Susan E. Metros

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Picture Perfect Generation Visual Stimulating
or Visually Literate?

• Susan E. Metros
• smetros_at_usc.edu University of Southern
  California

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Webinar audience
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t h e j o u r n e y
Questions?
Questions?

• Becoming Visually Literate

What does it mean to be literate?

• Affecting change

• The role of the visual

Questions?
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t h e j o u r n e y
What does it mean to be literate?
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Literacy

• the condition or quality of being literate,
  especially the ability to read and write.

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(No Transcript)
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21st Century Literacies

• Cultural

Technological

• Ecological

• Political

Information

• Scientific

Media
Visual

• PersonalSecurity

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Visual Literacy

• Decode and interpret visuals
• Encode and compose meaningful visuals
• Make judgment of accuracy, validity and worth of
  visuals

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Judging Validity

• There is no such thing as inaccuracy in a
  photograph. All photographs are accurate. None
  of them is the truth.

Richard Avedon
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Judging Validity
Luke Frazza, AFP, USA Today, February 24, 2005
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visual literacy continuum
Fluent
Literate

• Stimulated

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• Lives is a visually saturated word
• Interacts with visuals everyday
• Amateur producer and manipulator
• Imitates rather than innovates
• Not enough knowledge to judge

• Stimulated

visual literacy continuum
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Visual Overload

• Environment
• Communication
• Knowledge gathering
• Personal interactions
• Jobs
• Recreation

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Visual Overload

• Clutter and confusion are failures in design,
  not attributes of information.
• (Tufte, 1990)

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Amateur or Authentic?

• Authentic
• denoting an emotionally appropriate, significant,
  purposive, and responsible mode of human life.

• Amateur
• Unprofessional
• Producers not visually literate

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• Understands design vocabulary and concepts
• Informed viewer, decoder, and consumer
• Effective communicator, encoder and producer
• Informed critic of visual information

Literate
visual literacy continuum
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• Is a knowledgeable and highly-skilled innovator,
  designer, composer, and producer

Fluent
visual literacy continuum
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t h e j o u r n e y
Questions?
Questions?

• Becoming Visually Literate

What does it mean to be literate?

• Affecting change

• The role of the visual

Questions?
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t h e j o u r n e y

• Becoming Visually Literate

Learning Styles Dependencies Vocabularies
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Learning Styles
Visual Auditory Kinesthetic

• A behavioral preference
• The way we perceive andprocess things the best
• The way people concentrate when they learn

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Learning Styles
(Bradford, 2004)
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Visual Dependencies

• Communicate instantly and universally
• Social practice
• Economic reliance
• Discipline agnostic

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Vocabularies

• Writing
• letterwordsentenceparagraphrhythmprotagonist
  antagonistsettingpoint of viewhyperbolepers
  onification
• Journalism
• articlestorybeatrepurposeleadkickerspreadi
  nverted pyramid
• Film
• scenescriptpacenarration framingzoom
  pantiltfadecut

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Vocabulary of Vision

• If people arent taught the language of sound
  and images, shouldnt they be considered as
  illiterate as if they left college without being
  able to read or write?
• (Lucas, 2004)

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Vocabulary of Vision

• Elements
• Point
• Line
• Form

• Attributes
• Color/Tone
• Texture
• Volume
• Size

• Relationships
• Structure
• Balance
• Contrast
• Position
• Motion

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t h e j o u r n e y

• The role of the visual

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The Role of the Visual

• Document
• Validate
• Communicate
• Inform
• Engage

• Expose
• Politicize
• Provoke

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Document
The War Tapes, (2006)
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Validate
Childrens Visions of Genocide (Human Rights
Watch, NPR, 2005)
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Communicate
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Inform
World Trade Center, NYC (September 11, 2001)
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Engage
Spore, Electronic Arts (2008)
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Expose
Abu Ghraib Prison (May, 2005)
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Politicize

• Politics will eventually be replaced by imagery.
  The politician will be only too happy to
  abdicate in favor of his or her image, because
  the image will be much more powerful than he or
  she could ever be.
• (McLuhan,1971)

Kennedy/Nixon Presidential Debate (September
26,1960)
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Provoke

• A cartoon published in a Danish newspaper
  depicting Muhammad's turban as a bomb provoked
• Protest marches and deadly riots worldwide
• Attacks and the burning of Danish embassies
  throughout the Middle East
• Costly boycotts of Danish products

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t h e j o u r n e y
Questions?
Questions?

• Becoming Visually Literate

What does it mean to be literate?

• Affecting change

• The role of the visual

Questions?
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t h e j o u r n e y

• Four Models
• Come to us
• Woven into the curriculum
• Systemic change
• Component of something bigger!

• Affecting change

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Come to usOSU Digital Union

• New media production
• Emerging technologies
• Gathering place
• Showcase new tools
• Workshops
• Research
• Corporate sponsors

digitalunion.osu.edu
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Woven into the curriculumUSC Institute for
Multimedia Literacy

• Research on the changing nature of literacy
• Teaches multimedia production
• Provides academic programs in MM scholarship

iml.usc.edu
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Woven into the curriculumVisual literacy
integrated into the mission

• Association of Colleges and Research Libraries
  (ACRL) Guidelines
• Library courses and instruction in information
  literacy should include visual literacy and media
  literacy.
• Clemson General Education Vision
• To more fully integrate visual literacy and
  creativity into the curriculum in an effort to
  expand communication skills, critical thinking,
  ethical judgment, and cultural awareness.

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Systemic changeNMC 21st Century Literacy Summit

1. Develop a strategic research agenda
2. Raise awareness and visibility of the field
3. Make tools for creating and experiencing new
   media broadly available
4. Empower teachers with 21st century literacy
   skills
5. Work as a community

(NMC, 2005)nmc.org/publications/global-imperative
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Component of something bigger Emergency
Preparedness

• USC Provosts charge
• Have courses up for one to three weekswithin one
  week of the disaster
• Assumptions
• Campus is inaccessible
• Power and Internet up and running
• Misconception
• Blackboard is the solution
• A captured lecture is a course

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Component of something bigger Scenario 1 Gen
Ed in the Can

• Select best Gen Ed instructors
• Develop high quality online courses in Bb
• Activate in case of emergency

• Issues
• Who picks instructors?
• Who prioritizes courses?
• Who develops courses?
• Expense
• Currency of content
• Students distracted

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Component of something bigger Scenario 2
Global Crisis Curriculum

• Identify, collect, tag content related to crisis
• Provide Freshman literacy skills modules to
• Create a digital story
• Serve as a citizen journalist
• Chronicle service learning experience
• Write a paper
• Respond to crisis through lens of Gen Ed
  course

• Issues
• Curricular review?
• Cathartic or painful?
• How to coordinate efforts
• How to build content sharing infrastructure

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t h e j o u r n e y
Questions?
Questions?

• Becoming Visually Literate

What does it mean to be literate?

• Affecting change

• The role of the visual

Questions?