Week 12 - PHOTOJOURNALISM

Photojournalism is one of the most important  career in the media. This is because images taken by photojournalists plays a major influence and can shape viewers perception.  For this week’s journal, I would like to argue  to what extent is editing a photograph considered ethical in photojournalism.  The reason why I would like to argue about this topic is because I am interested in photojournalism and photographs that I have seen portrayed in the media has affected me.

Photojournalism is where pictures of events are taken about the truth values and showed to the world through the use of media. According to Eastlake, (1857,p.24) “Photography bears witness to the passage of time, but it cannot select or order the relative importance of things at any time”.  Images have always been appreciated by the message of ‘eyewitnessing’ authority and the idea of ‘having been there”. According to McCullin (1987, p.11), it’s not a case of “There but for the grace of God go I”: it’s a case of “ive been there”. Photographs are used for displaying events of war which nobody will get the chance to witness except for the photo journalist.

  However, there are debates between scholars that claim photojournalism is dead.  Mitchell (n.d , p.20) suggest that we have already moved in a ‘post-photographic era’. The old photograph has been replaced by the new photograph through the means of the emergence of latest technology called editing. This raise questions because if photojournalist edit their photographs, where does the truth value of the photograph lie.  

The above photograph shows an example of manipulation of photographs that can be done with the latest technology. If we observe, on the left is the image of a shark that has been washed ashore. However, on the right side of the photograph is the edited version of the shark which makes it look more like a dinosaur washed ashore. Notice that the little boy in the left image has also disappeared on the right image. This photo manipulation is absolutely prohibited in photo journalism because it is able to give false information to the viewers and this is against the ethics of photojournalism. Photographs like this questions the existence of photojournalism, and whether it is still alive or dead with the rise of the new photograph. According to Rodchenko, (p.135, n.d), “we can no longer be sure that the image we see documents anything at all....photogaphers need to be aware of the issues determining his or her approach to the subject as well as the ethical implications and the representational consideration.”

It is important for a photo journalist to present only what is the truth to the viewers. This is because the status of the photograph as evidence is not questioned by anyone. Photographs are taken for granted. Like what Minto (1970, pg. 31) pointed out, “More than words, more than paintings or prints , old photographs convey an immediate, undistorted impression of the past”.

Below is a picture taken from the The Independant newspaper.  The photo depicts poverty in Africa and the number of children that is dying due to starvation, war and poverty. I chose this image because it is very heart breaking to see that the boy is left sitting with a skull beside it. I believe that the image creates a social critic towards the government of Africa.

Figure 1

In this picture, the image itself is enough to express the intended meaning of the story. As a visual communicator, we can use semiotics to analyse the picture. We can analyse the denotations of the image which is the boy, skull and deserted place. However, the image also  connotes poverty and death. As long as the journalist retains the truth value in the photograph then it is considered to be an ethical photograph.

In photojournalism, there are ethics to taking photographs. There are arguments between theorists that we are now moving from old photography to new photography. The debate is that new photography is able to create many changes through the use of editing without even being detected . Thus if this is happening, how far can the photographs taken by photojournalism represent the truth value?

With the emergence of new photography, pictures can be edited  with  ease and manipulation of photographs can be done without getting detected at all because it leaves no evidence of changes. This is the consequences of the change from analogue to digital photography.  Nowadays, we rarely see photographs in their original state as it is portrayed to us through magazines , newspapers, advertisements etc. Here, their social meaning has designed them into the space often accompanied by text that gives us the prefered reading of the producers. Captions from news reports are also able to distort the truth of the image. As Harold Evans stated, “It is one of the central contributions of photojournalism that it goes beyond the limits of imagination. It makes the unbelievable believable” ( Warburton, 1998, p. 150 )

Above is an example of doctoring President Obama’s photograph. The original photograph on the right was taken by Reuters photographer, Larry Downing which shows Coast Guard Admiral Thad W. Allen and Charlotte Randolph, a local parish president, standing alongside the President. However,  Emma Duncan, Deputy editor of the Economist magazine admitted that she  cropped the picture and made Obama looked as if he was isolated , as we can see in the left picture because "Charlotte Randolph was an unknown woman to the public and it might cause the public to be puzzled." (cited from http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/).  However, Reuters was dissapointed because according to one of Reuters spokesman, "Reuters has a strict policy against modifying, removing, adding to or altering any of its photographs without first obtaining the permission of Reuters and, where necessary, the third parties referred to" (cited from http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/).  This changes the meaning of the image and makes Obama look as if he is lonely and staring into the water. According to the editor of The Economist magazine, she edited the photograph "not because she wanted Obama to look isolated but it is because she wanted the readers or viewers to focus on Obama" (cited from http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/). Here, it is already an evidence that the media has edited the image for the sake of shaping the perception of the audience into how they want the audience to percieve the image. Hence, their social meaning has "designed them into the space often accompanied by text that gives us the prefered reading of the producers" ( Stuart, 2005). For people who have only seen the left photograph and not the right photograph, their perception towards how and the way they interprete the photograph is totally different from how the photograph should be interpreted if they have seen the original photograph before cropping. Here, we can see that just by cropping the picture, it can cause major change to the way an image is presented thus it can change the meaning of the image.

However, there are certain exceptions to where photojournalists are allowed to edit their photographs. For example, minor adjustment of colours , burning in of important details or cropping out unnecessary information is acceptable in certain circumstances. Adding a caption to give identity to the image about place, time and events happening is also accepted.

Here, is another  case study of a photojournalist Dr. Bernardo who photographed children in the 1870’s to show their condition and appearance in order to aid his fund raising enterprise for his children’s home. He used the diachrome technique of before and after pictures ( which involves editing issues and moral selection) for this cause. However, Barnardo was accused of falsifying informations by making the children look worst than in actuality and he was taken to court and found guilty of ‘artistic fiction’ (  Wright, 1999,p. 137). This is because he has exagerrated the fact and what his photograph represent is not the actual truth. This event shows that editing image even for a good cause is unethical and against the law. The most important rule that every journalist must follow is to present the photo to the public as the truth value and the originality of the photograph should be preserved.  According to an American journalist, 'it is a tradition...that when an event or history is raised to a level of great importance, we use pictures to reflect that importance" (Bill Marinow, cited in Nesbitt, 2001, pg. 23).

Nevertheless, to remain a good photojournalist, the photograph taken should represent the truth value to the viewers and should be presented to the viewers as the camera’s eye view.  Editing can only be acceptable at a certain condition. If this is practised among all photo journalist ,then hopefully photojournalism can last and not be overtaken by what is called the new photography in order to maintain the truth and to let the world see what is true.  

REFERENCES.

Zelizer, B. (2005), Journalism through the camera’s eyes. In Allan, S. (ed.), Journalism : Critical issues . Berkshire : Open University Press . Retrieved November 1 , 2010 from UBD Ebrary Website.

Warburton ,N. (1998). Electrical photojournalism in the ae of the electronic darkroom.In Kieran, M.(ed), Media ethics, London: Routledge. Retrieved from November 2, 2010 from UBD Ebrary Website.

 Warburton, N. (1991), Varieties of photographic representation, History of Photograph. London: Gordon

http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/farid/research/digitaltampering/index4.html retrieved on November, 3, 2010

Week 11 - INFORMATIONAL GRAPHICS



A photo by Chris Jordan which depicts 200,000 packs of cigarettes, equal to the number of Americans who died from cigarette smoking every six month



In week 11, the topic on informational graphics was introduce to us. Here, we were demonstrated the use of information graphics as a very powerful tool for visual communication. For this week’s journal, I will be exploring the importance of information graphics as a part of visual communications and how the use of information graphic is able to capture audience attention and summarise long details in order for audience to remember and understand what is being presented easily. The reason why I want to write about the importance of information graphics as part of visual communication is because I believe that information graphics plays a powerful role in relaying messages to the audience than if data was presented  only verbally and presented in a text full of words.

Informational graphics are “visual displays with accompanying labels and text that helps explain an illustration’s meaning”( Informational Graphics and the Six Perspective, p.194). Here, is a very famous image of a skull presented as an information graphics by Chris Jordan. The image is very carefully created by the producer . This famous image has a caption which reads, “ Depicts 200,000 packs of cigarettes, equal to the number of Americans who die from cigarette smoking very six months.” It is amazing to see that the  producer of this image use graphical form to explain the statistics instead of using words. According to Lidman & Lund (1972, p.171), “people usually see the pictures before reading the text.”. The image here creates a visual stimulus for the viewers and it is very ‘eye catchy’. Chris Jordan may have chosen to give out the statistics in graphical form because it creates a resonance in the mind of the viewers thus the image will have a stronger effect on the audience then if the statistics were explained only by words. Braden & Beauchamp (1986) makes a distinction between ‘reader slides’ and ‘picture slides’.  Informagraphics combines the intellectual satisfaction of words with the emotional power of visual messages.

 According to Neurath (1925), “words divide, pictures unite.” An example of pictures uniting people is when people in a common culture become more literate to visual communications, people from different cultures can be united in their mutual understanding of the information conveyed by the pictures contained in informational graphics. For example, if the statistics of the cigarette above is presented in English, people who are illiterate in English or who do not understand English will not be able to understand what the intended message is all about hence people will not take notice of it, however, when it is represented as a graphic image relaying information,  people from all over the world with different cultures will be able to understand what the message is trying to say.  They are able to see the skull and the number of box of cigarettes and are able to interprete the meaning of the visual information graphic without any language barrier. However, the infographic designers need to be careful in choosing the symbolism for communicating a message to the audience (cited from Information graphic, p.210) .

Imagine a world without images and if all the data representation is to be represented in long words, the audience will have a problem in remembering all the important data. "Information graphics provide the reader with a rapid and easily grasped overall view of a message and are therefore highly suitable as an introduction to and summary of a subject" ( Pettersson, 1993, p.173).   Today, information graphics have been used widely to represent a huge number of statistics as well as representation of numbers, weather forecasts and many others. Information graphics can be used in  charts, graphs, maps, whether charts etc.  It is used in presentations, newspapers, reports, television and magazine news etc.

However, it is also important to note that different rules apply to different graphs. The type of graph used depends on the informations about the statistics that we want to present to the audience. The info graphic has to be in a clear structure in order be able to compare datas. For example if the producer wants to compare and contrast data, it is best for him to use a barchart. Likewise, if he is to compare the trends , linechart will be the best information graphics for him to use.

In creating information graphics, ethics is one of the most important thing to take into consideration. There are a few ethical issues that information graphic designers do to manipulate the audience when creating the information graphics. For example, when creating a bar chart, the scales on the x and y axis should be divided equally. If say the scale is labelled at an interval of 5 hence the following numbers has to follow the same pattern as well. If not, this will result in misrepresentation of the data.

Information graphics does not always show the true representation of numbers . The quotation by Benjamin Disraeli below states the point that “statistical representation of numerical facts can easily distort the truth”. (cited from Informational Graphics and the six perspectives, p.207) .

There are 3 kinds of lies : "lies, damned lies and statistics". – Benjamin Disraeli, Prime Minister

According to Daryl Moen (1987, cited from Informational Graphic, p. 208)  when he noted Dew Jones Industrial average fell he noticed that 60 percent of the newspaper used infographics to highlight the crash on the front page. However , 13 percent contained factual errors and 33 percent had designed errors that visually distorted the figures.  The writer in journalism stated that the reason why errors and visual distortions occur so frequently is because infographic producers believe that if information graphics was used to grab the viewers attention then presentation errors and decorative flourishes can be overlooked. Furthermore, only a few individuals are familiar with words, number , picutrs and computer operations to identify misleading infographics.  This is a huge ethical problem to be considered when creating the infograph.

One of the critic for Information graphics, Tufte (1983, p. 208, ), said that “a high quality infographic should have an important message to communicate, convey information in a clear and precise manner, should never insult the intelligence of viewers and always tell the truth.” He further argues that the presentation is never more important than the story. He terms infographics loaded with designs as “chartjunk”. He emphasised that these informational graphic serve to entertain then educate the viewers.

However, Tufte’s idea of ‘chartjunk’ has been criticized by Holmes (1983, p. 208) as he claims that people watch television to entertain and they wouldn’t buy newspapers that doesn’t reflect same characteristics. Charts should however accurately reflect the data that they are portraying. This is because images generally have a greater emotional impact than words and chances of misleading  people in visual images is higher.

Using the knowledge of visual communications, the gestalt theory can be applied to this image because the accumulation of the 200,00 packets of cigarette being combined into a collage of a skull is  . As what Wertheimer ( p.53, 2005) said, “The whole is different from the sum of its parts.” This shows that if the cigarette box was to be placed on its own, it would not have created the same effect as when it is combined into the shape of a skull. This is the beauty of gestalt effect in relation to visual communication.

 The skull here , is also a representation of death. A representation refers to the “ use of language and images to create meaning about the world around us” (Image, Power and Politics, p.12).  The skull connotes danger, fear, death and many negative connotations. If we analyse this image, this skull also has a narration within it. This particular image of the skull has a story to tell. Thus, by using this image as an information graphic to represent the number of deaths in America caused by the people who smoke has a very powerful effect as perceptions and communication between the image and the viewers takes place. thus audience are able to understand the message that Chris Jordan intended to relay to them. 

Nevertheless, information graphics is very important in relaying information to the audience in a short matter of time.  The informational graphic tells a story that is too tedious for words, yet too simplified for photographs alone. We can imagine if the producer of the image is to relay that message in words, it will not be as effective as the visual image. Thus information graphics is very powerful and useful tool in getting the audience to understand and digest the information being relayed to them in a short matter of time.

REFERENCES

Tufte, E.R (1990), Escaping flatland, The visual display of quantitative information. Connecticut : Graphics Press.

Petterson.R, (1943), Visual for Information. New Jersey : Educational Technology Publications, Inc.

Lester , P.M (1995) Informational graphics. Visual communication : Images with messages. California : Wasworth Publishing.

Week 10 - CYBERCULTURE- MACHINES AND AVATAR IN THE INFORMATION WORLD.

During the 10^th week lecture,  we were introduced to the topic of cyberculture and the virtual world. Cyberculture is a very interesting topic as it introduces us into the virtual world that some of us have never encountered before. In this week’s journal, I would like to explore about human beings becoming a cyborg in today’s world and  at the same time i would like to explore as to why people nowadays would prefer living in the virtual world whereas a real world where we can see the fact of reality exist. The reason why I want to explore this subject is because I have a friend who is always attached to the virtual world where he spends almost three-quarter of the day in the game called Tibia-Me which is similar to WarCraft except that it is a smaller version of  it.

Gibson terms cyberspace as ‘consensual hallucination’ (p.78, n.d), where it shares a common vision with virtual reality which is the ‘tunnel vision’. “Tunnel vision” here refers to where the members of the virtual community only pays attention to what they see in the visual world and ignore the real world.

In today’s world, innovations such as latest gadgets and technologies being invented at a fast pace. Here, technology plays a major role in the lives of every human being. Nowadays, the use of internet is very popular among people of all ages. Internet games, Chatrooms, Social Networking Sites are among the applications that have been created online. Because of this innovations, human beings tend to nowadays be called cyborgs because they cannot detach themselves from what we call the ‘cyberworld.”

Cyborg is defined as a “cybernetic organism where it has both artificial and biological systems which is a hybrid of human and machine” ( Pyle, p.124).  In today’s world, there are arguments among some scholars that human beings are becoming cyborgs. Humans are indeed cyborgian in nature, this is because humans cannot detach from the everyday use of machineries and technologies. But this does not mean all human beings are cyborgian because there are certain technological conditions that must be met to be considered a cyborg.  Technology and machineries has become a part of human beings.  If a body can be recreated , then it would mean that a body is a machine. I will demonstrate this example from the movie, ROBOCOP, where the police officer Murphy was shot in the head and was declared dead. Because he was dead technology used his body to create a bionic police thus a cyborg was created.  Robocop’s brain is human and he is still able to think for himself. Although his physical body is made of steel and his action is programmed by computer, he still has his memories and a human touch in him. This shows that Robocop is half human and half machine thus is a cyborg. Springer            ( p.82, n1991)  claims that cyborg involves “transforming the self into something entirely new, combining technological with human identity”.

Video Clip of Robocop

It is unavoidable in today’s world that we are living in because technology is getting higher and human beings are unconsciously forced into using technologies which will create them into a cyborg.  For example in today’s world, it is unavoidable for students to live without their laptops for assignments, and handphone is a very essential tool for communication in today’s world. Obviously our daily lives are dependant on technology because of globalization and it is almost impossible to survive in this world without the use of technology. According to Rheingold (1994, p.147) , the use of computer-mediated communications is driven by ‘ the hunger for community that grows in the breasts of people around the world as more and more informal public spaces disappear from our real lives.’ The need of high technologies such as computers in our everyday lives is the consequences of virtual community living in the virtual world.

A virtual world is where the cyberworld enables human beings to create another of their own identity in the fantasy world through the use of games and internet. For example the famous Tibia-Me is part of a cyber culture which enables the virtual community to create their own identity online into whoever they want to be. The game is played by people of all ages from all over the world. This game is a similar version of War of Witchcraft where it enables the virtual community to own characters, fight, gain weapons etc. However, this game of virtual reality can be played on the handphone thus people don’t have to stay in their rooms to play the game but they can go almost anywhere and play the online game anywhere they want.

Graphic from a Virtual World

Virtual reality according to Sherman and Judkins (1992, p.78 ) “is the hope for the next century. It may indeed afford a glimpse of heaven.” In virtual reality, almost everything that you dream of can come true. Sherman and Judkins further states that virtual reality allows us “to play God”. You are able to change your life and make life go according to what you want in virtual reality. Identities can be changed and discarded anytime you want. In contrast to the real world, as Lanier (1991, p.81) argues that we have to submit to the dictates of this frustrating reality and that “not only are we forced to live in the physical world.......but we are almost powerless in it.” Lanier describes the real world as “really something like a prison”. Here, we can see that the reasons that Lanier stated out has perhaps contributed to people participating in the virtual community.

The fact that many people are involved in a virtual world is indeed creating a social problem as many people tend to detach themselves to the real world and participate in anything that goes on in the virtual world. They have lost touch with the physical surroundings .Christopher Lasch argued that “it registers a significant transformation in the relationship between the self and the social world outside.” Furthermore, Mongardini (1992, p.61 ) claims that because of the existence of virtual reality, there is now ‘ a greater sense of alienation that makes it increasingly difficult to have relationships that demand more of the personality such as love, friendship, generosity, forms of identification....”. 

Another problem that can be identified is the loss of identity in the real world. People seem to be living in the illusionary world creating a new identity which they dream of. Here, Mongardini (1992, p. 61) argues that “it leads individuals to give up the unity and coherence of their own identity, both on the psychological and sociological level”. As an outsider and a community of the real world, we see this as pathetic because we can see that there is a loss of identity.      

Nevertheless, there should be a solution to the problem in order for people not to lose touch with the real world and not to lose identities. However, the fantasies and illusion of life in the virtual world is way too perfect for the virtual community to even give it up and face life in the real world. Here, we can see how strong visual communication is in relation to virtual world as the people in the virtual world is only able to see the images and graphics in the screen of the computer. It has caused hallucination to the online community.  This shows how strong and powerful visual images can influence a life of any human being. Thus, human being a part of the virtual world can be indeed defined as a cyborg because without the computer and without online communication, their life will not be as what they have fantasized in the virtual world.  

REFERENCES :-

Sherman B, Judkins.P (1992), Glimpses of Heaven, Vision of Hell : Virtual Reality and its Implication, London : Hodder & Stoughton.

Rheingold H., (1994), The Virtual Community ; Finding Connection in a Computerised World, London ; Secker & Warburg.

Springer C.,, (1991), The pleasure of the interface,

Mogardini C., (1992), The ideology of postmodernity, Theory, Culture and Society.

Robins K, ( 2000), The cyberculture readers,

Week 9 - CULTURAL LITERACY- TELEVISION AND CINEMA

For week 9, our lecture topic Cultural Literacy and the Media has brought us to another world of understanding the media and how it works. We were taught how to understand cultural literacy that exist within film and television. For this week’s journal, I would like to argue to about the importance of cultural literacy in order to understand a film. The reason is because I am a big fan of Korean movies and I have always wondered why almost all of the Korean movies I have watched focuses mainly on plastic surgery. Perhaps my question lies in the lack of cultural literacy that i have towards the Korean culture.

Television is a tele-technical system for transmission of sound and images, as well as motion pictures in both black and white and colour
(Petterson, p.334). Film Noir was a cultural product of the past.  It shows the cultural and social pattern in Europe in the past, especially in gender relations as well as the class. In order for cultural literacy to take place, we must have familiarity, ability, determining factor and a nuance understanding of language.

Cultural literacy can be defined as both a knowledge of meaning systems and an ability to negotiate those systems within different cultural contexts. It is virtually impossible to describe and analyse what is happening in any communication context or practice without using the concept of cultural literacy (Shirato and Yell, 2000, p. 1).

 In order to understand a particular movie it is important for us to understand the cultural literacy if not we will not be able to understand the message hidden within the movie. The movie that I will analyse is based on a Korean movie titled ”200 pound Beauty”. This movie focuses on the structure and the narrative of the story. It also follows the traditional folktale narrative by Vladamir Propp (1988, p.25), Morphology of the Folktale. This story reflects the Korean culture where beauty is a priority and is not in the eyes of the beholder which makes plastic surgery a trend in Korea.



Kang Hanna



Below is the video of the 200 pound Beauty, where a girl named Kang Hannah has a very beautiful voice but a very obese body.  Her voice is her asset where she use it to have phone sex conversation with men. In the mean time she is a lip sync singer for Amy, a famous Korean pop singer. This movie has discourses of beauty, heterosexuality, jealousy ,love and obesity.  This movie is very controversial because it discriminates fat or obese women in the society. Kang Hannah has always hid behind the stage where Amy sings infront using Kang Hannah’s voice. Kang Hannah does not have the opportunity to sing front stage because of her appearance. This movie shapes the ideology that men likes beautiful women and in order to have a boyfriend, you need to match that perfect hour glass shape body. However, this is not true in all cultures. Different people have different perception of beauty. 

Video Clip of 200 Pound Beauty

As a Bruneian, in my culture, plastic surgery is not accepted because of the religious values which prohibits any alteration of the body which includes the changing of hair colour. . Here, coming from a different perspective I view plastic surgery only acceptional if there is a need to do so for example if there is any disability or deformed body parts. However, in the movie, Kang Hannah undertake plastic surgery for the purpose of looking beautiful. For people who doesn’t have any cultural literacy of Korea, they will think that all women in Korea does plastic surgery. However, with the knowledge of cultural literacy, the people will understand that not all women do plastic surgery. According to Hirsch ( 1988 ) , “children in the U.S. are being deprived of the basic knowledge that would enable them to function in contemporary society”. Hence here it is important that we know about cultural literacy in order to function and communicate well in the society.

Here, this film could shape a person’s identity in a sense that it changes a woman’s perception towards size. For example, to a young lady who is obese, it can cause depression which can lead to aneroxia and bulimia. These are not a good way to portray movies because this shows that the community does not favour women who are big. This will have a psychological effect on women.  The politics in this film are the politics of jealousy, love within beauty, love within heterosexuality, jealousy and many more. 



200 Pound Beauty



Overall, it is important for us to understand cultural literacy to work within communication industries. Without cultural literacy, we will not be able to understand and communicate within any society.  The importance of cinema and television is to understand the cultural literacy because in television and the media is where the cultures of one’s society is being portrayed and it is through the films and television that we get to learn and understand the culture of different societies.

REFERENCES

Hirsch. E.D, (1988) Cultural Literacy, What Every Americans Need to know. Vintage Book

Propp, V. (1927). Morphology of the Folktale. Trans., Laurence Scott. 2nd ed. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1968s.

Hartley, J. (1999). Knowledge, television and the 'textual tradition'. Uses of Television. London and New York : Routledge. Retrieved September 17, 2010 from UBD Ebrary Website.

Week 8 - PHOTOGRAPHY

For week 8 , we were introduced to the world of Photography. We were taught to understand the relations between photographs with memory and space and as a cultural critique. According to Oliver Wendell Holmes (1859, p.145), he called photography “the mirror with a memory”. This is because photographs has been associated with memories and it is meant to freeze time and space.

In this week’s journal, I would like to explore about photographs as a cultural critique. The reason why  I wish to write about cultural critique for photographs  this week is because after understanding the whole lecture of photography, I realised the importance of the power of photographs and how it is able to change the perception of an individual’s view and at the same time attach meanings to the photograph. Here, I would like to highlight on the possible social critique about the photograph that I have personally taken in a drag show held in a Hotel in Brunei.

The photograph above shows 3 men who dresses up like women and dance for the audience during a Wedding in the Hotel. The photograph shows  the discourses of homosexuality , gay, entertainment, lack of religious belief, unfulfilled desire etc.  Hence, the ideologies that are portrayed in the image above is that men prefer to become women, love within the same sex, having problems with the society and many more.

By looking at this image, it raises many controversial issues especially in a country like Brunei where there is strong religious beliefs and especially where MIB is practised. Drag dances like this are strictly prohibited in the country. According to a number of photographers in Europe and America, “the functions of photographs was to show the world as it had never been seen before”(p.26, n.d). This dragshow photograph was taken in a private function, and through this image, other people who are not in the function are also able to catch a glimpse of the events happening where they will not be able to see without the camera. According to Wright (1999)  'A photographer is able to place him or herself in a privileged position/location to bring social or political issues to the attention of the viewers'. This image also can raise many politics such as the politics of poverty, struggle within personality, homosexuality, religion etc.

Just imagine, if this photograph above is taken by a photo journalist and  published  in the local newspaper, there will be many people who will criticize this image due to the values of the religion in the country as well as going against the norm and values. According to Sontag (1979, p.40), she is concerned about the ethics between a photographer as a reporter and the person, place or circumstances recorded. Given that theory of ‘load’ and shoot for a photo journalist, the photographs might be used for “policing and incrimination”. This image will definitely raise many questions and with no doubt it will involve many people to criticize this image. This will in turn reflect the image of the drag-dancers as well as their reputation. Critic Victor Burgin (1982, p.39) distinguishes the difference between photography theory and criticism theory. He argues that ‘photography theory must be interdisciplinary and must engage with process of signification. However, photograph criticism is evaluative and normative, authoritative and opinionated.”

Nevertheless, photographs plays a very powerful role in influencing the viewers perception towards any situation thus photographers need to be careful especially when they are already invading other people’s privacy with the camera. This is because photographs carries a memory for other people and we may never know whether the picture taken will hurt the subject or not.

REFERENCE

Wells,L. (1997). Thinking about photography. Photography : A Critical Introduction. London : Routledge.

Wright,T.(1999). Photography as a cultural critique. Photography handbook. London and New York : Routledge. Retrieved August 20, 2010, from UBD Ebrary Website.

Holmes, O.V (1980), Photography : Essay and Images , London : Secker and Warburg

Sontag, S. ( 1979), On Photography, Harmondsworth : Penguin

Week 7 - VISUAL NARRATIVES

This week we were taught about Visual Narratives in the Media. In this topic we learned about the component and structures of narratives as well as structuralist and post-structuralist narratives. For this week’s journal, I will be  investigating post-structuralist narratives. The reason why I wish to investigate on post-structuralist narratives is because I am very faithful to movies which follows the traditional narratives structure and following post-modernism, post-structuralist narratives has always created an incongruent effect in me thus I feel that it has affected my views towards such movies.

First of all, “Narrative is a representation of an event or a series of events”( Abott, p.13). Narratives of different kinds exist as long as they fit the rules of having a series of events, however, here we will only focus on visual narratives.

According to Aristotle’s Dramatic Structure, narratives consist of a beginning, middle and end. This is the traditional narratives which we can find in fairy tales such as Snow White, Sleeping Beauty and many others. We as human beings cannot imagine a world without narratives. According to a novelist Paul Auster, “A child’s need for stories is as fundamental as his need for food”( p.3, n.d).  This shows that narratives plays an important role in every human’s lives.

Narratives are composed of paradigmatic and syntagmatic features. For syntagm, the elements in the narratives has to have a linear configuration and plots. On the other hand, paradigm has characters which can appear in any parts of the narrative and it can be substituted by another element which belongs to the same category.   Structuralists started in the 1950’s where a number of theorists such as Strauss, Saussare and Barthes has contributed to the narratives. For structuralist, narratives  follows a binary system where they have the good and the bad, conflict between two qualities, weak and strong etc.

Let me use an example of a classic traditional fairy tale, Snow White where  it follows the traditional narratives according to Aristotle’s Dramatic Structure and also the  structuralist narratives. The cartoon Snow White consist of a binary system such as a hero and a princess, a bad witch and good dwarfs, castle in the city and house of the seven dwarfs deep in the forest. Here, the genre of the movie is a fairy tales where it involves discourses such as love, evil ,jealousy, friendship, death etc. The point of focalisation of this cartoon is Snow White herself as this tells a story from Snow White’s perspective.. The story is presented in a mimesis where “the poet tries to give the illusion that another-whom we call the character speaks” (T.S. Dorsch, 1965, p.11). This emphasises on the direct speech where the characters speaks for themselves.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarf. An example of a traditional narrative

However, nowadays following post-modernism, not all movies follow the traditional rules of narratives. These kind of movies are called post-structuralist narratives where it creates incongruency for the viewers.

Below is a short trailer on “Kill Bill” which is a movie that demonstrates a very post-structuralist narrative. In this trailer, the producer breaks the rules of how traditional narratives is suppose to be. According to Barthes, in post-structuralist narratives, “the author is dead” and it is up to the interpreter to interpret the meaning of the text.

Video Clip of Kill Bill

In this movie, the Bride or Beatrix Kiddo ( Uma Thurman), plays the character of a member of an assassination squad. Here, there is evidence that this movie breaks the rule of traditional narratives because this is a counter-ideology of a woman where the ideology of a woman is shy, quiet, needs  a man to protect her etc.  Instead, Kill Bill portrays the character of a woman playing a role of a man who is fierce, violent and brave.  In the trailer, we are also able to see the use of silhouette of the actors which is used when the a violent scene is portrayed on the screen. Silhouettes  is not found in the traditional narratives and the use of shadows and silhouettes to portray actors in action is very post-structuralist. Another interesting point to highlight about this trailer in regards to post-structuralist narratives is mixture of animation or cartoons in the movie itself.

There are critiques to structuralism narratives, as Derrida, a post-structuralist theorist claims that “narratives has an  arrogance that a text has fundamental truths and meanings as intended by an author.”According to structuralists, “Narrative cannot be arbitrarily constructed because it must have coherence and fidelity”. However, according to Fisher, “stories connect together when the audience are sure that the narrator has not left out any important details.” For him, “the ultimate test for narrative coherence is whether we can count on the characters to act in a reliable manner.”( Fisher, p.303, n.d)   

In conclusion, I understand that narratives helps to structure an individual’s point of view and that there are however no conventions or set rules or universal method as to how a post-structuralism in narrative is suppose to be. Post-structuralist narratives are indeed  created how the producer intended it to be although it maybe incongruent at times  it doesn’t necessary have to have a coherent story line in order for people to understand it. 

REFERENCE

Griffin.E, (2009), A First Look At Communication Thery, Seventh Edition. USA, New York : Mc. Graw Hill.

Huisman, R. (2005) Narrative concepts. In Fulton, H., Huisman,R, Murphet, J. and Dunn,A (eds.) , Narrative and Media . Cambridege : Cambridge University Press.

Week 6 - Visual Rhetorics

Week 6 highlights on another new theory of communication which is called Rhetoric. Rhetoric is known to be a very successful means of communication. The founder of Rhetoric is Aristotle who was a student of Plato in the Greek civilization. (Griffins,1997, pg.279). For this week’s journal, I will analyse how visual rhetoric is used in advertising and how does it successfully persuade the consumers to buy their products through the use of rhetoric. The image below is a Burger King advertisement. The reason why I chose to analyse this image is because I believe that this image contains a rhetorical visual and by analysing this image it will help me enhance my understanding towards this visual rhetoric and persuasion.

According to Aristotle, “Rhetoric is the art of discovering ways to make truth seem more probable to an audience that isn’t completely convinced. (Griffins,1997, pg.280). The available means of persuasion are based on three kinds of proof which is the “logical, ethical and emotional”. Logical proof comes from the line of argument in the speech whereas ethical proof reveals the speaker’s character through message. On the other hand, Emotional proof is the feeling the speech draws out of the hearers. (Griffins,1997, pg. 280)

Fig. 1

When we see Fig. 1, the visual elements shows a fast food restaurant and a lady serving the customer with a smile. It also shows a humanly figured customer purchasing some food. We obviously know that this is burger King because the logo is placed right in the centre of the counter. By looking at the human figure purchasing the product, we automatically infer or assume that it is the Ronald the clown from Mc. Donalds because of the colour of the hair and the red shoes. Here ,the clown is used as an enthememe. According to the theory of Rhetoric, the theory focuses on two forms of logos, which is the enthymeme and the example. An enthymeme is an incomplete version of a “formal deductive syllogism.” (Griffins,1997, pg. 281). For rhetorics to happen there must be an enthememe. Now the proposition is much clearer. Burger Kings is the greatest burger. Even the clown who resembles or we assume is Ronald Mc. Donald buys Burger King.


This advertisement targets audience of all ages from the young to the old. For people who have a schema of what Ronald Mc Donald’s look like and who are loyal customers of Mc. Donalds, they will automatically assume that the customer in the image is indeed Ronald Mc. Donald. In rhetorics, the purpose of the enthememe is to make the audience / viewers to assume and complete the argument. According to Aristotle, “ enthymemes intuitively unite speaker and audience and provide the strongest possible proof.....The audience itself helps construct the proof by which it is persuaded.” (Griffins, 1997)

I personally think that the overall argument and the purpose of this image is to show customers that Burger King is the best burger in the world and it is trying to show that even the mascot, Ronald Mc. Donald eats Burger King.

However, the enthememe of this image is the customer. We perceive the customer to be a clown which represents Mc. Donalds. Without the enthememe, this image will not be a rhetoric image as there will be no argument. Here, the customer who we perceive to be the Ronald Mc. Donald is the unstated premise of the argument. Thus this is part of the deductive argument. Although we cannot see the full body of the clown since he is facing backwards and wearing a raincoat, automatically we are already assuming that he is Ronald Mc. Donald and he is buying Burger King. Through this advertisement, it is telling the customers that Burger King is the greatest Burger outlet and even Ronald Mc. Donald is purchasing burger’s from Burger King. This is how they use the art of Rhetoric visuals to persuade customers to come to them .

Here we can see that both visual and verbal rhetorics work together very well to convey the argument. The Burger King Logo becomes the anchorage to this advertisement. Because of this anchorage, it changes the meaning of the image making a controversy out of a simple image. If there is no anchorage, it looks just like an ordinary clown buying burgers or people will not even notice or associate the clown with Mc. Donalds. The advertisement never said anything about Mc. Donalds or who the customer was. From the image, the viewers infer that it is the clown from Mc. Donalds because the advertiser has cleverly placed an enthememe and it depends on the interpretation of the viewers to achieve the advertiser’s motive. The clown is used a means of persuasion to make the viewers convinced that Burger King is the best. According to Kenneth Burke ( 1968 ), the key for persuasion is “identification”. Burke said that in order for persuasion to take place , one must identify the purpose of the speaker . This is also another evidence where the advertiser successfully makes the viewers identify the purpose which is Burger King is the best. The advertiser created this image in a way that the enthememe is made open to the interpretation of the viewers.

In conclusion, rhetorics is indeed a powerful tool especially when it is used in advertising. The best thing about rhetorics in advertising is that the enthememe is placed in a such as way that it leaves the premises open for the audience to interprete the purpose of the advertiser.



REFERENCES:

Chandler D., (2002), Semiotics, the basics, Great Britain :Routledge


Em Griffin (2000), A First Look at Communication,Mc Graw Hill, 7th Edition.

Week 5 - The Effects of Gestalt and Schema Theory

For Week 5 of the lecture, we were introduced to another topic which relates to Semiotics which is the effect of Gestalt and the Schema theory. For this week’s journal, I am going to focus on Schema theory by creating a presentation for a group of primary school children and I am going to explore and investigate how schema theory can be used and applied by learners of every age especially in young children. My topic for the schema will be about fire safety and how to prevent fire accidents in the home. The reason why I chose these schemas is because according to Piaget’s ideas of children’s cognitive stage development, children between 7 -11 go through a pre-operational stage of learning, hence they are able to think logically about classifying objects into several features.( Atherton, 2010). Therefore based on Piaget’s theory, I will investigate whether they are able to classify things that causes fire and extend their schema about the causes of fire.


Before that, I will first explain a little bit about Gestalt and how it works. Both Gestalt and Schema theory are interrelated. Weitheimer( 1910) a German Psychologist describes Gestalt as “the whole is different from the sum of its parts”. The word Gestalt comes from the German noun meaning “Shapes”.

On the other hand , A schema generally means anything that an individual has experienced. According to The Schema Theory, people organize everything that they know into schema and structures. When people have their schemas , they are able to identify and associate things that they see around them. Schema theory also suggests that when a person doesn’t have any existing schema, it is very difficult for them to learn new information on a certain topic. There are two important parts for Schema theory, one is that every person’s schema is individualized and the other is that the knowledge structures are expandable.

Furthermore, Schema theory explains how knowledge is created and used by people who are in the learning stage. The term “Schema” has been created by Bartlett (1932). However, This theory was developed further by R.C Anderson (1984) , a respected American Psychologist. This theory represents an individual’s understanding of the world.

The first video clip that I use demonstrates how dangerous fire can be to children and at the same time it helps the child to understand how to prevent fire accidents in the home. The video clip also includes an animated fire engine which will catch the attention of the child and at the same time give them a schema of what a fire engine does.

Bartlet viewed schema as “ an active organization of past reactions, or past experience.”(pg. 257). It is important that every child has a schema about things around them so as they grow older, they are able to extend their schema further. Fire preventions and safety precautions are also important for children to understand at a young age because without these schemas, a child might be prone to play with matches, candles, oven and other dangerous things in the house without knowing the dangers that it can cause. According to Piaget’s theory of development, children adopt a series of schemas to understand the world ( ).In the above figure, I have provided two visual schemas that will frame my topic for fire safety and how to prevent fire accidents in the home.

According to the Piagetian Theory, when a child receives information that doesn’t fit his or her own schema about a particular object or event ,the child will experience incongruity. (Martin, 2007). The video shows a fire engine giving advice to the children regarding the fire safety and how to prevent fire accidents at home. Here, the fire engine is an incongruous schema because we don’t see fire engines talking in real life . By using the animated fire engine as an incongruous schema , the children will pay more attention to it and will create arousal and excitement because the fire engine is talking and giving them advice. Hence, it will make them wonder what the fire engine is trying to say to them.



In this video clip, the fire engine is talking and teaching the children about fire safety and how to prevent fire accidents in the home. This video is able to build a schema on the children regarding fire safety. It gives them the idea of what to do when a fire is detected in the house and the do’s and don’ts in the house to prevent fire accidents at home. By using animated graphics to relay the message to children, it helps them to recognise and remember the situation.



By using this incongruous schema, the presentation will be successful as this is part of “accretation” of the schema. According to Widmayer (2004), “Accretation” is a process whereby learners take in new information but do not need to alter the existing schemas. When the video clip show the children that the fire engine is giving advice, it strengthens their schema of a fire engine thus they get to understand and believe what the fire engine is telling them in regards to fire precaution. According to Widmayer (2004), Schema theory articulates three process of which knowledge structure changes. Among them is accretation, tuning and restructuring. Here, If the child has a schema of what a fire engine does and the dangers of the fire, they will go through an accretation process. An accretation process is where the children have an existing schema of the fire engine and they will just take in new information but do not have to change existing schemas.

Children are attracted to the flames of the candle or lighter or anything that burns with flames. By nature, children are constantly curious of their surroundings and they are always ready to try out new things. However, it is the parents or teachers responsibility to create the schema in children that these things are dangerous. Their curiosity might lead them into danger in which they are not aware of. In video 2, it shows a schema of what will happen if the children do not listen to the advice given by the fire engine in Video 1. When we look at the 2nd video, it shows a real image of what fire looks like. This gives an image and a schema to the children of what fire really looks like in the real world and the dangers of it.

The top level of the schematic process is the fire. The top level always represents the truth about the situation. For example in the video 1, the top level schema is the fire engine and the flames of the fire because this is the schema that I am trying to embed in the children when doing my presentation. However, the lower level of the schematic process is the variables that cause the fire. For example , the candles , the stove, the matches, the lighter , cigarette etc. This is part of the lower schema because it has terminals that can change. For example the candles can become different kinds of candles, or the stove can be of different colour or brand, or perhaps the variables which caused the fire can vary into different cause such as electrical wiring mishaps. The variables can change and it will not effect the top schema. The people who watch the video still know that the video presentation is focusing and highlighting on fire safety and precautions.

In conclusion, I am convinced now about Piagets theory whereby he claims that children are able to think logically about “classifying objects into several features.”. I have also explored the use of incongruity for visual images to create schemas in children. By understanding the use of top and lower schemas, children are able to classify the objects into groups because when the top schema changes it doesn’t fit their existing schema however, when the lower schema change, they are still able to modify their top schema and adjust it to the changes.

References :

Atherton J S, (2010) Learning and Teaching ; Piaget’s developmental theory , UK : http://www.learningandteaching.info/learning/piaget.htm Retrieved on 10th September 2010.


Martin, R.A (2007). The psychology of humor : an integrative approach. Google Books, Retrieved on 8th September, 2010 from http://www.books.google.com.bn/books


Retrieved on 10th September, 2010 from www.spiritus-temporis.com/schema-psychology


Tracey, Diane H., Morrow, Lesley Mandel. Lenses on Reading : An Introduction to Theories and Models. New York, NY, USA: Guilford Press, 2006. Pg 53

Week 4 - Visual Syntax

Now, we have reached week 4 Lecture. For this week’s topic we learned about the three most important dimensions and rules of visual communications which are the visual Syntax, semantics and pragmatics. These three important rules makes up the structure, the meaning and the context of the image. Here, we are taught how visual images also uses syntax, semantics and pragmatics to make sense and understand an image.


My proposition for this particular week will be that Visual Images can actually be considered a language because what I have learnt in class today shows that Images do have their own syntax, semantics and pragmatics. I will do so by investigating the origin of Roman alphabets. As a Visual Communication Student , I have every right to believe that images should also be considered a language because images have the power to send messages and play a major influence in people’s lives the same way words do.

Over the years, there has been a disagreement between linguists and visual communicators because there are various linguistic scholars who fail to acknowledge that images can be considered a language. According to the Linguists, “Images do not have common elements similar to a written ABC alphabet” and they have no formal structure or syntax therefore they cannot be considered a language. ( Lester, 2000). To strengthen their argument, Noam Chomsky also stated that “a language is defined by its alphabet and it’s grammatical sentences”.(n.d.)

I have done several research and my findings is that during the historical period, before words or alphabets even existed, human beings communicate using signs and symbols. Iconic symbols as Pierce named it, is used as hieroglyphics during the Egyptian century . Language in its spoken form is a natural phenomena because it is common to everyone as a means of communicating. However when comes to writing, it is only achieved by some cultures depending on their historical background. In the past, certain cultures needed a form of writing to record matters dealing with trade, religion or power (Crees & Leeuwen, 2004) . During those days, things were written in a form of icons. According to Pierce, there are 3 types of signs which is iconic, indexical and symbolic. “Icons is an image that refers to something outside of its individual components.”( Pierce, pg.31 ) . People in the Roman and Egyptian period communicate through signs and drawings which closely resembles the object. This is commonly used for the hieroglyphics. This is how the alphabets were invented. For 25,000 years, the chief mode of written communication was paintings on the walls of caves.

Fig.1

An example of alphabets in order.

Fig.2

An example of hieroglyphics used during the Egyptian period

Visual communicators have also challenged statements from the linguists as their research has provided sufficient evidence that images can indeed be considered a language because according to visual experts, there are also rules to visual syntax. Saussure made a distinction between langue and parole. Langue refers to “system of rules and conventions which is independent of individual users” . Parole on the other hand refers to “its use in particular instances”.(Sassure, 1974) These rules have been studied by psychologists as well as both neuro and cognitive scientists. According to visual syntax, human beings follow an unconscious rule that leads us to focus on a certain point and start moving our eyes from the start and to the end of the image.




In order to test whether this statement is true, let us observe an image from an advertisement, and we will test the order of eye movement and see whether or not it follows a visual syntactic rule as claimed by the Visual Communicators.

Fig.1

An image of a hairdresser advertisement

Fig.2

The Lines and Arrows indicates the movement

Fixation




Here is a hair dresser advert advertising hair cut. Fixation is where the eye is fixed to a certain point in the image for a certain period. The fixation point for this advert will be on the hair between the two fingers. The reason for this is because according to the law of Pregnanz, the eye is lazy and it will only identify the most prominent image. When we apply the law of contrast, the colour of the finger is much in contrast with the colour of the hair which makes the hair in between the fingers stand out. According to Suzzane Langer, “grammatical structure is not a symbol of itself but it ties several symbols,....to make one complex term.”In an image, that term or idea is expressed through “ visual forms..lines, colours, proportions, etc. And are just a s capable of articulation as pictures.” This is the synctactic theory of visual communication. ( Langer, n.d.)



In this image, the hair in between the fingers captures our attention that cause our eyes to focus on that part. Perception is also another factor as to why we focus on the hair between the fingers. For most adults , their first impression on this image is that they see two legs which is actually the fingers and to them it represents nudity . However, when I asked my 11 year old boy what this image represents , he said that the finger represents a scissor and he interpreted it as someone trying to cut some hair. Here, it is proven that perception of an image strongly relies on cultural and historical knowledge. The reason why most adults interpret this as nudity at the first impression is because they already have a schema of what nudity is. On the other hand, the boy is innocent and sees the picture as exactly how it is represented. A perception only has meanings when the signs are recognizable and when it can be related to personal and cultural experience.



From the eye fixation in between the fingers , the focus of the eye slowly moves down to the fingers and then around the hair. The last part of the fixation will be on the text. Here, we can see that there is a set visual syntax rule of the eye movement and how they see the images. This is also similar to the structure of language.



Visual syntax also explores how colour, lines , shades and shadow are all part of the visual grammer. These rules are the syntactic rules of colour, syntactic rules of line and the syntactic rule of composition.



RULE OF CONTRAST.

When we analyse Fig.1 above, we can see that the colour of the background which is the hair is dark and the colour of the foreground which is the fingers is light. The two colours of the image is strongly contrasted hence it highlights the main image which the little part of the hair between the fingers.



RULE OF LINE

The major function of the line is too create a border and to guide the eyes of the viewers towards the direction of the image. When there is a border in the image, it makes the image look more prominent and focussed. Take a look at the Fig.2 and compare it to Fig.1 above. The image in Fig.2 gives a more prominent look to the image and it looks like it is in a frame. This is because of the border around it.

Fig. 3

When the rule of Lines is applied it gives a more stability and prominent look to the image.

However, we should note that both horizontal and vertical lines gives a different impression. For example, if the lines are horizontal, it gives the viewers an impression of depth. When it is vertical it stops the movement of the eyes for a moment before the eye movement continues to move to the next image.




RULES OF COMPOSITION.



In the rules of composition according to the syntactic rule of visual communication, it has the rule of third which is essential in photography. The rule of third actually helps to focus the composition. When we follow the rule of thirds, the image will turn out to be what is considered a good image. The image will not be out of focus and the viewers is able to identify what object is being highlighted. In this image Fig 1. And Fig.2 , the rule of third is focussing on the fingers. Perhaps we can say that the fingers is what the advertisers use as a subject to highlight the hair. Without the fingers, the climax of the image is gone.



We often ask what is the relationship between semiotics and semantics. Semiotics studies the meaning between signs and what they denote ( Barthes, 1977 ) whereas Semantics questions the “meanings behind the image and how the meaning is being created”. For example, when we look at the image again in Fig.2, we ask how did the advertiser create this meaning. What sort of visual grammar did the advertiser apply in order to capture the attention of the viewers.



CONCLUSION



Thus, from all the evidence given above, i hereby conclude that visual images can indeed be considered a language because images also contains certain rules such as syntax, pragmatics and semantics and I have demonstrated how these rules are applied into visual images.

The reason why children or adults are able to remember something well and clearly by looking at visual images is because according to Lester, (1996) “Words are repressive while pictures are fascinating, easily understood within a particular culture and can be made personal mediums of expression.” Indeed, visual images can be considered a language because they do have their own form ,structure, conventions and rules



REFERENCES:

Gunter Crees & Theo Van Leeuwen (2006), Routledge. 2nd edition.Reading Images. The grammer of Visual Design,pg.21. Retrieved from http://www.books.google.com.bn on 7th September 2010


Langer, Suzanne K. (1960). Philosophy in a New Key. Cambridege : Havard University Press.


Lester, Paul Martin.(2006) Visual Communication Images with Messagess 4th edition. Belmont,CA: Wadsowrth Publishing Company.