Sixty Years of Showing the World to America

Abstract

News photographs of international events serve Americans as a visual medium for understanding other cultures and countries. However, a content analysis of 60 years of Pulitzer Prize-winning photographs (1942-2002) reveals that the major visual themes of the prize-winning photographs depicting international news events are predominantly about war and coups. On the other hand, the Pulitzer Prize-winning photographs taken in the US reveal more diverse themes and subjects, although they, too, tend to concentrate on bad news, like crime and terrorism, social problems, racism and poverty. Based on the content analysis and personal interviews with the judges, it is believed that the Prize’s most important determinants of international news photography appear to be violence and conflict with a consideration of the photographers’ demonstration of courage producing the pictures.