The Corporate Eye: Photography and the Rationalization of American Commercial Culture, 1884–1929

Awards:   Winner of AAP/Professional and Scholarly Publishing Awards: Business, Management and Accounting 2006 (United States) Winner of AAP/Professional and Scholarly Publishing Awards: Business, Management and Accounting 2006. Winner of PROSE Award for Business, Management and Accounting 2006 (United States)
Author:   Elspeth H. Brown (Director, Centre for the Study of the United States (CSUS), University of Toronto)
Publisher:   Johns Hopkins University Press
ISBN:  

9780801889707


Pages:   348
Publication Date:   26 April 2008
Recommended Age:   From 17
Format:   Paperback
Availability:   Manufactured on demand   Availability explained
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The Corporate Eye: Photography and the Rationalization of American Commercial Culture, 1884–1929


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Awards

  • Winner of AAP/Professional and Scholarly Publishing Awards: Business, Management and Accounting 2006 (United States)
  • Winner of AAP/Professional and Scholarly Publishing Awards: Business, Management and Accounting 2006.
  • Winner of PROSE Award for Business, Management and Accounting 2006 (United States)

Overview

In the late nineteenth century, corporate managers began to rely on photography for everything from motion studies to employee selection to advertising. This practice gave rise to many features of modern industry familiar to us today: consulting, ""scientific"" approaches to business practice, illustrated advertising, and the use of applied psychology. In this imaginative study, Elspeth H. Brown examines the intersection of photography as a mass technology with corporate concerns about efficiency in the Progressive period. Discussing, among others, the work of Frederick W. Taylor, Eadweard Muybridge, Frank Gilbreth, and Lewis Hine, Brown explores this intersection through a variety of examples, including racial discrimination in hiring, the problem of photographic realism, and the gendered assumptions at work in the origins of modern marketing. She concludes that the goal uniting the various forms and applications of photographic production in that era was the increased rationalization of the modern economy through a set of interlocking managerial innovations, technologies that sought to redesign not only industrial production but the modern subject as well.

Full Product Details

Author:   Elspeth H. Brown (Director, Centre for the Study of the United States (CSUS), University of Toronto)
Publisher:   Johns Hopkins University Press
Imprint:   Johns Hopkins University Press
Dimensions:   Width: 15.20cm , Height: 2.00cm , Length: 22.90cm
Weight:   0.522kg
ISBN:  

9780801889707


ISBN 10:   0801889707
Pages:   348
Publication Date:   26 April 2008
Recommended Age:   From 17
Audience:   General/trade ,  Professional and scholarly ,  General ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand   Availability explained
We will order this item for you from a manufactured on demand supplier.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments Introduction 1. The Physiognomy of American Labor: Photography and Employee Rationalization 2. Industrial Choreography: Photography and the Standardization of Motion 3. Engineering the Subjective: Lewis W. Hine's Work Portraits and Corporate Paternalism in the 1920s 4. Rationalizing Consumption: Photography and Commercial Illustration Conclusion Notes Selected Bibliography Index

Reviews

A highly welcome contribution to the field of business history as well as American visual culture. Business History Review 2006 This highly readable, interdisciplinary book provides insights into both the history of American economic development and the history of photography. Afterimage 2006 A unique and interdisciplinary analysis of the intersection between visual and commercial culture in the USA. History of Photography 2006 The Corporate Eye is American studies and interdisciplinary cultural history at its best. Journal of American History 2006 This is a book whose 'big picture' is fully in focus. Technology and Culture 2006 Meticulous research and rich contextualization... A welcome and imaginative addition to the history of visual technologies and commercial history. Industrial Archaeology 2007


A highly welcome contribution to the field of business history as well as American visual culture. - Business History Review This highly readable, interdisciplinary book provides insights into both the history of American economic development and the history of photography. - Patricia Johnson, Afterimage A unique and interdisciplinary analysis of the intersection between visual and commercial culture in the USA. - History of Photography The Corporate Eye is American studies and interdisciplinary cultural history at its best. - Journal of American History This is a book whose 'big picture' is fully in focus. - Technology and Culture Meticulous research and rich contextualization... A welcome and imaginative addition to the history of visual technologies and commercial history. - Industrial Archaeology


Author Information

Author Website:   http://www.utoronto.ca/csus/

Elspeth H. Brown is an associate professor of history at the University of Toronto and the director of the Centre for the Study of the United States, Munck Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto.

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Author Website:   http://www.utoronto.ca/csus/

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