Considers five documentary sequences or narratives: the antebellum portraits of Mathew Brady and others; the Civil War albums of Alexander Gardner, George Barnard and A.J. Russell; the Western survey and landscape photographs of Timothy O'Sullivan, A.J. Russell, and Carleton Watkins; and social photographs and texts by Alfred Stieglitz and Lewis Hine; as well as documentaries inspired by the Depression, esp. Walker Evans's American Photographs.

Considers five documentary sequences or narratives: the antebellum portraits of Mathew Brady and others; the Civil War albums of Alexander Gardner, George Barnard and A.J. Russell; the Western survey and landscape photographs of Timothy O'Sullivan, A.J. Russell, and Carleton Watkins; and social photographs and texts by Alfred Stieglitz and Lewis Hine; as well as documentaries inspired by the Depression, esp. Walker Evans's American Photographs.

'American Photographs' is regarded as one of the most important photobooks ever published. It was originally an exhibition catalogue of his one-man show at the Museum of Modern Art, New York in 1938, the first solo show MoMA had given to a photographer. It documents the lives of the poor and dispossessed in 1930s, depression era America.

"This comprehensive new survey places American photography in its cultural context for the first time. Prize-winning author, Miles Orvell, examines this fascinating subject through portraiture and landscape photography, family albums and memory, analyzing the particular way in which American photographers view the world around them - from Alfred Stieglitz to Walker Evans, Andy Warhol to Cindy Sherman."--Back cover.