Me Daddy: Analyzing National Gaze In An Iconic Canadian Photograph

“Wait For Me Daddy”: Analyzing National Gaze in an Iconic Canadian Photograph

The photograph known by the name “Wait For Me Daddy” is arguably one of the most recognizable images of Canadian history. The black and white image depicts a small family being torn apart by the Second World War, as a mother runs after her young son while he reaches for his soldier father. Behind them stretches a long line of other soldiers who are going to war. The “Wait For Me Daddy” image involves the intersection of nuclear and national families, as well as national values and emotions which are represented visually. Wendy S. Hesford and Brenda Jo Brueggemann have written about this intersection of familial and national gazes, using examples of national memorials

As Hesford and Brueggemann state in their writing, national gaze is a fictitious lens “through which the nation is seen and understood by its members and that creates and/or presumes a sense of national identity and belonging” (160). The “Wait For Me Daddy” image became very popular shortly after it was taken in 1941, and is still seen as a positive delineation of the national gaze of Canadians during the Second World War. The photograph’s inclusion of a nuclear family and war-time activities in an indistinguishable Canadian location may be the reasons why this photograph has become such a popular visual representation of national

Ryan Edwardson points out in his essay that Canadians have an especially difficult time uniting as one nation because of the diversity of Canada’s citizens and because it is a geographically vast country (185). Philip Kennicot explains that maps can help people understand an area that is too large for them to otherwise understand (qtd. in Green 140). In the same way, the “Wait For Me Daddy” image helped Canadians understand and identify more with their large country. Canadians sometimes identify more with their province, or even a smaller region within their province, than with the whole of the nation. Often it is purely because their local area may be completely different in terms of environment and culture than an area on the other side of Canada. During World War II, there were very few ways to broadcast information to the entire country, and people were a lot more disconnected from the country as a whole than they are now. The “Wait For Me Daddy” photograph has very few distinct physical landmarks to hint at it’s location, but with no context whatsoever, there are a couple of hints that the picture was taken in Canada. The words “Premier Hotel” are written on the side of a building behind the soldiers, hinting that the image was taken in an English-speaking country. With a little bit of knowledge of Word War II a