The image, a newsletter from the 1950s, shows us the detail with which certain spaces propogated specific communities to invest in certain futures. Strinkingly, the newsletter ties up the quality of (social, public) housing with "WHO" lives in it, and there is little room for ambiguity in the depiction that accompanies the text: blond-headed white children.
Both the caption and the image address the divisive production of space. But the image actually goes further than the caption : by defining a given population (one with white children) as desired for bettering the neighborhood, it negatively frames the current population as blight-causing ; through presenting whiteness as a remedy, the image is actually about the toxicity of blackness. The caption, on the other hand, could be more explicit, and mention outwarldly the category that is enforced through the divisive production of space : blackness.
This visualization powerfully draws attention to a process of racial segregation based on the categorization and signification of a population as socially and materially toxic. Given this is an archival image and that such spatial segregation based on the objectification of certain populations as 'toxic' continues today we are reminded of how a racial purity discourse and white supremacist structure continues to violently oppress people, yet such is done in a way as to appear convivial and innocent even though it is anything but.
I found the caption evocative and it educated me about the study site while also contextualizing the discourses at work. The contextualization was necessary for me as a foreigner to get a clearer sense of the racial politics in the USA, and particularly at this study site. The most powerful ethnographic insight generated for me was how what can at first appear to be a convivial representation can be in fact deeply informed by an historically persistent binary logic of clean/unclean, purity/danger, subject/object, inclusion/exclusion, etc.
For me, the caption does the work that is necessary here. Of course, more detailed historical context would be helpful for a non-USA audience however then the caption would likely become less punchy. Combined with the image the caption enough information is provided to generate questions and reflection about toxicity, populations, place-making, representation, etc.
The image is clear. It is a found image (archival). I would love to have seen another image of this poster being held up on-site at the present-day location - a performative image, if you will. However, it is likely that given it is an archival item that would not be possible.
See previous comment about possible composition of a contrasting with archival representation and a present-day site image.
This image tells us that toxics are historical, contingent, socially-constructed. It also underscores thepoint the violent systems of oppression are circulated through signifiers of purity, innocence, and conviviality.
