Women Photojournalists - Trials and Triumphs
The women photojournalist that I have chosen today is Ami Vitale who is a Nikon Ambassador and National Geographic photographer, writer, speaker, and documentary filmmaker. I have chosen her because I have had an interest in National Geographic since I was little.
Photo by: Bryan Liscinsky
Date: 2018
image source: link
Ami Vitale was born on August 29, 1971, in Florida, USA. Ami Vitale has a remarkable affinity for life-changing events, Ami Vitale was a self-described shy, gawky child who possessed little confidence. The assessment of the grade school teacher told her that she was not very good at English stuck with her for years and though Ami Vitale was not very good at English she almost perfected the SAT math score and thought of becoming an engineer when she was younger. Ami Vitale attended high school outside Washington, D.C. Where she discovered photography at the age of 14. Using a Pentax K1000 borrowed from school she learned to talk to people and photograph people in Washington, D.C. Says Vitale, “My teachers pushed me out of my understanding of what I could do. It was difficult, but they saw something in me, and encouraged me to find the best version of myself. They opened my eyes, and allowed me to realize that the world contains so much beyond our own parameters that we often don’t understand.” During high school she volunteered at the Smithsonian Museum of American History where her job was to make prints and archive which further inspired her to engage the world around her and meet people, Ami Vitale would walk around the city and just talk to people and ask to take their portraits. Ami Vitale studied International Relations at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Her academic background in international affairs influenced her approach to documentary photography, and focusing on international affairs influenced her.
Photo by: Ami Vitale
Date: 2009
Image source: link
Ami Vitale's career began as a photojournalist covering domestic and international news, she worked for various publications and news agencies such as The Associated Press. Ami Vitale started as a photo editor for the Associate Press in 1993. She then quit her job to be a photographer correspondent in the Czech Republic in 1997. Today, she is a well-known conservationist championing the cause of endangered wildlife and the environment with her own photography and that of others. Ami vitale motivation .When she began photojournalism her motivation was to tell stories of humanity and war and she was to focus on the horrors of the world after a decade she realized that she had been telling stories about people and the human condition but the backdrop of everyone these stories was the natural world. Ami Vitale did not become a photographer right away, people weren't hiring Ami Vitale because she was a quiet, young woman. Not only Ami Vitale has to go through this problem, other females in other fields of work have to face problems, even though nowadays the social discrimination of women is decreasing but there are jobs in male-dominated industries like construction, mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction. Not only did women not get hired they also faced pay discrimination. In this blog female photojournalists like Ami Vitale also faced discrimination towards her and her work. But because she always had her mind on her dream she knew she had to try even if she failed. She has stopped couting but she thinks she has visited around 110 countries, Ami Vitale refuses to pick favorites but she is drawn to Kenya primarily because of the relationship she has created there. Ami Vitale can recall the moment when she truly understood how connected wildlife is to our own well-being in December 2009 in a village outside Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic. Ami Vitale's encounter with a rhino named Sudan marked a pivotal moment in her life. She learned about a plan to transport four of the last Northern White Rhinos from Safari Park Dvůr Králové in the Czech Republic back to Africa, which seemed like a storyline from a Disney film but was, in fact, a desperate attempt to save the species. At that time, only eight Northern White Rhinos were known to exist, and they were all in captivity in zoos. The hope was that the change in environment, with fresh air, water, food, and space to roam in Kenya, might stimulate breeding, and the offspring would be used to repopulate Africa. Unfortunately, this hopeful plan did not come to fruition, and the species remains critically endangered. Ami Vitale currently photographs wildlife and environment stories in order to educate about global conversational issues. She is a visual journalist working as a photographer for National Geographic and a documentary filmmaker and cinematographer. Her recent still photography focuses on wildlife conservation in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. As an ambassador for Nikon and a contract photographer with National Geographic magazine, she has documented wildlife and poaching in Africa, covered human-wildlife conflict, and concentrated on efforts to save the northern white rhino and reintroduce pandas to the wild. Ami Vitale is an author, and contributor and frequently writes corresponding articles with her photojournalist works.
On the topic of women facing discrimination, I also found an article surrounding women who faced discrimination in photojournalism. The articles discussed women in photojournalism highlighting the historical dominance of men in the field. Despite the shift in recent years. With more women interested and wanting to work in the photojournalist field and working in the photo editor position the shift hasn't fully translated into the industry yet. While women have made progress, they still face challenges such as gender discrimination in hiring, sexual harassment, and the difficulty of balancing demanding assignments with traditional social expectations. However, the article emphasized that female photojournalists have unique strengths which make the unique. For example, Marilyn Nance has produced exceptional photographs of unique moments in the cultural history of the United States and the African Diaspora and possesses an archive of images of late 20th-century African-American life. Not only the fact that their gender gets looked down on they also face more discrimination based on their race. black and Asian females tend to have a harder time. Photojournalist Yunghi Kim who is an Asian female photographer said that she doesn't recall seeing another Asian female on the frontlines early in her career. She didn't face much sexism but debunked the stereotypical first impression of her as a petite asian. Yunghi Kim also said that in our society men become icons less so of women because institutions recognize photographers more than women.
Date: 2015
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