Photos in Women Veterans Historical Collection and Research Travel Grant Attract Doctoral Student from University of Texas at Austin to Visit UNCG
What do your snapshots say about the way you look at the world? Andi Gustavson wants to know. The recipient of the University Libraries’ Research Travel Grant this year, Gustavson has an unusual dissertation topic for her work in American Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, one with a somewhat unconventional methodology. Her dissertation, “What Comes Home: Vernacular Photography and the Cold War, 1945-1991,” explores how American nurses, servicemen and servicewomen, and diplomats used their cameras to construct their own worldviews, posing and positioning themselves within an emerging new global order. Because these personal photographs depict the ordinariness of life lived amidst violence, she believes that they are key to understanding how Americans became accustomed to a culture of endless war. Andi Gustavson in Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives Research Room Gustavson says her work bridges a gap in the scholarly research o...