1. "I was channel surfing between reality TV programming
and actual war coverage when [the]story came to me. One
night I'm sitting there flipping around, and on one channel,
there's a group of young people competing for, I don't
know, money maybe? And on the next, there's a group of
young people fighting an actual war. And I was tired, and
the lines began to blur in this very unsettling way, and I
thought of this story.”
Suzanne Collins as quoted in the article by Rick Juswiak

3. Suzanne Collins
Author of The Hunger Games Trilogy
In March 2012 she became the best selling Kindle
author of all time. She has written 17 of the top
20 most highlighted passages in Kindle e-books
“I don’t write about adolescence, she said. I
write about war for adolescents.”
Suzanne Collins in a New York Times interview
“The series makes warfare deeply personal,
forcing readers to contemplate their own roles
as desensitized observers.”
Susan Dominus, New York Times staff writer

4. What Does it Mean to
Write about War ?
For Adolescents.

5. Author’s Perspective
• An overt critique of violence, the series makes
warfare deeply personal, forcing readers to
contemplate their own roles as desensitized
voyeurs.
• “This is not a fairy tale; it’s a war, and in war, there
are tragic losses that must be mourned.”
Suzanne Collins
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/10/magazine/mag-10collins-t.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

6. Author had years of informal schooling
on the subject of war
• Military “brat” whose family moved frequently
• She understood at a young age that war determined
her family’s fate
• Grandfather was gassed in WW I, uncle sustained
shrapnel wounds in WW II
• Her father experienced lifelong ““nightmares” from
his service in Vietnam
• http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/10/magazine/mag-10collins-t.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

7. • Collins embraces her father’s impulse to educate
young people about the realities of war.
• “If we wait too long, what kind of expectation can
we have?” she said. “We think we’re sheltering
them, but what we’re doing is putting them at a
disadvantage.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/10/magazine/mag-10collins-t.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

8. Who are we when it comes to war?
• “I’m an American, I like violence” heard from a New
Tech Student as we start to read The Hunger Games
• The Hunger Games, “A cross between gladiators
and Project Runway”

9. When America is at war, how do we as
citizens “see real war”?
• Is war journalism “voyeuristic travel writing”
as suggested by Bill Buford a published war
journalist.
• Does war journalism answer the question
“What is war like?” Does it matter who is who is
asking and who provides the answer?
• What can be learned by looking at how
various American wars were “seen” by citizens
through the work of war journalists?

10. Picture from Mr. Brady’s
studio display

11. Some defended (Mathew Brady), and the realism of
his photos. An account in Humphrey’s Journal (1861)
read, “The public is indebted to Brady for his
numerous excellent views of grim-visaged war.”
Dead Soldier in trench
Petersburg, VA 1864
Mathew Brady, Photographer

12. Their graphic power overwhelmed cynical New
Yorkers. The New York Times wrote that if Brady “has
not brought bodies and lain them in our dooryards
and along the streets, he has done something very like
it.” At last, someone had captured “the
terrible reality and earnestness of war.”
Dead at Antietam, VA 1862
Matthew Brady, photographer

13. “Mass-produced and relatively cheap, the integrated system
of mechanical viewer and photographs became fashionable
for classroom pedagogy, tourist mementos, and parlor travel
to exotic places of the world” (90) Long, Burke O. Imagining the Holy Land: Maps,
Models, and Fantasy Travels. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2003.
• Stereograph is an early form of 3-diminsional photography
• Civil War documented in stereographs with textual
comments
• Commercial Success
from the beginning
• Affordable even to the
lower and middle class
americanantiquarian.org
STEREOGRAPH

14. Stereographs of the Civil War

15. Burial of the
Union dead at
Fredericksburg
Dec. 15, 1862
A dead Rebel
soldier as he lay
In the trenches

16. So, why does this matter?
• “But few things in American history changed this country
like the Civil War.” shmoop.com
• “Photography changed the way civilians perceived war by
turning people removed from war into eyewitnesses of the
carnage.” civilwar.org
• Civil War photos were presented in galleries to satiate the
public’s desire for authentic images of war civilwar.org
• As media blends war and reality shows, the question for
Suzanne Collins is : Is there a voyeuristic thrill with the
potential for desensitizing the audience? scholastic.com
The volume and focus of photojournalism is determined by
the conditions of the war and the media technologies
available and it does impact public opinion

17. South Pacific
1939-1945
World War II 1941 America entry
Life Magazine

19. “Shock and Awe”
Bombing Baghdad 1990
“Highway of Death”
Persian Gulf War
Aug 1990- Feb 1991
“Operation
Desert Storm”

20. As writers for Wired point out, . . . the next step in military technological
development is said to include "virtual warfare". During such warfare
military personnel will be safely ensconced at distant locations as
televised imagery and other telemetry allows them to direct weaponry
against remote targets. Such a prospect may well signify that, as media
guru Marshall McLuhan wrote in 1968, "television war (will have)
meant the end of the dichotomy between civilian and military."