Scholars have long noted the disparate coverage provided by black and white media outlets for the torture and killing of fourteen-year-old Emmett Till in the summer of 1955. While images of Till’s mutilated head were widely published in the black press, not a single white newspaper, magazine or television station reproduced images of Till’s corpse until decades later. A white press willing to publish scores of articles on the murder was nonetheless unwilling to depict the victim’s body. Berger's talk explains the reticence of the white media to circulate photographs of Till’s corpse and considers what was lost in withholding these gruesome images from white Americans.

Martin Berger is Professor and Chair of the History of Art and Visual Culture Department at UCSC.

Time: 5:00 PM

Venue: Dark Lab (Room 108), Digital Arts Research Center (DARC), UCSC

FREE admission. Open to the public.

Reception follows.