Documents That Changed the Way We Live: The “We Can Do It!” Poster

Sponsored by Rowman & LIttlefield

Recorded on 10/16/2017
Posted in The Authority File

Episode 12

In this third episode of our 4-part series about Joe Janes’s new book, Documents That Changed the Way We Live, we discuss the famous “We Can Do It” poster. The take-charge, cultural icon Rosie the Riveter depicted in the poster, it turns out, isn’t who you think she is. We’ll talk about that and how this particular document might be less of a “document that changed the world” than the other way around.

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About the guest:

Joe Janes is a frequent speaker in the US and abroad. He is the author of several books, including Documents That Changed the Way We Live, and Library 2020, and has written a monthly column for American Libraries magazine since 2002. He holds the M.L.S. and Ph.D. from Syracuse University, and has taught at the University of Michigan, the University of Toronto, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the State University of New York at Albany as well as at Syracuse and Washington.


About the Music:
The intro and outro music in Authority File is “Grapes,” mixed by I dunno. The transition music is “Peace ( There’s A better Way ),” mixed by Loveshadow. The music is available on ccMixter, and is used under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license (cc-by 4.0).