Weekly Reading 4 ~ Educators and Mulitmodal texts

"However, when I ask teachers to share a comprehension strategy for making sense of a visual image of multimodal ensemble, I am usually met with the 'deer-in-the-headlights" look we try to avoid during classroom instruction or professional development workshops" (Serafini, 2014).  

Good point Serafini!  It is easy enough to say that we are going to teach our students how to "read" mulitmodal ensembles but exactly how do you do that?  What we take for granted everyday - reading images combined with texts, music, etc... can be much more difficult for a student to understand.  Especially if they are still in the literate stage of their life.  A lot of multimodal imagery is embedded with metaphoric meaning.  I liked Serafini's reference - a picture is worth a thousands words but a thousand words cannot describe a picture.  I have to pause for a moment because I'm not sure myself how to teach multimodal literacy skills.  I am certain we don't just have our students stare at the image until the meaning comes to them.

Flickr Censorship Campaign

Multimodal literacy hits us everyday from artwork, FB memes, text messages, emails, to advertisements for food, hotels, museums, etc... Decoding the messages embedded in multimodal ensembles can vary depending on the context in which they are displayed. Interpreting the information in its context can be difficult and requires skill and practice.  Memes and their meanings have always intrigued me but I have trouble with Political Memes. A meme is "an idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture" (Merriam-Webster Dictionary, 2014).

Wikipedia furthermore states that a meme, "acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols, or practices that can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals, or other imitable phenomena with a mimicked theme. Supporters of the concept regard memes as cultural analogues to genes in that they self-replicate, mutate, and respond to selective pressures" (Wikipedia, 2014).

Politics and the hidden meanings within have always alluded me but occasionally memes do a good job of helping me interpret how the public sees certain political stances.  Education does an excellent job at helping students understand reading and written literacy.  In fact, education is attempting to become more and more innovative in aiding students in understanding text.  But how would a student interpret the Flickr image above? Would they have the tools at their disposal to understand the political background of why Leonardo da Vinci's "Vitruvian Man" has censored stickers all around him?  Politics is a huge topic within our culture. Expanding our student's literacy in visual art, audio, hyperlinks, fonts, and other digital media will help them to understand multimodal ensembles, much like the one above.  The text for the censored stickers on the "Vitruvian Man" is in red and all capital letters combined with strategic placement to make a point. It is up to the "reader" to understand that point.  By having our students create and practice with multimodal literacy we can better ready them for a world full of memes and other media images.

Literacy Mountain

"... more recent definitions of literacy suggest it is as much a social practice as it is an individual cognitive skill" (Serafini, 2014). Serafini suggests that literacy is something we "do" in a social context depending on the situation. This is an interesting point. Serafini defined it much the same way I do but I like his wording. From the time an individual wakes up till the individual goes to sleep their literacy skills will require "reading" a clock, road signs, facial expressions, emails, photographs, work memos, gas receipts, television ads, dinner manners, time-clock punch cards, Candy Crush, FB memes, Twitter "tweets", and the list goes on... The visual component of literacy is often lost in the rush to make sure everyone can read print. Considering visual literacy across several different theoretical perspective such as feminism, political, historical, etc... is what intrigues me in Serafini's book "Reading the Visual." The context of the imagery is an important part of reading the picture correctly.  

Feminist

I find the image to the right appealing since I am a woman. She is literally wearing her make-up like war paint and her face is contorted as though she is going to war. She is sick of being trapped in a world where being a feminist has a particular definition which people believe cannot be combined with what she feels a feminist is. She's trapped and she's mad... I can relate to this information. How do you help someone who has never been in this situation? How would a man interpret this information? It is a valid issue in our society and culture today. It could potentially be an image our students see. How would they interpret this?

Visual literacy in regards to our students is important because of the media images that they are constantly being bombarded with from all angles.  How do they interpret what is false and what is true and are they interpreting the imagery correct?  Aiding our students in visual interpretations will help them become a responsible citizen that understands current and past politics, various philosophies, historical contexts, and other relevant topics in our culture and society.  Especially in our growing digital savvy society.


Citations

Merriam-Webster Dictionary. (2014). Definition of meme. Retrieved on June 15, 2014 from
     http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/meme

Serafini, F. (2014). Reading the visual: an introduction to teaching multimodal literacy. (p. 4, 19). New
     York, NY: Teachers College Press.

Wikipedia. (2014, June` 12). Meme. Retrieved on June 15, 2014 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meme