PICTURING DOGS, SEEING OURSELVES
Nigel Rothfels and Garry Marvin,
GENERAL EDITORS
ADVISORY BOARD:
Steve Baker
University of Central Lancashire
Susan McHugh
University of New England
Jules Pretty
University of Essex
Alan Rauch
University of North Carolina at Charlotte
Books in the Animalibus series share a fascination with the status and the role of animals in human life. Crossing the humanities and the social sciences to include work in history, anthropology, social and cultural geography, environmental studies, and literary and art criticism, these books ask what thinking about nonhuman animals can teach us about human cultures, about what it means to be human, and about how that meaning might shift across times and places.
OTHER TITLES IN THE SERIES:
Rachel Poliquin, The Breathless Zoo: Taxidermy and the Cultures of Longing (VOLUME 1)
Joan B. Landes, Paula Young Lee, and Paul Youngquist, eds., Gorgeous Beasts: Animal Bodies in Historical Perspective (VOLUME 2)
Liv Emma Thorsen, Karen A. Rader, and Adam Dodd, eds., Animals on Display: The Creaturely in Museums, Zoos, and Natural History (VOLUME 3)
PICTURING DOGS, SEEING OURSELVES
[VINTAGE AMERICAN PHOTOGRAPHS]
ANN-JANINE MOREY
THE PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY PRESS,
UNIVERSITY PARK, PENNSYLVANIA
Copyright © 2014
The Pennsylvania State University
All rights reserved
Printed in Korea by Pacom
Published by The Pennsylvania State
University Press, University Park, PA 16802–1003
The Pennsylvania State University Press is a member of the Association of American University Presses.
It is the policy of The Pennsylvania State University Press to use acid-free paper. Publications on uncoated stock satisfy the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Material, ANSI Z39.48–1992.
FRONTISPIECE: Unused RPPC, 1910–1918, 8.6 × 13.8 cm.
Designed by Regina Starace
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Morey, Ann-Janine, author.
Picturing dogs, seeing ourselves : vintage American photographs / Ann-Janine Morey.
p. cm — (Animalibus : of animals and cultures ; Volume 4)
Summary: “Explores antique photographs of people and their dogs to expand the understanding of visual studies, animal studies, and American culture. Uses the canine body as a lens to investigate the cultural significance of family and childhood portraits, pictures of hunters, and racially charged images”—Provided by publisher.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-271-06331-7 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Photography of dogs 2. Human-animal relationships—United States. 3. Dogs—Symbolic aspects—United States. I. Title. II. Series: Animalibus ; v. 4.
TR729.D6M67 2014
779'.329772—dc 3
2013046852
FOR MY PARENTS
Donald Franklin Morey and Martha Ann (Ballew) Morey
CONTENTS
PREFACE: SOME WORDS ABOUT THE PICTURES
Introduction: Romancing the Dog
[1] The Visual Rhetoric of Everyday People
[2] The Dog on the Table: From The Great Gatsby to the Great White Middle Class
[3] The Gaze Outside the Frame
[5] Hunting Pictures and Dog Stories
Conclusion: The Dog in the Picture
PREFACE
[SOME WORDS ABOUT THE PICTURES]
I began my career as a religious studies professor, but I’ve been an English professor for the last twenty years, so it’s safe to say that no matter where I’ve been in
