Simona Supekar & Anjali Enjeti — Stock Photo & Ballot
Two writers combine memoir and cultural criticism to examine race, representation in media imagery, and the stakes of voting in American democracy.
Why we picked this
Two writers examine the images and institutions that shape American identity — one through stock photography's racial fictions, the other through the ballot box's broken promises.
Simona Supekar and Anjali Enjeti approach American identity from two distinct angles that turn out to be deeply connected. Supekar examines stock photography — the generic images that populate advertisements, textbooks, and websites — to reveal how visual culture constructs and reinforces racial narratives. Enjeti turns to the ballot box, tracing how voting rights have been alternately extended and retracted along racial lines.
Both books blend memoir with cultural criticism, grounding their analysis in lived experience. Together, they offer a conversation about the gap between how America represents itself and how it actually functions.
In conversation with Sunu P. Chandy at Politics and Prose. Free admission with livestream available.