Research indicates that textbooks play an important role in determining course content and influencing students' impressions of a discipline. Photographs are particularly powerful because they appear as actual representations, and students can often recall them better than text. This study examines the photographs of six introductory human geography textbooks to evaluate the representation of women. Compared to Mayer's (1989) study, the quantity of photographs overall and those of females have increased, however photograph content depicts women in essentially traditional, passive roles that are treated as a norm. Consequently, these textbooks miss engaging students in meaningful discussions about gender and about female roles in society across cultures.