Self- Defined Final Project
How does Women, Ethics, Bias and Images in Society Affect Photojournalism?
Throughout this course, photojournalism has been the main target in identifying relationships between the impact amongst women, ethics, bias and the overall effect on society. Photojournalism tells a story through images which ultimately helps to prove a news-story and most importantly to document real life world events. Photojournalism is essential from decades ago to now in the current year, 2025, because it captures moments in time that make history. While the act of taking images is important, the people behind the camera are even more resilient for taking on this work because they have a strong passion for it while facing dangerous situations.
The creative format I chose to use is a digital collage to capture images taken from both men/women, images taken across different eras, the ethics/ bias within photojournalism, and to show how women and photojournalists in general put their life on the line in certain situations to capture an image. In the top left of the digital collage, it shows off the AI image from Michael Christopher Brown which raised ethical concerns as if it was right to do so or not as well as to showcase the bias of photojournalism and if people think AI is right. In the top middle and top right images, I chose these to depict women in photojournalism and show what women have to go through especially when being put in dangerous situations. The middle left and bottom left images that are depicted shows off the power of social movements and what photojournalists do to show off the reality of what happens in the world. The middle right and bottom right images show off men and woman having to face the realities of COVD and what a drastic challenge it was in the healthcare setting. I chose these images overall because to me it shows off the challenges the person in the picture had to face as well as the one behind it.
When looking deeper into my research that I conducted, I wanted to implement images from both men and women since they both take a part in photojournalism as well using images from different timelines which I did since I wanted to show off how photojournalism changes through time. When thinking of AI there is major bias and ethical considerations as to if it is acceptable or not. According to Peta Pixel it states, "this is something I can't get behind, especially when it is for profit. Using AI to tell a story you weren't there to document is one thing in itself, but selling those AI generated images... sorry, but not sorry. Lost a lot of admiration from me." This shows how AI generated images have two sides of people who think it is fine vs. who don't accept it especially when the person was not there to document and are only trying to get profit from it. Throughout this course, learning about AI and how it is viewed shows me how some people think it is ethical and some don't but there should always be truthfulness with images.
When I kept researching, I also wanted to look deeper into women photojournalist and what they had to endure. Like the second image at the top portrays in my digital collage with Catherine Leroy who was in the war and was the only journalist of any gender to parachute. According to Historical Firearms it states, "she would spend the next decade periodically covering the war in Vietnam under the fall of Saigon in 1975." This shows how women had to endure many things and even put themselves in war to capture the shot. Compared to Catherine Leroy, Isabel Ellsen who is depicted in the top right is also a photojournalist who put herself in the line of fire to be a photojournalist. Photojournalists in general have to deal with ethical issues such as whether to capture a person's face or ask a person to take an image. When learning about this topic in the course it was important for me to get the overall picture of whether photojournalists should or should not ask for permission, and after learning deeper, I have come to the decision that they should to keep integrity.
Photojournalism has made a major impact in the world and has impacted both the photojournalist and the audience when taking images. There are many aspects of photojournalism, and it all is interconnected. Photojournalism and photojournalists are essential and that should never be forgotten regardless of where in history we are.
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