example: two of you might pool resources to research the same archive/s but you must not use that material to tell the same story.

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PHOTOGRAPHIC ARCHIVES, A DEFINITION
In the context of this module the term 'archive' is used broadly, to include personal collections of family photographs, found objects like discarded wedding albums and bundles of charity shop postcards, as well as the more formal collections of photographs housed and catalogued in our museums and public institutions.

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ASSESSMENT
By midday on Friday 30 April 2010 you will hand in one reflective log and one essay as follows:

50% of the marks will be awarded for your REFLECTIVE LOG. This will be a scrapbook with commentary. The log should include your lecture notes and research material including photocopies of and comments upon pictures. It should give a proper account of (and reflection upon) your progress through the module, your adventure of discovery as you identify and research your chosen archive. You will need to make regular entries and record everything you do as your work progresses. Record all the efforts you make as you conduct your work; your interview questions, how people react to you, your thoughts on the process, all the highs and lows.

50% of the marks will be awarded for an ESSAY of 2,000 words. This will tell a story about your chosen set of photographs and the theoretical approaches which can be applied to them, their findings and your arrangement. You are required to make reference to the specific tools for making judgments about pictures (Barthes and Lester) which are discussed in class. Your story must connect your findings to the wider history of photography.

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DISCIPLINE
It is important that you do not miss any classroom sessions. You are advised that if, through ill health or some other reasonable cause, you do have to miss a session, you must inform the tutor in advance.

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YOUR PROGRESS THROUGH THE MODULE...
...might go something like this. Following the first lecture you will go out and buy a scrapbook (A4, blank or lined white pages, ring bound).

Your pressing need will be to find an archive to trawl and, from it, a subject to study. So, you might begin by visiting one of Cardiff's 20 public libraries.

Find them listed here (link opens in a new window).

There you might search in the local reference section looking for clubs and societies attended by people who share your own interests.

You can search Cardiff Central Library's list of clubs and societies here.

Let's say you are interested in meeting people who go salsa dancing.

Having found a contact phone number or an address in the library, you might then make an approach to the secretary of the Cardiff Latin American Dancing Association and ask to see any photographic records which record people salsa dancing in Cardiff. In the company of the archivist (who probably won't think of him/her- self as an archivist and the archive itself may be just a few old photo albums or a shoebox stuffed with prints) you will then look at the pictures and listen for the stories which are told about them.

EXAMPLE: you might, for instance, notice that quite a lot of the pictures you are seeing date from the 1950s and were taken (say) in a club in Butetown. You might then wangle yourself an invitation to attend a salsa dancer's club night when some of the older members are present. You will encourage people to tell you stories, stories that relate specifically to pictures. You will listen to the stories and take a lot of notes. Information gleaned might then lead you to (say) the Butetown History & Arts Centre where is stored on disc a large archive of pictures about life and entertainment in Cardiff's dockland ('Tiger Bay').

Your researches might then give you a wider context for whatever story it is that you now see emerging -- perhaps the salsa dancers you have spoken to were also one-time cruise ship entertainers, or they worked as stewards in the merchant shipping fleet -- so that, before you know where you are, you will find yourself trawling the archives of the National Waterfront Museum in Swansea where are stored huge numbers of pictures relating to Welsh maritime history.

And so on.

As the semester progresses you will, from attending the lectures, learn some of the many ways in which photographs can be understood. You will also learn some criteria for making judgments about photographs. During the seminar sessions you will share your experiences of researching your stories with other students on the module, in this way knowledge can be pooled and your skill-set will expand.

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LECTURE SCHEDULE
Lectures take place in Bute rm. 0.53 on Tuesdays, 1.00-2.30 pm

1. 26 January 2010: Introduction to the module. Seminar groups are decided. What is an archive? List of some local archives. Example of an outline for your progress through the module. 'Albert Smith' by Graham Smith (story as told in Granta 95, 'Loved Ones').
2. 2 February 2010: Making judgments about pictures using criteria suggested in 'Camera Lucida' by Roland Barthes, and in 'Visual Communication' by Paul Martin Lester. Case study: Martin Parr: 'The Last Resort'. Introduction to your principle guides for the module: Tate Britain's: 'How We Are, Photographing Britain: 1840 to the present', (we look at some of its delights, Charles Jones etc.); BBC 4's 'The Genius of Photography'.
3. 9 February 2010: Camera and Film Formats in documentary photography. Meyerowitz on formats from 'The Genius of Photography 4'. Bruce Davidson: 'East 100th Street'. Meadows: 'The Shop on Greame Street'; Parr and Meadows: 'June Street'... and what happened next.
4. 16 February 2010: A History of Photography in Britain part i. From William Henry Fox Talbot to Eadweard Muybridge: 'The Genius of Photography 1'. Story: Muybridge, Flora, Helios, Larkyns, Pendegast.
5. 23 February 2010: Case study: 'National Portraits' and 'The Bus', an English photo archive from the 1970s by Daniel Meadows. 'The Genius of Photography 2' (August Sander). 'The Genius of Photography 5' (Diane Arbus).
6. 2 March 2010: A History of Photography in Britain part ii. 'The Genius of Photography 1' (Carte de Visite, George Eastman and Kodak, the vernacular). Postcards. Garffild Lewis: 'Ync'. BBC 'Capture Wales': repurposing the nation's family archive. 'How We Are' (Percy Hennell). The Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players.
7. 9 March 2010: A History of Photography in Britain part iii. Picture magazines: Picture Post. Layout, pace, some lessons about design. Haywood Magee. 'The Genius of Photography 2' (Bill Brandt): 'The English at Home'.
8. 16 March 2010: Archive Ecstasy: Stephen Poliakoff's 'Shooting The Past'.

-- Easter break 22 March to 11 April, 2010 --

9. 13 April 2010: A History of Photography in Britain part iv. How the snapshot informed street photography. 'The Genius of Photography 3' (Cartier-Bresson). 'The Genius of Photography 4' (Robert Frank, Tony Ray-Jones). 'How We Are': (Sir John Benjamin Stone, Homer Sykes).
10. 20 April 2010: A History of Photography in Britain part iv. How art photography rediscovered the snapshot. 'The Genius of Photography 5' (Larry Clark's 'Tulsa', Richard Billingham's 'Ray's a Laugh'). Nick Waplington's 'Living Room'.

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SEMINAR SCHEDULE
Seminars take place on Wednesday mornings in Bute rm. 0.05 and last one hour. Three groups. You must sign up either for Group 1 at 9.00 am, Group 2 at 10 am or Group 3 at 11.00 am.

1. 27 January 2010: How to do this module: your questions answered.
2. 3 February 2010: Planning your approach.
3. 10 February 2010: NO SESSION THIS WEEK, YOU HAVE SOME TIME TO DO ORIGINAL RESEARCH.
4. 17 February 2010: More planning in the light of what you have learned so far.
5. 24 February 2010: NO SESSION THIS WEEK, YOU HAVE SOME TIME TO DO ORIGINAL RESEARCH.
6. 3 March 2010: Student presentations of work-in-progress including group discussion.
7. 10 March 2010: Student presentations of work-in-progress including group discussion.
8. 17 March 2010: Student presentations of work-in-progress including group discussion.

-- Easter break 22 March to 11 April 2010 --

9. 14 April 2010: Student presentations of work-in-progress including group discussion.
10. 21 April 2010: Student presentations of work-in-progress including group discussion.

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SOME NOTES ON VISITING PUBLIC ARCHIVES
You can walk into any public library and start browsing. For other public archives you will almost certainly need to make an appointment. Here are three to be going on with:

Butetown History & Arts Centre (opens in a new window)
5 Dock Chambers
Bute Street
Cardiff Bay
CF10 5AG
To make an appointment to view the picture archive ring: 02920 256 757

Ian Smith  Curator, Modern and Contemporary Industry
National Waterfront Museum (opens in a new window)
Oystermouth Road
Maritime Quarter
SWANSEA
SA1 3RD
01792 638 973
ian.smith@museumwales.ac.uk
There is a research room which houses the National Museum's Industry photograph collection. The photographs are not available for general browsing but by contacting the museum in advance an appointment can be made with the relevant curator to see any images which they have on the subject of your choice. Photocopies can be made.
Dr. David Jenkins, Senior Curator Maritime and Transport: 01792 638 992
david.jenkins@museumwales.ac.uk
Robert Protheroe-Jones, Curator Heavy Industry: 01792 638 992
robert.protheroejones@museumwales.co.uk

Richard Edwards
Librariean
St. Fagans National History Museum (opens in a new window)
CARDIFF CF5 6XB
02920 573 446
richard.edwards@museumwales.ac.uk
The photographs are not available for general browsing but by contacting the museum in advance an appointment can be made with the relevant curator to see any images which they have on the subject of your choice. Photocopies can be made.
Assistant archivist, Social History Dept.: Lowri Jenkins
02920 573 444
lowri.jenkins@museumwales.ac.uk

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SOME NOTES ON BORROWING PHOTOGRAPHS
Public archives will not allow you to borrow their photographs, although most will let you take away photocopies. If individuals allow you to borrow from their personal collections then this is a huge responsibility for you. Their precious pictures are in your care and you must be very careful with them. If you intend borrowing pictures in this way (so that you can make photocopies, say) then you should always transport them in a cardboard stiffened envelope (available from most Post Office shops) and be sure to return them in good condition.

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READINGS

Mandatory
* Barthes, R. 1980. 'Camera Lucida.' London: Flamingo. (Bute Library: PQ2603.A55.A61.C4)
* Lester, P. 1999. 'Visual Communication: images with messages.' Belmont: Wadsworth/Thomson Learning. (Bute Library P93.5.L3)
* Meadows, D. 2001. 'The Bus: The Free Photographic Omnibus 1973-2001.' London: Harvill. (Bute Library PN4784.P5.M3)
* Williams, V. and Bright, S. 2007. 'How We Are, Photographing Britain.' London: Tate. (Bute Library TR57.W4)

Internet:
* 'Photobus, adventures of a documentarist by Daniel Meadows' (opens in a new window).

DVD:
* 'The Genius of Photography' from BBC Four (autumn 2007). Six episodes of one hour each. Four copies of each episode are kept in the Bute Library and may be viewed there.

Recommended
* Berger, J. 1972. 'Ways of Seeing.' London: British Broadcasting Corporation and Penguin Books. (Bute Library N7430.5.W2 and other libraries)
* Clegg, B. 2007. 'The Man Who Stopped Time.' Washington D.C.: Joseph Henry. (Bute Library TR849.M8.C5)
* Meadows, D. 1997. 'National Portraits: Photographs from the 1970s.' Salford: Viewpoint Gallery and Derby: Montage Gallery. (Bute Library PN4784.P5.M3)
* Ritchin, F. 2009. 'After Photography.' London: W.W. Norton & Co. (Bute Library TR267.R4)
* Sontag, S. 1979. 'On Photography.' Harmondsworth, Middx: Penguin. (Bute Library PN4784.P5.S6)
* Wells, L. (ed.) 1997. 'Photography: A Critical Introduction.' London: Routledge. (Bute Library TR145.P4)

Book Chapter:
* Sekula, A. 'The Body and the Archive' in Bolton, R. (ed). 1989. 'The Contest of Meaning'. Cambridge, Mass: MIT. (Bute Library TR15.C6)

Journals:
* 'Photography & Culture' ed. Val Williams, Kathy Kubicki and Alison Nordstrom: ISSN: 1751-4517.
* 'Visual Communication Quarterly' ed. Paul Martin Lester: ISSN:1555-1393.
* 'Portfolio' ed. Gloria Chalmers: ISSN: 1354-4446
* 'Source' ed. John Duncan and Richard West.

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