Tag Archives: CTW

CTW 3

Posted on by

b80b2e4ac138f32ef8ae02c96dce8ac5

Comics have entered the classroom, and educators have taken notice.

Traditionally viewed in academia as less than, comics had been relegated to the realm of entertainment. Now, however, academics have begun to understand that comics enable a presentation of information in different ways than traditional academic texts allow. Comics are bridging the gap between the public and the academic, and deconstructing complex ideas for general consumption.

The rise of comics within the classroom and the academic realm has inspired discussions on the construction of comics as multimodal texts, the validity of comic arguments, and the challenges this imposes on the traditional academic power structure.

In creative presentations of dissertations, two academics have explored the concepts of the rise and the power within and behind a comic book. Aaron Scott Humphrey wrote the comic/dissertation, Multimodal Authoring and Authority in Educational Comics: Introducing Derrida and Foucault for Beginners, in which he explores the collaborative nature of comic construction, and the struggle for voice and authority that arises within a multiple person creation. Nick Sousanis presented his dissertation in the comic, Unflattening, which he discussed in an interview with Steve Dahlberg and Mary Alice Long on BlogTalkRadio, “Artist Nick Sousanis on the Power of Visuals (& Comics) on Learning & Creativity.” Sousanis’ work explores the challenge comics provide the academic structure, opening content to a broader audience by breaking down complex arguments with visual aids.

Multimodal compositions have grown in number with the rise of technology. But utilizing multiple modes in creating a text of sorts is not confined to a computer. By looking at comics, we can examine multimodal compositions that have been constructed with layers of meaning, enabling visuals and handwriting to express ideas that are closed to a traditionally typed academic paper. It is a way of integrating thoughts and presenting them with a “focus on readability,” using “metaphorical language and visuals to engage people” (Sousanis).

At the heart of Humphrey’s dissertation is authorial voice. Within a written text the voice is apparent through word choice, sentence structure, and organization. However, what happens to that voice when a second of third person becomes involved? How do an author and an artist and/or a designer, when working together, impact the voice and the authority within the text? How do the words and the pictures work together or against each other? And what does that do for, or take away from, the text, and the readers’ experience with the text? This is the basic struggle within all collaboration as people attempt to balance their parts with others, or try to usurp control of the final product altogether. Humphrey provides examples of comics where collaboration works well and examples where there is an obvious power struggle. He exposes that an authorial power struggle exists, but that some are better at balancing it than others. This exhibition shows that when its working it strengthens the text through a cohesive presentation of the argument, and when the conflict is apparent it weakens the argument because it distracts and leaves the reader in unease, unsure as to which elements hold the key to understanding the presented concepts.

What it not addressed is how this struggle in creation ultimately affects the reader’s experience and understanding of the text? Rather than contribute to the spread of ideas, could a comic full of struggles conflate the argument and confuse the reader? Or worse, could it turn a new comic reader off, losing the chance to engage the reader in multifaceted ideas?

In Unflattening, Nick Sousanis explores the potential of a comic to help spread compound ideas to more viewers outside of academia. By presenting complex ideas in a nontraditional way, comics enable a broader audience to participate with the material, expanding educational possibilities. With the aid of visuals and conscious choice of language, comics create potential. Comics enable the deconstruction of a complex idea that is “not dumbing down an argument but letting the audience come up to the argument” (Sousanis). By breaking with the traditional mode of presentation—the typed paper—comics challenge the academic power structure, open doors, and expand possibility.

While I agree that the potential is there and comics could be extremely powerful in regards to information distribution, I wonder how they can be better circulated and dispersed within society in order to achieve their full potential? There is a stigma attached to comics, an assumption that they are frivolous or nerdy. While the embracement of academia will contribute to the breaking of this stigma, I wonder how much it will help and what could be done to improve comics’ reputation within the general population, so that they can be used as effective information disseminators?

Regardless of the main ideas in both Humphrey’s and Sousanis’ dissertations, they both challenged the traditional educational presentation of a wordy, academic term-specific presentation of a thorough research project. Both were able to control the authorial voice through handwriting, and expand the layers of meaning in their texts by using visuals and layout. Humphrey in particular has a very noticeable voice as he drew himself on the bottom of several pages with personal comments. Sousanis sought to create meaning with what was presented as well as what wasn’t presented, using white space for emphasis.

Effective and incredibly interesting, the works of Humphrey and Sousanis contribute to the discussion of multimodal texts and the contribution of presentation to arguments. As Humphrey says on page 20 of Multimodal Authoring and Authority in Educational Comics: Introducing Derrida and Foucault for Beginners, “Comics can show us new ways of thinking about language and power.” I think the real understanding of this has just begun, and as comics are utilized more and more within academia, we will understand more and more how they challenge and change what we known thus far.

 

________________________________________________________

Educational Comic from Comic Relief on Pinterest.

________________________________________________________

Sources:

“Artist Nick Sousanis on the Power of Visuals (& Comics) on Learning & Creativity.” Interview by Steve Dahlberg and Mary Alice Long. BlogTalkRadio. BlogTalkRadio, June 2015. Web. 19 Mar. 2016.

Humphrey, Aaron Scott. “Multimodal Authoring and Authority in Educational Comics: Introducing Derrida and Foucault for Beginners.” DHQ: Digital Humanities Quarterly. Alliance of Digital Humanities Organizations, 4 Sept. 2015. Web. 19 Mar. 2016.

Critical Thinking Through Writing 2

Posted on by
“Assemblage theory . . . emphasizes fluidity, exchangeability, and multiple functionalities. Assemblages appear to be functioning as a whole, but are actually coherent bits of a system whose components can be ‘yanked’ out of one system, ‘plugged’ into another, and still work”

–“Assemblage Theory,” University of Texas

________________________________________________________

5313847516_c10bb0c570

The pieces of the pie.

The parts that are able to combine and make meaning, change, evolve, or exchange and create alternate meanings are assemblages.

This also defines media flow. A flow that is not a linear path, like a river, but is instead a series of things that are linked to one another, connected, and interact (Reeves 316). The flow can move back and forth connecting one idea or bit of information to another.

It is the parts rather than the sum, yet all the parts combine to create meaning of some sort.

________________________________________________________

Media flow is the main idea of Joshua Reeves’ “Temptation and Its Discontents: Digital Rhetoric, Flow, and the Possible.” Reeves explores the “flow” of digital compositions on the World Wide Web, examining how presentation of multimodal compositions impacts audience interaction with the composition, and how the audience is both liberated and constrained by it.

Traditional rhetorical texts possess a linear flow that leads the audience down the author’s intended path. Through the rise of multimodal compositions online, texts now have images, videos, links, and advertisements; there is information everywhere, leading the audience on divergent paths.

Like this…

Having options in a text provides audiences with a sense of autonomy and choice, however Reeves’ thinks that choice is an illusion and that texts are still carefully crafted to provide an audience with specific information.

After reading Reeves’ article I began to look differently at websites. Specific things are linked and embedded to create a structured flow where the options of what you can follow are carefully selected for you. For example, on the University of Texas website, “Assemblage Theory” cited above, the only linked words are “Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.” Why are other words not linked, such as “Gilles Deleuze” or “Organismic Matter”? Are they any less important? What are the purposes of choosing which words to link and which to not link? By leaving things out, either purposefully or coincidentally, the composer is altering the possibilities.  While we feel like we have control as the audience (we get to chose whether we click or not), the composers purposeful presentation controls our experience and knowledge acquisition (by limiting what we can click).

So, what does this mean for our interactions with texts?  How did the previous video alter the flow of this composition?  How have my linking decisions (to link or not to link) affected your choice to click or not?  How, as the composer have I altered your interaction with this text?

________________________________________________________

Teresa Rizzo in the article “Television Assemblages” uses the assemblage theory also in relation to media, but focuses on the evolution of television into a multiplatform model. She explains how television had been viewed as a single static entity, but it is really just a sum of parts. Those parts have changed and taken new forms into what is now a “network of connections” with the Internet and technology disrupting the television consumption algorithm (Rizzo).

Television is no longer dependent upon a large broadcast network, confined to a set schedule, or stuck in the living room. Shows and movies can now be watched anytime, anywhere, as mobility emerges. Interaction and participation are prevalent as audience members create their own content and comment on what they are watching. This generates all kinds of possibilities. What will be actualized is yet to be seen and depends upon the configuration of assemblages.

This stance on possibility, what could happen and what actually happens, is linked to linearity.  Rizzo thinks that linearity does not exist within assemblages, rather a “linear cause and effect logic” is only in hindsight, once you already know what happened—“it only has determinacy when read retroactively; it could always have happened otherwise” (Rizzo). If assemblages are all about “an infinite number of possibilities” then it leaves no straightforward linear path (Rizzo). While I find this to be interesting, I wonder if anything can be truly linear then? Can the concept of linearity even exist? If not, then has linear composition been a false idea in rhetoric all along?  Perhaps it is the lover of narrative in me, but I have a difficult time believing Rizzo’s point here.

________________________________________________________

Besides debating the concept of linearity, the articles are in conversation with each other concerning customization.  Personalization enables a device to respond to the likes and dislikes of that particular person. While this concept seems like a great filter, I wonder what costs are associated with it.

Personal data collection is everywhere. Rizzo speaks of children using devices to watch television, well then what sort of information is being collected on our kids? Reeves thinks that “[v]irtually every move we make on the Web is being captured and analyzed by strategists who are designing ever more refined ways to govern our lives on and offline” (326).  Composers, producers, and advertisers are purposefully structuring our media flow to achieve their own goals.  Based on the ads that pop up on my computer, I’d agree.

Despite the wealth of information available in the world, both theorist worry that websites and applications will become so personalized that people will not continue to be exposed to new knowledge and differing opinions. Reeves calls this the “echo chamber,” where we only see and hear things that agree with us, stunting our growth and prohibiting ourselves from emerging into our potential.  I believe people do this anyway.  Our environment and our personal choices affect what we see and hear.  Some people chose to tune out what they don’t agree with.  Through the emergence of personalization in technology, I think that the audience still has a legitimate choice, to close things out or to open to possibility.

As media continues to change, reorganizing its assemblages and flowing through the channels of technology, it will be interesting to see how rhetoric in these spaces emerges. I tend to think that much will stay the same, with adaptions here and there to fit the needs of changing technology.  As more and more websites and applications are developed, the way in which we interact with compositions evolves.  By going mobile and breaking with linear tradition, there is no telling where it will go from here.

Oh, the possibilities.

________________________________________________________

Photograph:

The class-distribution of another library’s collection by Mace Ojala, complements of Creative Commons and Flickr.

________________________________________________________

Works Cited:

“Assemblage Theory.” Texas Theory. University of Texas, 2010. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.

Reeves, Joshua. “Temptation And Its Discontents: Digital Rhetoric, Flow, And The Possible.” Rhetoric Review 32.3 (2013): 314-330. Academic Search Complete. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.

Rizzo, Teresa. “Television Assemblages.” The Fibreculture Journal 24 (2015): n. pag. The Fibreculture Journal. Open Humanities Press. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.