“It’s What I Do” Lynsey Addario

               I don’t have a favorite anecdote from the book, I find that a lot of the book was thought-provoking but hard to read. One of the anecdotes I’m drawn back to is from Lynsey’s time in Sudan. The reason these moments stood out to me was the parallels between genocides that are currently happening today but many governments chose to ignore or outright deny. Early on while in Sudan, Lynsey states the conditions in Darfur were quickly developing and that the international community was beginning to discuss the potential definition of genocide to describe the state of affairs in Darfur at the time. Lynsey hoped the honest and heart-rending images of refugees in Sudan would be seen on the front cover of the New York Times and motivate the United Nations to respond to the crisis as the Sudanese government continued to deny any wrongdoings in Darfur. 

        During her time in Sudan Lynsey and her team walked the edge between Chad and Sudan through hot dry sands where they carried very little and foolishly didn’t bring enough food or water. A group of nomads they came across in the desert offered some water and space on their camels’ backs to help lighten the load. Twenty miles of travel took three days as the vehicle kept sinking into the sand and yet it would miraculously continue to turn over and run. Once they came upon a Shigekaro where the SLA had a mini training camp they found a well with water needing to be purified. Took them five hrs each day to haul the water to the villages’ one pot to be boiled. They then tried to sort that water into their empty plastic bottles that would go missing as the plastic was so valued in the area. 

     

   I am constantly amazed at the lengths to which Lynsey is willing to go to document the truth about civilians and soldiers in conflict zones. She’s constantly putting her health and safety at risk for journalism and as much as I value the work that she’s doing I couldn’t imagine the amount of personal strength and sacrifice it takes to just survive while doing her job. I can’t imagine the pain she felt when the little girl saw her and ran screaming because she associated her Italian features with those of individuals in the Arab militias. The atrocities that the civilians have faced just for being born in a place are heartbreaking. Yet that’s exactly why these stories must be known so that we can work to put an end to them and not enable them. 

        

Addario uses the basic principle of journalism to establish the basis behind her techniques. She focuses on telling the stories of the individuals she subjects and she approaches them with dignity and respect making sure that she prioritizes the individual over the result. For example, when she photographed the young pregnant woman she made sure to speak with the translator to seek another individual's opinion on whether the question she wished to ask would be deemed offensive or insensitive. The translator assured her that there would be nothing wrong in asking her question respectfully. The young pregnant woman was well receptive to the question and felt comfortable enough to reveal her baby bump shirtless to the camera. Lynsey focuses on establishing connections and portraying the subjects in the stories that they are comfortable telling. Her work differs from that of her colleagues as she is one of the few female photographers in conflict zones so she has access to areas that culturally they would never have access to.  

    

I can conceptualize and understand Addario’s sense of duty in pursuing photojournalism in conflict zones, but absolutely would not choose that lifestyle for myself. I value very different things in the course of my life and truly live by the stance that we are not all meant to have the same specializations or qualifications. Life functions better when we each find our niche or find our value in our differing abilities.  I value community and family and I feel like that’s something you can’t easily maintain as a photojournalist dedicated to documenting life in conflict zones. 

     

To be honest, looking back over the term, I’ve struggled to apply much of anything to my photojournalism. For me when reading Lynsey’s book I had a hard time reading it from a photography perspective. The Book for me reads more as an autobiography than something to learn from and apply to my work. I also found that the nature of Addario’s life to be hard to relate to, which made it hard for me to grasp many of the concepts of her job that she talks about. I find her story to be interesting but not highly educational for where I’m at in my time and place in life. Maybe I will one day pick up her book and read it again with a completely different perspective and be able to pull more from it but right now there is a bit of a disconnect. 

     

Would I recommend this book to others? As a blank slate recommendation no, If I had a specific person in mind yes. I don’t think the book is for everyone at every stage in life. If you're interested in war, journalism, and photography then this book might be perfect for you. But this book has some sensitive concepts that need to be noted as a disclaimer before recommending it. I rarely recommend any books so this has little to do with the book itself but with how I view preconceived ideas of how others may relate to a book's content. 

  

    “Trying to convey beauty in war was a technique to try to prevent the reader from looking away or turning the page in response to something horrible. I wanted them to linger, to ask questions.”

      

    “He taught me to stand on a street corner or in a room for an hour—or two or three—waiting for that great epiphany of a moment, the wondrous combination of subject, light, and composition. And something else: the inexplicable magic that made the image dive right into your heart.” 

Without the physical book, I can not tell you what pages these quotes come from. What I can tell you is that these quotes speak volumes about what Addario does and what she strives for. She is well educated in what makes for good composition in a photo but her goal is to use great compositions to influence the viewer to linger and to ask questions about what it is that she’s documenting, even when that reality can be painful or just something so horrible that our instinct is to look the other way. 

Addario, Lynsey. “Iraq War.” Lynsey Addario, www.lynseyaddario.com/iraq-war. Accessed 25 Nov. 2024. 

The reason that I chose this photo as my favorite, is due to the haunting nature of the photo. It’s not gory and gruesome but it still tells of the devastation and destruction of the conflict. It also shows the resilience of humanity in the face of chaos and loss. It makes me curious to know where the individual is going, what they are thinking of, where they are coming from and  who else might be with them. It’s a compelling photo that would be a great segway photo in telling a narrative.