Founded on the spirit, values, and
actions of Lewis Hine, the Lewis Hine Documentary Fellows Program
connects the talents of young documentarians with the resources
and needs of organizations serving children and their communities
around the world.
LEWIS W. HINE
A staff member for the National Child Labor Committee from 1906
to 1918, Lewis W. Hine traveled the United States, camera in hand,
to document children at work in sweatshops, in slums, in factories,
and on farms. Over a thirty-year period, Hine's photographs were
used to advocate for legislation against the exploitation of children
and, in 1938, were instrumental in convincing Congress to include
child labor reforms in the Fair Labor Standards Act. One of contemporary
history’s most ardent artist-activists, Lewis Hine helped
lay the foundation for the social documentary photographic tradition
in America.
SHARED VISION FOR SOCIAL CHANGE
The Center for Documentary Studies (CDS)
was founded in 1989 as the first university-affiliated institution
in the United States dedicated to documentary fieldwork as an interdisciplinary
mode of inquiry, drawing upon photography, filmmaking, audio, oral
history, folklore, and writing as catalysts for education and change.
CDS supports the active examination of contemporary society, the
recognition of collaboration as central to documentary work, and
the presentation of experiences that heighten historical and cultural
awareness. CDS has been recognized nationally and internationally
for its pioneering work, conducted through courses, research, oral
history and other fieldwork, gallery and traveling exhibitions,
annual awards, book publishing, radio and other audio programs,
community-based projects, and public events. The Lewis Hine Documentary
Fellows Program is the first postgraduate program at the Center
for Documentary Studies.
FOCUS ON WOMEN, ADOLESCENTS, AND CHILDREN
The Lewis Hine Program places Fellows with organizations seeking
creative solutions to the specific problems faced by women, adolescents, and children in poor, marginalized areas. Fellows have a chance to engage directly with the
social fabric of the communities: parents, schools, health clinics,
and other local structures. For both Fellows and host organizations,
work with mothers and children is an integrated pathway into community life.
The Lewis Hine Documentary Fellows Program is part of a long-standing
commitment to youth-focused work at the Center for Documentary Studies.
Over the years CDS has been home to a number of courses and programs
that cultivate and amplify the voices and perspectives of children,
including such innovative projects as Literacy
Through Photography, Community Stories, Youth
Document Durham, and Children and the Experience of Illness.
The Hine Fellows Program joins these CDS efforts to emphasize the
special concerns and conditions of children and extends this work
to an international context.
banner image:
After the earthquake in 2001, temporary child-care
centers such as this one in the Surendranagar district were set up
by SEWA in villages where original centers had been damaged. Photograph
by Sara Gomez. Original in color.
From Together We Do Good Work:
SEWA's Child-Care Program in Gujarat, India.
A Documentary Project by Sara Gomez. Edited by Alex Harris and Sara
Gomez. A Publication of the Lewis Hine Documentary Fellows Program
at the Center for Documentary Studies in association with the Hart
Leadership Program at the Terry Sanford Institute of Public Policy,
Duke University.
