PHOTOGRAPHS THAT HAVE CHANGED THE WORLD

Starving Boy and Missionary by Mike Wells, 1980

World Press Photo of the Year: 1980 Mike Wells, United Kingdom. Karamoja district, Uganda, April 1980. Starving boy and a missionary. About the image Wells felt indignant that the same publication that sat on his picture for five months without publishing it, while people were dying, entered it into a competition. He was embarrassed to win as he never entered the competition himself, and was against winning prizes with pictures of people starving to death.

Biafra By Don McCullin, 1969

When the Igbos of eastern Nigeria declared themselves independent in 1967, Nigeria blockaded their fledgling country-Biafra. In three years of war, more than one million people died, mainly of hunger. In famine, children who lack protein often get the disease kwashiorkor, which causes their muscles to waste away and their bellies to protrude. War photographer Don McCullin drew attention to the tragedy. "I was devastated by the sight of 900 children living in one camp in utter squalor at the point of death," he said. "I lost all interest in photographing soldiers in action." The world community intervened to help Biafra, and learned key lessons about dealing with massive hunger exacerbated by war-a problem that still defies simple solutions.

Lynching by Bettman/Corbis, 1930

A mob of 10,000 whites took sledgehammers to the county jailhouse doors to get at these two young blacks accused of raping a white girl; the girl’s uncle saved the life of a third by proclaiming the man’s innocence. Although this was Marion, Ind., most of the nearly 5,000 lynchings documented between Reconstruction and the late 1960s were perpetrated in the South. (Hangings, beatings and mutilations were called the sentence of “Judge Lynch.”) Some lynching photos were made into postcards designed to boost white supremacy, but the tortured bodies and grotesquely happy crowds ended up revolting as many as they scared. Today the images remind us that we have not come as far from barbarity as we’d like to think.

The first day of Dorothy Counts at the Harry Harding High School in the United States . Counts was one of the first black students admitted in the school, and she was no longer able to stand the harassments after 4 days, 1957.

Martin Luther King, Jr. 1963

Martin Luther King, Jr. raised his arms as he addressed the crowd in his “I Have a Dream” speech in August 1963. His performance there, and the subsequent photos of the crowds and his address, were a turning point in the blossoming civil rights movement.

Sudanese Child With a Vulture by Kevin Carter, 1994

This Pulitzer Prize-winning picture of a vulture waiting to feed on a dying toddler in Sudan summed up the cruelty of the famine in Sudan. It also, famously, highlighted the plight of the photographer; within three months of gaining recognition for this photograph, Kevin Carter committed suicide.

Kids who are shocked by the civil war in Angola, 1996.

A man who was tortured by the soldiers since he was suspected to have spoken with the Tutsi rebels, 1994.

A mother in Somalia holds the body of her child who died of hunger, 1992.

Elizabeth Eckford and Hazel Massery by Will Counts, 1957

Elizabeth Eckford was one of the first black students admitted to Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. This photo shows her grueling walk to class while being shouted at by white student Hazel Massery. Although Massery would later express regret for her actions, the photo showed the nation and the world the heated strife in the Southern United States.

DOCUMENTARY: RETURN TO AFRICA'S WITCH CHILDREN

I wanted to broaden the type of studying and research that I've been doing lately; I basically want to, in a sense, stop playing it safe and just journey out to places, topics and issues that I've never really heard or know much about. I came across a documentary that really struck my attention, a documentary about witchcraft and the African traditions behind such issues. This documentary discusses the results of children being accused of being witches, how they are tortured because of this and how they are supposed to overcome this by turning to religion. As seen in this documentary, the children who are accused of witchery are beaten, tortured and shunned by their family because of these accusations. This again is hitting a soft spot for me, especially when seeing the aftermath of these children getting tortured; their scars, both emotional and physical, which will be with them forever. Return to Africa's Witch Children can be viewed here, a documentary which dares to explore the fragile issue of child abuse while exposing the deepest and oldest traditions of the African culture.

This film shows a part of an African tradition, of culture and how much it differs from my own beliefs and culture. The narrator said something that really stuck with me after watching it, she said, "Traditional African belief has it that nothing happens for natural reasons in life, any ill fortunes is the work of witches." For some reason, I couldn't get this sentence out of my head, mainly because I believe that things happen for a reason, that in the end of everything, there are certain reasons why something has happened to you. However, I never thought this to be the works of witches or a higher power, I just never really thought why or how this happens but that it is just something I believe because of evidence from my own life.

"2008 Emmy Award-winning Dispatches story of an estimated 15,000 children in Africa’s Niger Delta being denounced by Christian pastors as witches and wizards and then killed, tortured or abandoned by their own families. Two-and-a-half-year-old Ellin is one such child. Found at the side of the road, her body having been severely burnt with boiling water. Nwanakwo, eight years old, had acid poured over him after being labeled a wizard, and later died. Return to Africa’s Witch Children is a documentary that follows the work of Gary Foxcroft, an Englishman whose charity, Stepping Stones, raises funds to help care for more than 150 children accused of witchcraft, and blamed for catastrophes, death and famine. Narrated by Sophie Okonedo."

SEX TRAFFICKING IN AFRICA

I found some interesting websites that have information/articles on sex trafficking in Africa.

In Africa, Sex Trafficking is a River:
http://humantrafficking.change.org/blog/view/in_west_africa_sex_trafficking_is_a_river

South Africa's Child Sex Trafficking Nightmare:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/1037215.stm

Human Trafficking and Modern Day Slavery:
http://gvnet.com/humantrafficking/SouthAfrica.htm

Vital Voices:
http://www.vitalvoices.org/

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.

I never really thought more of Martin Luther King, Jr. than him being the Black activist who gave a famous speech with the words "I have a dream" in it. I watched his full "I Have a Dream" speech given on August 28, 1963 at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington, D.C. just recently and I began to think how his words can relate to the things I have been studying and researching. His speech, for me, meant equality not just among races, but for all. He represents such a powerful message and meaning to people who have struggled with their identity, with learning to accept who they are and not being concerned with other people's ideas and thoughts. Here are some excerpts from his speech that really spoke to me:

"But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land."
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"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."
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"Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children."
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"It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. And there will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges."
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"And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

These quotes remind me of what I have been studying; a peace among people, a voice for people who have been treated unjustly because of their skin colour and a comfort in knowing that you are not alone. I feel like this relates a lot to what K'Naan preaches in his songs; the true meaning of the 'African way', of what these people have gone through, how they are living through it today and the effects of their history. Like I have said before, I have become so obsessed with K'Naan so I obviously had to work him into this post somehow. Here's his website to check out.

"I Have a Dream"
Martin Luther King, Jr.
August 28, 1963

*This website here has the full speech, along with a video of it as well.

SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT

A mother in Somalia holds the body of her child who died of hunger, 1992.

• WORLD HUNGER/POVERTY FACTS AND STATISTICS

• AFRICA HUNGER

• IMAGES OF WORLD HUNGER