Photographic Presidents: Taking History from Daguerreotype to Digital by Cara A. Finnegan

FAIN: DR-278065-21

Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois (Champaign, IL 61801-3620)
Laurie Matheson (Project Director: August 2020 to July 2023)

Photographic Presidents tells a history of photography through stories of how presidents shaped and participated in transformative moments in the history of the medium. Cara A. Finnegan analyzes a wealth of newspaper and magazine articles, letters to the editor, trial testimony, books, and speeches produced by viewers in response to specific photos they encountered in public. Finnegan treats the photograph as a locus for viewer engagement and constructs a history of photography's viewers that shows how Americans used words about images to participate in the politics of their day. As she shows, encounters with photography helped viewers negotiate the emergent anxieties and crises of U.S. public life through not only persuasion but action as well. Telling a new story about a medium and an institution that have largely grown up together, this book offers readers an accessible, visually engaging story about photography, the presidency, and public life.

Associated Products

Spring 2021 seasonal catalog for University of Illinois Press (Catalog)
Title: Spring 2021 seasonal catalog for University of Illinois Press
Author: N/A
Abstract: Promotional seasonal catalog for books published in spring 2021 by the University of Illinois Press.
Year: 2021
Primary URL: https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/find_books.php?type=catalog&season=s21&page=1
Primary URL Description: Spring 2021 seasonal catalog for University of Illinois Press. Book is listed on page 7.
Catalog Type: Other
Publisher: University of Illinois Press

Single Publication (Open Access eBook or Collection)
Publication Type: Single Publication
Title: Photographic Presidents: Making History from Dageurreotype to Digital
Year: 2021
ISBN: 9780252085789
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Author: Cara A. Finnegan
Editor: N/A
Abstract: Lincoln’s somber portraits. Lyndon Johnson’s swearing in. George W. Bush’s reaction to learning about the 9/11 attacks. Photography plays an indelible role in how we remember and define American presidents. Throughout history, presidents have actively participated in all aspects of photography, not only by sitting for photos but by taking and consuming them. Cara A. Finnegan ventures from a newly-discovered daguerreotype of John Quincy Adams to Barack Obama’s selfies to tell the stories of how presidents have participated in the medium’s transformative moments. As she shows, technological developments not only changed photography, but introduced new visual values that influence how we judge an image. At the same time, presidential photographs—as representations of leaders who symbolized the nation—sparked public debate on these values and their implications. An original journey through political history, Photographic Presidents reveals the intertwined evolution of an American institution and a medium that continues to define it.
Primary URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5406/j.ctv1k03sbn
Primary URL Description: JSTOR
Secondary URL: https://muse.jhu.edu/book/83119
Secondary URL Description: Project MUSE
Type: Single author monograph

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