Tuesday 1 December 2015

Saluting the Flag (1892)


How The Other Half Lives is a publication of photojournalism by Jacob Riis, a Danish immigrant who moved to the United States of America in 1870 at the age of 21. Through his photography he documented the hardship and struggle of living in New York during the Great Immigration, with much focus on the many tenements that the majority of these new immigrants lived in. Many examples of this type of mass housing still remain today as a reminder, particularly the Tenement Museum, in the lower east side of Manhattan.

Saluting The Flag, 1892, is a very interesting image from Jacob Riis' collection as it doesn't show the conditions in which the immigrants lived. however it gives an interesting look in to the daily lives of the children growing up in a new countries. The picture shows how particularly overcrowded the schools were as they struggled to deal with the large influx of people into the area. Another interesting aspect of this picture is the fact that these, mostly non-American children are saluting the American flag. This gives the idea about how the new American citizens were immediately indoctrinated with the ideologies upon which the country was founded and a loyalty to America that still remains through to the modern day.

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