Alex Harris, Center for Documentary Studies
Kirk Felsman, Center for Documentary Studies

OVERVIEW:
Increasingly, attention to the status of children in the United States, particularly those in poor and immigrant communities, has suffered from superficial and sensationalized coverage in both the popular press and in the advocacy reports of various intervening agencies. Consequently, the views and aspirations of these populations have often been misrepresented, the general public's understanding has been seriously distorted and important opportunities to influence critical policy decisions have been missed.

This seminar is not intended to provide an exhaustive review of all the major child policy issues of current concern in the United States. Rather, we win give consideration to selected policy questions that relate to particular groups of children, and at the same time, from a historical perspective, examine the ways in which documentary work has been drawn upon to inform policy makers and the general public and affect change.

Students in the seminar will explore the status of American children and adolescents through involvement in individual, service-oriented projects in local communities.

Students are expected to engage in a community- service activity that brings them into direct contact with children and/or adolescents for at least three hours on a weekly basis. This might take the form of tutoring, acting as a teacher's aide, being a big brother/sister, coaching a team, or the like. Students will be required to write weekly documentary papers integrating their service experience with the readings and class discussions.

The class will also study historical and contemporary literary, policy, and documentary works on the status of children. Selected photographs will be shown regularly during class periods. For comparative purposes we will draw upon work from international settings.

Main Texts: (Available from the Regulator Book Shop)
1) Wilkomirski, B., Frazments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood
2) Butler, R.O., A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain
3) Kotlowitz, A., There are No Children Here
4) Williams, W.C., The Doctor Stories
5) Ellison, R., Invisible Man
6) Finnegan, W., Cold New World
7) Coles, R., Lee, J., & Moses, J., The Youngest Parents

EVALUATION:
Course Participation: 25%
Community Service: 25%
Weekly Writing Assignments (approx. 3-5 pages each): 50%

Alex Harris and Kirk Felsman will share the teaching of the seminar and comments on papers. Class preparation, regular attendance and participation are essential. The community service requirement includes a bi-weekly group meeting outside of class. These sessions are intended to provide students with an additional venue in which to discuss their service learning experiences and receive observations from a childcare professional.

Short, weekly documentary papers linking course materials and students' hands-on experience are required and will be due (two copies) the end of every class from September 9th through December 9th. A one-paragraph description of the community service placement is due (two copies) at the end of class on September 9th. Students should schedule an individual, mid-term meeting with each professor by October 21st. Though formal mid-term grades will not be issued, these meetings will provide students a clear sense of how they are doing academically.

Class Schedule:

September 2nd – Memories of Childhood
Readings:
1) Harris, A. (1987) in A World Unsuspected: Portraits of Southern Childhood
UNC Press, Selected sections: Introduction (xiii-xx.), My Real Invisible Self
(1-13); Hitting Back (14-35), Didn't Mean Goodbye (36-52); Going Up to Atlanta
(78-107); The Power and the Glory (108-126); A Secret You Can't Break Free
(210-234)

Photographs in Class: an overview of documentary photography with a focus on the south

September 9th -Who is a child?

Readings:
1) Wilkormiski, B. (1996) Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood
Schocken Books: New York.
2) Ewald, W., "Dreams" Summer 1995, DoubleTake #1, pages 34-49
2) Graves, K, "Story" Spring 1996, DoubleTake #4, pages 45-51

Photographs in Class: an overview of previous Duke student photographs of children and adolescents in the Triangle
* A one paragraph description of community service activities is due (2 copies)

September 16th – Methods and Ethics Readings:
1) Stolar, D. "City Map" Spring 1997, Doubletake #8, pages 68-72
2) Williams, W. C., "The Doctor Stories," Selected stories: Old Doc Rivers (13-41);
The Girl With the Pimply Face (42-55); The Use of Force (56-60); Jeane Beicke
(69-77); A Face of Stone (78-87); The Insane (104-107), The Practice (104-107)
3) Eldon, D. "The Journals of Dan Eldon," Fall, 1995, DoubleTake #2, pages 138-144

Photographs in Class: Sally Mann's family photographs, and Abraham Menasch's "Inner Grace"
Film: The Postmaster, Satyajit Ray, 1961

September 23rd – Childcare and Early Education
Readings:
1) Greenhouse, S., 1995, "If the French can do it why can't we?", New York Times Magazine, Nov. 14.
2) Lardner, J. "Separate Lives", Spring 1997, DoubleTake, #8 pages 54-67
3) Duffy, P. "From the Nannies Series", Spring 1997, DoubleTake, #8, pages 59-67
4) Nixon, N. & Nixon, B. "Room 306", Spring 1996, DoubleTake, #4, pages 52-64
5) Ewald W., "Black Self/White Self", Summer 1996, DoubleTake, #5. pages 54-66
Photographs in Class: Alex Harris' documentary work in Philadelphia inner-city Schools in the spring of 1999

September 30th – Children in the Inner City
Readings:
1) Kotlowitz, A. (1991) There Are No Children Here, Delacorate Press: New York
2) Morse, E., "Ghetto Life 101". "Remorse: The 14 Stories of Eric Morse", CD – National Public Radio (199??)
3) Garbarino, J. et. al., (1992), "The developmental toll of inner-city life", pages 48–66, in Children in Danger, Jossey-Bass: San Francisco

Photographs in Class: Helen Levitt's and Bruce Davidson's photographs from the streets of New York
Film: "In the Street", Helen Levitt ( in class)

October 7th – Orphans and Homeless Children
Readings:
1) Cohen, C., Hendler, N. (1998) No Home Without Foundation, Women's Commission on Refugee Women and Children, New York.
3) Toth, J., (1997) Orphans of the Living New York, Touchstone Books, pages 13-73
4) Goldstein, R. "Floating Homes", Fall 1996, DoubleTake #6, pages 117-121

Photographs in Class: Noah Hendler in Rwanda and Malawi, Fazal Sheikh's images of mothers and children, and children's drawings from Bosnia

October 14th – Street Children
Readings:
1) Felsman, JK, (1995) "Risk and resiliency in childhood: The lives of street children", in The Child In Our Times: Studies in the Development of Resiliency (Eds.) Dugan, TA Coles, R., pages 56-80.
2) Riis, J. (1918) "The street Arabs", in How the Other Half Lives pages 147-158
3) Poinatowski, E., and Klish K. "In the Street," Winter 1998, DoubleTake #11, pages 117-129

Photographs in Class: Lauren Greenfield's "Fast Forward — Growing up in the Shadow of Hollywood"
Film: Los Olvidados, Luis Bunuel, 1950

October 21st – Refugee and Immigrant Children
Readings:
1) Butler. R.O.. 1992) A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain, New York:H. Holt, selected stories: The Trip Back (2944); Crickets (59-64); Letters from My Father (65-72); Mid Autumn (95-102); In the Clearing (103-110)
2) Hoenig, L, "Refuge", Fall 1995, DoubleTake #2, pages 85-94
3) Epstein, M. "In Vietnam and Versailles," Fall 1995, DoubleTake #2 pages 68-85
4) Cohen, C. & Hendler, N., Looking Towards Home, Women's Commission for Refugee Women and Children/UNHCR, 1999.

Photographs in Class: Alex Harris' work with Cambodian Children in Washington DC mid 1980's, Current Duke Student photographs of refugee and immigrant children and adolescents

October 28th- Child Labour Readings:
1) Finnegan, W. (1998) "Work Boy: New Haven", in Cold New World, Random House: New York, pages 1-92
2) Urrea, L.A., and Leuders-Booth, J. "Dompe Days", Winter 1996, DoubleTake #3, pages 132-136
3) America and Lewis Hine (on reserve)

Photographs in Class: Child labor by Lewis Hine, migrant workers by Wendy Ewald, Ken Light, and Herbert Emmet

November 4th – Street Gangs
Readings:
1) Finnegan, W., (1998) La vida loca: The Yakima Valley", in Cold New World, Random House: New York, pages 209-268
2) D'Amato, P., "Barrio", Summer 1995, DoubleTake #1, pages 94-109
3) DeCesare, D.,"In Progress", Summer 1995, DoubleTake #1, pages 16-17

Photographs in Class: Larry Clark and Donna, DeCesare on Gangs

November 11th – Young Parents
Readings:
1) Moses, J., Coles, R., (1998) The Youngest Parents, New York: WW Norton/DoubleTake
2) Furstenberg, F., (1988), "Good dads, bad dads" in Changing American Family and Public Policy, Washington, D.C.: Urban Institute Press.
Photographs in Class: John Moses and Jocelyn Lee on teen parents,
Margaret Sartor on young women in the South

November 18th – Juvenile Justice
Readings:
1) Ellison, R. (1947) Invisible Man Vintage Books: New York Note: To be discussed November 18th & December 2nd
2) Archey, D., (1996) "Children, Genocide & Justice", Save the Children, Kigali, Rwanda
3) Courtwright., D. (1996) "Ghetto violence", "The crack era" and "Life in the new frontier society", in Violent Land: Single Men and Social Disorder from the Frontier to the Inner City pages 225-280, Harvard University Press: Cambridge, MA

Photographs in Class: Paul Kwilecki and Thomas Roma in the courthouse

December 2nd – Race, Social Class & Historical Moment
Readings:
1) Ellison, R. (1947) Invisible Man, Vintage Books: New York
2) Finnegan, W., (1998) "The unwanted: The Antelope Valley", pages 269-351, in Cold New World, Random House: New York

Photographs in Class: to be announced

December 9th – Final Discussion