It has happened that people, after having seen frightening sights, have also lost presence of mind for the present moment; in this way fear extinguishes and excludes thought. And many have fallen victim to useless labor and dread diseases and hardly curable madnesses. In this way the sight engraves upon the mind images of things which have been seen. And many frightening impressions linger, and what lingers is exactly analogous to what is spoken. Moreover, whenever pictures perfectly create a single figure and form from many colors and figures, they delight the sight, while the creation of statues and the production of works of art furnish a pleasant sight to the eyes. Thus it is natural for the sight to grieve for some things and to long for others, and much love and desire for many objects and figures is engraved in many men.” —Gorgias, Encomium of Helen
Since at least the mid-1990s, when the New London Group introduced the idea of “multiliteracies,” scholars and teachers in composition and rhetoric (aka writing studies) have been looking beyond print-centic models of production (as well as the materiality of print itself) and have argued that using media as an object of study is insufficient. Instead, young people should also be taught to be producers of media, and schooling needs to “encourage the development of ‘multi-modal designs’ that relate to . . . all the other modes in quite remarkable relationships” (New London Group, qtd. in George, p.18).
That said, this course focuses on both the study of visual rhetoric and production of media
by combining seminar and studio experience.
In seminar mode, we will discuss visual texts and new media works as well as scholarship about such works, addressing issues in information design such as the rhetoric of fonts, gaze, framing, perspective, vectors, social distance, color, and juxtaposition. Broadly, we will ask how meaning is made visually.
In studio mode, students will apply and test the theories discussed in class in a series of projects that ask you to convey information and construct arguments using words and images. Ultimately, the course targets your critical and creative skills and facilitates your development as 21st-century writers.