Week 1: Your Position in the Mediascape

Woman Waiting to Take a Photograph by David Eggers

1. What is the time frame of this vignette?
• I would say that this vignette takes place sometime in the present or within the past decade based off his choice of vehicle the woman owns.

2. What does the text imply about photography and about photographers?
• Photographers are highly aware of the smaller interactions occurring in the world around them. The woman is self aware that she is exploiting the people that she features in her work and is benefiting from this. 

3. What is the writer’s attitude toward the woman? What words and phrases suggest that attitude?
• The writers attitude seems to be judgemental towards the woman. He talks about how this woman takes photos as a hobby but sees her work as having enough potential to be in a gallery or bought by a collector. When Eggers says,"This, for the viewer of her photograph when it is displayed...will prove that she, the photographer, has a good eye for the inequities and injustices of life, for hypocrisy and the exploitation of the underclass." he knows that the woman is exploiting her subjects through photography but is understanding in her ambition to do so.

4. How does the writer’s repetition of the term “Go-Getters” function in the text?
• The author wants to emphasize the label used for that specific group of people and how its definition doesn't accurately represent the people in that area.

5. How does the final sentence build on observed details?
• How much this woman and the author believes in the potential of her photography skills in composition of subject matter. The woman knows that through the photo she's about to take she is proving her knowledge of subject matter at the cost of exploiting the people in her photograph.

6. What new idea or surprise emerges in the final sentence?
•  It also brings the idea of how the underclass are exposed to labels in order to hide the truth of the matter. How "Go-Getters" has a positive connotation but the group in this area are Go-Getters in a more negative light of society.