Population & Social Environments

http://www.masters-of-photography.com/S/salgado/salgado.html

While our population continues to grow exponentially, our beloved planet remains the same size. The lack of space and resources in many areas force huge numbers of people to move from rural areas into bustling cities; but not as normal residents, but as “squatters”. These people are lured to the cities by modernization and the often-illusory hope of finding a job. The “squatters” are then subject to unbearable living conditions, and exposed to numerous dangerous diseases. The victims of this tragedy are in dire need of help, and it is our responsibility, as a society, to provide that assistance.

What You Can Do:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/world/2006/urbanisation/default.stm
www.iom.int/jahia/Jahia/pid/2

Shehzad Noorani- Daughters of Darkness

SHEHZAD NOORANI
Photography is a way to document peoples stories through a single frame. Shehzad Noorani uses his talent in photojournalism to bring the stories of the children of prostitutes to center stage. Child prostitution has been a taboo subject for too long. In the world’s quest to create a utopia, the hardships of reality are ignored and the people who need our help are cast into the shadows. In these shadows, girls as young as 14 are thrown to the streets with prostitution as they’re only means of income. Women are subjecting themselves to alcohol, drugs, and diseases just to make ends meet. Shehzad Noorani has finally exposed these playthings of the ignorant to an audience previously content with the time-old cliché “ignorance is bliss”. Now with open eyes, will you choose to gawk at the subject or take action? If you chose the latter, begin to do so through Captive Daughters.
To see his works, go to:
Fiftycrows.org
Flickr

We feel that consumerism is an important topic to educate people about because sometimes individuals pay too much attention to what their spending their money on and not how much their spending on it. Consumerism is all marketing and commercial tactic. It’s interesting to see how people can be fooled so easily by the whole quality vs. quantity aspect when the quality is double the cost of the quantity. For example, A person would much rather have a real fur coat then a fake when a fake would cost at least five times less and look exactly the same as the real one.

Poverty

www.namaste-direct.org/

The Bottom Billion

Poverty matters because while people living in first-world countries, like America, take the smallest things, like clean water, a sanitary environment, communication, technology, and other details, for granted, millions of people in the world live without any of these modern “essentials.” People die everyday from hunger and malnutrition, when these consequences can be fixed. The disastrous results of poverty must now be addressed.


Links:

www.pih.org/youcando/donate.html
www.bridgestoprosperity.org
www.ewb-usa.org/donate.php
www.one.org/about/
www.wfp.org
www.actionagainsthunger.org
www.kiva.org/about/how

Child Consumerism

Consumerism: Consuming our culture, one child at a time

Consumerism is creating insecurities in children, who grow up to think that shopping is the answer to the void they may feel. Ads appear everywhere and we’re exposed to several thousand a day, with digitally altered photos, so our children end up believing that real women should look “perfect.” Children should not be under the pressure to “make” themselves the ideal women or man, as we see in the Evolution video that what you see in the media is not the true woman, but the children walking on the street only see the edited photo. We think this topic is important because parents and young adults should reach out and teach children that everyone is beautiful just the way they are.

Lauren Greenfield's gallery:
http://www.laurengreenfield.com/index.php?p=CCLHWY93

Thirsty World

photograph by Brent Stirton

Our natural resources are diminishing day by day all over the world. In our everyday lives, we don’t always realize the amount of clean water we consume in our privileged lifestyles. Viewing the photos that Brent Stirton should change the way we see our communities. We ask you if we can all work together to limit the amount of water we use everyday. The photographed communities are living under tremendous stress to merely survive with contaminated waters; once large lakes, have shriveled to small ponds that cannot sustain towns. We should always keep these images in our minds, and help our neighbors, as we would want them to help us.

http://www.brentstirton.com/feature-water_issues.php

-> Brent Stirton’s photography artwork about global water crisis.

http://www.worldwater.org/

-> A website to show the information on the world’s water resources.

http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/

-> A website that contains various articles of water issues and photography works related to global water crisis.

By Joon and Rachel

The Lost Girls/Beloved Daughters

Photograph by Fazal Sheikh
From the pamphlet "Beloved Daughters"

Photograph by Fazal Sheikh
From the pamphlet "Beloved Daughters"
http://www.fazalsheikh.org/

Childhood Lost, Nothing Gained

While Poverty and World Hunger are serious and well-known problems in our world today, there is another problem, one that far less people know about, and that is child marriage. Child marriage is a custom in some countries, where girls are married usually as young as thirteen. In other cases, however, daughters have been used as payment for things such as gambling and are married as young as eight years old. Other parents who cannot afford to pay and support their children also marry them off to older men.

Child marriage is a huge problem because many young girls are affected by it. It damages them socially, emotionally and physically and their lives are obliterated-they do not receive basic schooling once they are married and are expected to stay at home to cook and clean…and eventually produce children to make a family. Child marriage also increases the spread of HIV, an epidemic we are desperately trying to stop.

We, as a group, were interested in this topic because we are young girls ourselves. We are also 15-the age that most child brides get married at- and we cannot imagine being married off and taken away from our families at this time in our lives. At this age we should be making friends, having fun and gaining important knowledge in school. Those are all things that child brides will not have a chance to do and will never be able to do if they remain married.

Learn more:

PBS: “Child Brides,” NOW

www.pbs.org/now/shows/341/take-action.html

International Women’s health Coalition

www.iwhc.org/getinvolved

International Center for Research on Women

www.icrw.org/html/donate/donate_ask.htm

See more of Stephanie Sinclair’s photographs:

www.sthephaniesinclair.com

A $879000 toilet constructed in China, while over a billion of people in the world live on less then a $1 a day.

We feel that consumerism is an important topic to educate people about because sometimes individuals pay too much attention to what their spending their money on and not how much their spending on it. Consumerism is all marketing and commercial tactic. It’s interesting to see how people can be fooled so easily by the whole quality vs. quantity aspect when the quality is double the cost of the quantity. For example, A person would much rather have a real fur coat then a fake when a fake would cost at least five times less and look exactly the same as the real one.

Urban Population

The Greatest Migration - A Societal and Environmental Issue

While our population continues to grow exponentially, our beloved planet remains the same size. The lack of space and resources in many areas force huge amounts of people to move from rural areas into bustling cities; but not as normal residents, but as “squatters”. These people are lured to the cities by modernization and the often-illusory hope of finding a job. The “squatters” are then subject to unbearable living conditions, and exposed to numerous dangerous diseases. The victims of this tragedy are in dire need of help, and it is our responsibility, as a society, to provide that assistance.

The Greatest Migration - Squatter Settlements

The Greatest Migration portrays the third world country’s struggle to migrate into the city. Half of the world’s population live in cities, and one third of these city dwellers live in squatter communities. These squatter villages are plagued with disease; children growing up in these areas are fifty percent more likely to die by age five than those born in more affluent countries. The speed of population growth is the problem, and that fact that we can’t do anything about it. In the nineteenth century, renowned photographer Jacob Riis photographed poverty, enough to open the eyes of the New York government to help the squatters in their city. This is what Sebastião Salgado is trying to achieve. We are interested in this because it is a less publicized world problem that is more immediate than people realize; we hope to open the world’s eyes about it too.

Global Urbanization
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/world/2006/urbanisation/default.stm

Donate To organization working to improve conditions for migrants
www.iom.int/jahia/Jahia/pid/2

To View Sebastiao Salgado's Work

http://www.unicef.org/salgado/

Infected or Affected

HIV is a very serious virus that can lead to a fatal disease, AIDS. Nobody deserves to get this disease, but they do, and they suffer severe consequences. When HIV breaks into your cells, it spreads thus destroying your immune system. This enables viruses to easily enter the body, when you are not able to fight them off. Therefore, a virus that may seem harmless can be fatal for someone with AIDS. There is no cure for AIDS, but some people can try different remedies to slow down the process of lowering their T-Cells. It is important to spread awareness about AIDS because even though you may not be directly affected by this disease, it is still taking the lives of many others. People have been enduring the constant battle of AIDS for decades, and it is prudent that every individual lends a hand in the prevention of this life threatening disease.

Alyssa and Star

Global Warming

Ponder the Polar Bears

- Margaret and Courtney

“There are these two young fish swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says ‘morning boys, how’s the water?’ And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes ‘What the hell is water?’” - David Foster Wallace

People (the younger fish) today don’t realize that the world that they live in is slowly disappearing, dew to global warming. We find that people should know about global warming because if they knew about it then they could help prevent it. Most people know that global warming is going on, because they don’t know how to prevent it. Here are some links on how you can help. Think of the polar bears!

Here's what you can do to help!

www.climatebiz.com

www.energystar.gov

www.climate.org

GUIDE DOGS

Photos by: http://www.cathylens.com/

Dogs are more than just pets. They are best friends, companions, and a loveable animal. Dogs have defined our society today with helping the blind, protecting the scared, and attacking the bad. There high spirits and the amount of energy they have make anyone fall in love with them right away. I am interested in this topic because most people just look at a dog and think well they are an animal, nothing special, but they are not just an animal. Without dogs the way we live would not be the same. I believe that it is important that everyone knows what the difference dogs are actually making and how much they are helping. Dogs deserve more respect than they are getting so I want to let people know of the amazing things that they can do. One of the many things dogs are doing to help our society is acting as guide dogs to the blind. Those who cannot see and need help with their daily life seek dogs to help them. They show the way and help them when the need it the most. Dogs are defining our society one paw at a time.

The Genocide in Darfur

THE SCORCHED EARTH

Katie and Renee

Never again, we said. Never again will we let the corruption of a government destroy a people. But with the echoes of Rwanda’s horrific history still hauntingly fresh in our minds, we are once again faced with another genocide. For six years now, villages in Darfur have been ethnically cleansed; the women raped, and all eventually are murdered. The United States and its allies have thrown nearly three billion dollars at the problem, but a solution will never come until specific, well-planned actions are made by the U.N. We must be committed to spreading awareness about Darfur, because only when the whole world has seen the grisly images of the mutilated carcasses will there be the drive to take the necessary actions against the heinous genocide.

For more information:

http://www.eyesondarfur.org/crisis.html

http://www.enoughproject.org/

How YOU can help:

http://www.savedarfur.org/

http://www.ourpledge.org

http://www.enoughproject.org/