Janet Zandy: When Black Lives Don't Matter: Marion Palfi's There Is No More Time
Lecture
Related Member: Janet Zandy
This presentation will present (textually and visually) excerpts from Marion Palfi's There Is No More Time and raise questions about the efficacy of photography to counter structural racial oppression and the role of institutions as agents of racial justice or injustice. Marion Palfi (1907-1978), was a pioneering social research photographer, who produced photo series on the elderly, children, Native Americans, prisoners, and, especially, race relations in America. In August 1949, she went to Irwinton to investigate the death of a black man. Posing as a white European interested in Southern small town life, she uncovered a white supremacist social space far removed from the American ideals she cherished. Out of that experience she produced a 100 page narrative of testimonies and photographs, titled, There Is No More Time: An American Tragedy.