Women in Photojournalism: Working Conditions, Career Options, and Networks, 1920–80

In the field photojournalism – as in many other professional groups that emerged in the 20th century – women were highly underrepresented. Only ten percent of those who had international careers as journal or agency photographers were female, among them celebrities like Margaret Bourke-White and Lee Miller. In my presentation I will address the following questions: How did working conditions, especially the need to travel and the high risks of working in war and conflict zones, affect female careers in the field of photojournalism? Which options did women photographers have if they wanted to have a family? And what kind of networks did they join or set up in order to enhance their careers?

My observations are based on the data of roughly 500 photojournalists who were active internationally between 1920 and 1980, among them 58 women of different nationalities (U.S. American, Mexican, British, German, Hungarian, Israeli). Obviously, being a woman had several disadvantages (lesser pay, incongruity with family work) but turned out to be helpful in some situations (to some places/events only women were admitted).

Most interestingly, female photojournalists did not set up networks of their own but joined those dominated by male colleagues – most probably because these networks were highly inclusive in other respects. The rate of Jews and migrants was outstandingly high, and the networks were by nature transnational. Even though I do not believe that there is a “female gaze” that per se distinguished the work of female photojournalists, it is obvious that the choice of places to go and subjects to cover differed.

My research on women photographers is part of a larger project on the history of public photography; a book on Image Agents. Photographic Action in the 20th Century was published in German in 2016.