While my high school career only ended around six years ago, I do not recall courses such as this being offered. However, through further research on the topic of teaching “visual literacy” at the high school level, I found that this has become much more common. In a 2008 article by Debby Zambo (which I have sent in an e-mail to all of you), she discusses how teaching the concepts of visual literacy to adolescents have been proven to help them greatly in their social development as well as enhances their critical thinking skills.
The article explains that our youth today live in a very visual world and as such this can affect how they look at themselves, the choices they make about their future as well as the friends they select. For this reason the author believes that knowing how to “interrogate and critique an image’s purpose and emotional effect” can help adolescent to let go of some surface level values they have acquired about image, culture and society.
In class last week, we talked about how creating visuals can be a science and an art. While I agree that both realms come into play, I believe this study makes a strong case for viewing it as a science. The idea that the images we create could potentially have an effect on how someone views themselves or judges other people is a scary-thought in itself. However, knowing that in high schools we are using the principles and concepts of visual literacy to help breakdown these social barriers is a powerful thing.
As a behavioral science major it interested me to see how analyzing different graphics and photographs made me challenge my own values. Below I have included images which have come under scrutiny for the psychological and contreversial messages they conveyed to those who viewed them.
I’m very interested to see the classes opinion on teaching visual literacy in high school, but also on these images, and the messages you believe were conveyed through the editing and composition of these graphics, and the techniques used to hone the points each image made.
Controversial Graphics:
Image #1: Killer Heels
Image 2: OJ Simpson Covers
Image 3: United Hearts
This is a really interesting post. I am surprised as well that your sister is required to take this course which includes visual literacy. The art classes I took in high school were more about composition and constructing products rather than learning about the topics we have been discussing in class. I think this is a great course to offer in high school, I am not too sure it needs to be a requirement though. I think that with technology on the rise kids are becoming more visual. They are becoming more aware of the way people around them look as they are submerged in the media. I think that having these skills to analyze media will help let go of those surface level values the article discusses.
ReplyDeleteWhen looking at the pictures you posted, I think they are up for interpretation and that is the great part about them! The first picture makes me think that those killer heels belong to a strong woman who can walk right over a man and make it to the top. The other picture I really liked what the United Hearts image. To me is shows that it does not matter what race you are, humans have the same heart and there is no way around that!
I think it’s a great idea to teach visual awareness. We’re constantly inundated with imagery, and while we do analyze some of it, many of the cultural messages sent slide under our radar. For a science writing class last year we analyzed the use of metaphor and its insidious power. A great deal of context and meaning is transferred without us even knowing it. The same can be said of visual imagery, and awareness of the fact that we’re receiving messages allows us to better interpret them. While the article focuses on promoting visual awareness in adolescents, I think it’s a valuable tool for everyone.
ReplyDeleteGreat post George!
ReplyDeleteDebby Zambo’s article was intriguing to say the least. I find that she really hits home some great thoughts on critical thinking and visual interpretation of media.
One of the issues facing high school students, is their inability to grasp the concept of “critical thinking” in terms of looking at the big picture. We are finding that some of the students we work with in the PIR program are not prepared for higher education as far as reading, writing and critical thinking skills.
I agree that visual literacy, among other things, needs to be introduced to students beginning in Middle School. It will go a long way to opening their hearts and minds to the reality of the world and not just the fantasy of movies and television. They can gain a better understanding at that age when they are still very impressionable.
I definitely believe that it should be a required course. Especially given the amount of influence media has on all of us, as well as, the extraordinary amount of media presented to us on a daily basis. Everyone needs to be able to see through the message and understand its sole intent or purpose.
If high schools teach students the basics of visual literacy, the college visual literacy class that we were talking about in Jeanne’s post could be avoided. By having high school students become familiar with the concept of visual literacy, once they get to college the expectations for their work can be higher. With technology growing at a fast pace, younger and younger kids are going to be experts at using technology and we are going to start seeing visual literacy classes starting at lower grades each year. Is this better or worse? I’m not sure, but I do think that it’s important to educate children and offer them with the necessary tools to succeed in today’s society.
ReplyDeleteI am really impressed that you sister is taking this class in high school, and kudos to the high school for offering the course. With new ways of consuming visual media, come new ways to create visual media. One of the tech blogs I frequent posted late last year about a law being preposed in France that would require all visual artists to indicate what, if any Photoshopping they had done to their images. The blogger took this a step further and said, essentially, that they should also have to disclose what high-end lighting was used, along with the multi-thousand dollar camera, and also whatever set-design, art direction, or anything else used in the production of this artificial world.
ReplyDeleteThis blogger wrote this not in seriousness, but as a way to illustrate much of what goes in to a lot of the media that we consume. I would like to some day count the amount of visuals I encounter in a given day, and how many of those visuals are meant to sell me something, or manipulate my opinion in some way? How would I be effected by this if I had no experience with visual design? This is why I think it is important that visual literacy be taught to more students, in order to make students educated and enlightened to an aspect of their society that has incredible influence.
I agree with all of you guys on the importance of visual literacy. As a cultural communication major, one of the classes I took was communication and pop culture. I would say that about 80% of the class involved analyzing messages sent through the visuals, like the ones in your post, that we all see every day.
ReplyDeleteLike Dave was discussing that much of the visuals if not all which we consume on a daily bases are manipulated for a number of reasons.
What I still find interesting are the intense effects that these images can have. In the class that I took we looked at how mediated images effect the self. This includes mediated images of race, gender, sexuality and age just to name a few. The power which an image can have is amazing.
Tom Ford is a fashion designer, and he is known for his shocking and provocative images, used to sell his product (check out his sight tomford.com). His advertisements capitalize on a certain view point to sell something. Without going into too much detail, and he may not know it, but he is also selling a frame of mind, so too speak.
I think that having a class with exposes students to the tools used to manipulate us is very important and helpful, especially as students are being targeted at such a young age.