On the road

On the road[pic 1][pic 2][pic 3]

        Migrant Mother (1936)                Family walking on highway, five children (1938)                Towards Los Angeles (1937)

[pic 4][pic 5]

1. Choose one of the three photographs by Dorothea Lange.

1. Describe it (landscape, people’s expressions and clothes…).

• The first photograph was taken in 1936 by Dorothea Lange. It is a black-and-white portrait of a mother with three of her children around her, the two oldest on her sides, their heads resting on her shoulders, and her baby sleeping on her lap. She is looking in the distance, frowning. She looks despaired, worried and tired. The whole family is wearing ill-fitting and dirty clothes.

• The second photograph was taken in 1938 by Dorothea Lange. It is a black-and-white picture on which we can see in the foreground a father pulling a small carriage/cart on which the family’s belongings are piled up and on which one of his five children is sitting. In the background, the mother and her four other children are following them. They do not have many belongings with them, they are probably tired from walking and the weather seems hot because they are wearing hats. They do not have enough to money to do the journey by car, bus or train, so instead of driving, they are walking.

• The third photograph was taken in 1937 by Dorothea Lange. It is a black-and-white picture of the men with their backs facing the camera. They may be farmers because they are wearing hats. They do not have a lot of belongings with them, just a small bag each. They are walking alongside the road and the railway. What is ironic is that they are passing by a giant advert on which we can read “Next time, try the train, relax”, but they are too poor to afford that.

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