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Wendy Kozol offers an interesting perspective on the Great Depression regarding gender. Kozol references critiques of the Great Depression, including the noteworthy critique that the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl led to the destruction of traditional agrarian ideals. As a side effect of this destruction, photographers during the Great Depression sought to preserve traditional values by photographing victims of the Depression. The most popular victims photographed were of women and children, specifically mothers and their children.

Many examples, such as the RA/FSA photographs captured victims of the Great Depression in ways that would separate the audience from the subject in the photo. As REBEKAHBENNINGER1 states, the intent of the photographs vary on the values that the photographers have. In many of the RA/FSA photographs, women are depicted as helpless victims alongside children in order to create an emotional appeal to Depression relief. The children accentuate this helpless appeal by suggesting that the children are dependent on the well-being of the helpless mother. Oftentimes too, the mothers and children are shown in poor, tattered clothing and rags that show a level of poverty that the audience may not be experiencing. The victimization of mothers is one way that the Great Depression promoted traditional family roles.