introduction: What’s the Point?
How often do you stop to think about the medium in which you are communicating? How does a specific medium change the way you write? What does it mean to “read” an image? How does our use of technology shape the way we communicate? What theories inform our relationships with media?
The ability to communicate effectively in multiple types of media is a crucial part of literacy in our society. In this class, we will explore the intersections between various media: print, film, images, sound, etc. Through the course, we will develop an approach for understanding and composing multimedia products while attempting to identify (and challenge) the implicit conventions of media. Along the way, we will consider the ways in which writing (as an object and as a practice) is shaped by these multimodal interactions from both theoretical and practical perspectives.
By integrating practical activities with broader theoretical issues, we will work on developing effective strategies for designing multimedia presentations that integrate text, photography, video and sound. Class sessions will be held in the Apple Mac lab in the CITES Nevada lab and will be a combination of in-class practice and discussion.
