This Place, These People ─ Life and Shadow on the Great Plains

Nancy Warner's photographs and David Stark's interviews and reflections provide fresh perspective on the history and culture of a distinctly American phenomenon. Continuing in the tradition of Solomon D. Butcher, who photographed some of the first midwestern settlers in the nineteenth century, and Wright Morris, who combined photographic and verbal accounts of farmers' lives in the twentieth century, Stark and Warner explore a way of life that continues to adapt in the face of wrenching change.

This book pairs images of abandoned farm places with the plain-spoken recollections of the people who still live in nearby communities. In his afterword, Stark grounds the project in the relationship between people and their land; the cadences and tough-minded humor of everyday speech; the ongoing mechanization of farming; the lure of cities for the young; and genetic and chemical innovations for improving crop yields. The result is both art and document, evoking memories, emotions, and open-ended questions for anyone with rural American roots.

David Stark is Arthur Lehman Professor of Sociology and International Affairs at Columbia University, where he directs the Center on Organizational Innovation. His most recent book is The Sense of Dissonance: Accounts of Worth in Economic Life.

Nancy Warner is a fine-art and portrait photographer based in San Francisco. Many of the photographs in this book were first exhibited at the Great Plains Art Museum as Going Back: Midwestern Farm Places (2008).