A History of Photography in USC Libraries CollectionsMain MenuIntroductionThe Changing Technology of PhotographyPhotography as an Art and SciencePhotography and American HistoryPhotography and Visual CommunicationSay Cheese: Vernacular Photography and IdentityStudent SunPrints
Children playing a game, East Africa, ca. 1900-1914
1media/123-35871-thumb.jpg2020-10-20T14:56:24-07:00Curtis Fletcher3225f3b99ebb95ebd811595627293f68f680673e381512"Wie Jung-Afrika seine Schulexempel ausrechnet!" ("How 'Young Africa' does its sums."). Two African boys are crouching and facing each other. Between them: four rows of small holes dug in the ground, similar to the game known as "bao" in East Africa. The boys are putting small stones into the holes.; Postcard published by the Leipzig Mission.plain2020-12-02T21:12:25-08:00USC Digital Library1900/1914photographsUnknownCurtis Fletcher3225f3b99ebb95ebd811595627293f68f680673e
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1media/123-35871.jpg2020-11-17T11:32:57-08:00“How ‘Young Africa’ does its sums,” 1900/19144This postcard depicts the two young subjects in East Africa crouching down and facing each other.plain2020-11-21T18:26:05-08:00
This postcard depicts the two young subjects in East Africa crouching down and facing each other. Between them are rows of small holes in the ground filled with small stones, suggesting that they are playing a game. The contrast between bright colors of their clothing against the more neutral tones of the ground and stones are visually compelling.
Apart from this aesthetic appeal, the photograph also allows a distant viewer to witness children at play in a place they may never visit themselves—a scene they would not have been able to see without the development of photography and its widespread circulation. This image from the International Mission Photography Archive exemplifies photography in relation to social science, offering a view of traditional culture and its preservation in an image.
