Diving In To Examine the Potential Power of Images

January 5, 2016January 5, 2016 / Dr. Evans / Leave a comment

FICTION SUITS

Grant Morrison, in describing, in a bit of existential retrospection, how people come to perceive or interact with the 2D world of superheroes and comic books from the “higher dimension” of the real world recounts how:

Stan Lee and Jack Kirby could send drawn versions of themselves into the created world of Fantastic Four, and those little drawings of Stan and Jack were like angels, UFOs, avatars from a higher universe, entering a world they’d made to interact with its inhabitants. They created, as I cam to call them, ‘fiction suits,’ like space suits for sending yourself into stories. (Supergods 226-7)

Let’s be honest…this sounds pretty freaking awesome. Morrison enacted a similar feat of sorts at the end of his run on Animal Man for DC Comics from 1988-90. The final story saw the character of Animal Man, who had already experienced (while on peyote) a breaking down of the 4^th wall in his reality and realizing that he was a character of fiction, had the character arriving at Grant Morrison’s very door-step to confront his own creator. This meta-confrontation/discussion was the final issue of Morrison’s run and ended with the character of Animal Man receiving his life back, including his murdered family.

To step beyond Morrison’s “meta-narrative” a bit more, one can find a similar discussion perpetuated by Nick Sousanis. In his work Unflattening, describes the way humanity perceives things, in his opening, by recounting how:

…flatness permeates the landscape. This flatness is not literal… No. It cloaks its true nature under a hyper-real façade. This is a flatness of sight, a contraction of possibilities…where the inhabitants conform to what Marcuse called ‘a pattern of one-dimensional thought and behavior.’ Lacking ‘a critical dimension’ of potentialities to transcend their existing state, everything has its place. Here, even choices (of which there are seemingly many), are predefined. Forgotten is wonder of what might be. In this place, a single chorus… (Sousanis 5-7)

Sousanis’ Unflattening is a publication of his doctoral dissertation that is actually done in the form of a graphic novel. His statement appears in the vein of a warning about how human’s can and do limit ourselves in thought and ideas. This is something we need to break free. We have become the limited two-dimensional creations in how we think and the lack of any critical examination. We have forgotten Socrates and the need to examine life.

Of course, these are two different writers looking at similar material, but in two philosophically different ways. Morrison is looking towards a means of interacting with the comic book world by “entering it” on a hypothetical level. Sousanis on the other hand is speaking of an almost two-dimensional way that humanity, perhaps, has come to perceive the world around it.

Interestingly enough, one can argue that both are talking about the same thing. Morrison’s notion of the “fiction suits” is meant to express an idea of interaction and communication between the world of our reality and the world of the comic books and their characters. Sousanis speaks of the ways humanity is limiting its perceptions through a “flatness” or 2D method of thought. Both men are talking about perception; both men are talking about opening up the human capacity for expression, thought, and communication.

Its time we embrace more steadily the opening of the book on not only how we perceive the world, but also how we communicate in it. It’s not really a new idea. It’s just an old idea that needs revisiting, re-examination.

One approach already in existence is the one laid out by Scott McCloud in his work Understanding Comics.

“Amplification through simplification” is a key tenant of McCloud’s short hand for our cultural obsession with cartoons and the potential they have (30). He states that “When we abstract an image . . . we’re not so much eliminating details as we are focus on specific details by stripping down and image to its essential ‘meaning’” (30).

Later on McCloud points out that the simplification leads us, often in our younger years to identify with cartoons and their essential messages (36). He even illustrates this in the following image:

He follows this up by expounding, “I doubt it! You would have been far too aware of the messenger to fully receive the message!” (37). What he is pointing out is that through the route of simplification, cartoons and comics are able to deliver messages visually in a way that amplifies the message without complicating it or letting the visuals get in the way.

APPLYING IT TO STUDENTS

So, what does any of this have to do with engaging students? Well, it goes back to what I called my idea for using images to engage students in the classroom: The Adaptation Approach. This approach centers upon:

Utilizing the creation of Graphic Narratives and other forms of Visual Rhetoric to communicate concepts, ideas, etc. found in the Composition classroom

This approach has been something under thought and gradual process for several years now. Originally it was born out of a desire to convey or get across to my students the genres I was having them write about, in both Comp 1 and 2, out the St. Martin’s Guide to Writing during my PhD studies at TWU.

Initially I wanted to partner up with an artist, such as my friend Dave Andrews, but I dragged my feet on writing the scripts. The project eventually took a back burner to my dissertation.

However, I have now been looking to revive this project and apply my own artistic skills (dust them off from my high school days) and take it on both as an aid to students and as part of an overall visual rhetoric approach to the First Year Composition classroom that more or less defines part of my pedagogical identity.

Here are some sample images I am using, as well as an example of some of my creations:

Me, Overwhelmed

Me, as Jedi Master of Composition

frustrated

smirk

ENGL1301-Description

Page_1 Page_2 Page_3

STAY TUNED to find out how this goes over when I apply it this Spring.

Application Approach 2.2

July 24, 2015 / Dr. Evans / Leave a comment

Entering the final chapter, Chapter 9 of McCloud’s Understanding Comics represents the end of what I am calling the Theory Phase of my students’ introduction to the graphic novel and interpreting the graphic novel. They will be finishing up their Literary Analysis papers for submission. Starting in Week 3, the class will shift into a Writing Workshop Phase of putting together their actual Research Papers.

Students, to end their examination of McCloud were given one final PowerPoint lecture on Ch. 9 (images used presented below). They were asked to take notes as the lecture was presented. Afterwards, students were asked to present in a discussion their final thoughts on McCloud’s presented argument about visual potential of graphic narratives (chapter 9 is a very good compact, conclusion point where McCloud summarizes much of his argument). Students were also asked to give a preliminary reflection about the usefulness and potential of this text in aiding them as a resource and potential source material for their papers.

Student conclusions I will present at the end of this post, what follows next is an annotated version of the PowerPoint where I provide my own analysis of McCloud’s argument as presented in Chapter 9:

McCloud: Understanding Comics, Chapter 9

Instructor Annotation

This is McCloud returning, in a more concise manner, to the questions he postulated in Chapter 1. Of course, he now provides a bit more of the opening of a complex answer: The Human Condition.

Of course, what McCloud is identifying about human isolation (or as individuals) is what Kenneth Burke would refer to as identification. Burke specifically quips that “If men were not apart from one another, there would be no need for the rhetorician to proclaim their unity” (Rhetoric of Motives 22). To see this in a different way, one identifies his or her self as an individual, but also as part of a group of friends, member of a community, citizen of a town, state, country, or even species. Burke refers to this as the hierarchy, or “move by a sense of order” (Language as Symbolic Action 15). All of these groupings progressively move upward, to larger groupings and represent points of larger identification that can offer a way of overcoming the previous “division” in the pursuit of a larger sense of “unity.”

This “wall” that McCloud is referring to here is part of the consequence found in Burke’s noting of identification.

McCloud’s argument for the seriousness of comics, particularly as a means of communication, as noted below here, is part of looking to find that element of unity noted by Burke, to try and “understand” comics is itself a seeking of that unity.

One might argue when McCloud, above here, notes “communication is only effective when we understand the forms that communication can take” that he is pointing out the rhetorical implications of any form of communication. In this he is echoing almost every rhetorical theorist since the ancient Greeks to the modern day.

In particular, Aristotle wrote that rhetoric was itself “. . . defined as the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion” (The Rhetoric 24).

Wayne C Booth, for a more modern spin, provides a direct link between McCloud’s assertions of “understanding” and rhetoric by defining rhetoric as “The whole range of arts not only of persuasion but also of producing or reducing misunderstanding” (The Rhetoric of Rhetoric 10).

Ultimately, though Burke asserts that if one is to view identification as a means to overcoming division and possible isolation, as McCloud is offering up here, one must account for what are the overarching elements and substances share in creating unity via identification. This requires the introduction of identification’s partner element that Burke calls: consubstantiality. Burke states that one is

“consubstantial with [one’s] parents [but at the same time] apart from them. In this sense, there is nothing abstruse in the statement that the offspring both is and is not one with its parentage. Similarly, two persons may be identified in terms of some principle they share in common, “identification” that does not deny their distinctness” (21).

The sharing of a common “substance” or unifying agent, agency, purpose, scene, etc. is at work here. So, McCloud begins this attempt to discover the shared “substance” via a process:

This approach might seem silly. However, our modern world today tends to embrace TWO common assumptions made about comic books. One, there is the traditional assumption that comic books are “kids stuff.” Two, the newer/modern assumption that comic books are simply about “superheroes,” as evident in the cultural zeitgeist and popularity of movie franchises involving Marvel and DC superheroes.

McCloud, however, attempts to separate the content of comics from the medium/form of comics. This itself an often overlooked aspect. Content in comics can have a wide range of both genre and age level. Content can be superheroes, or horror, or kids comics. The medium/form of comics, what McCloud is more directly addressing in his text represents the form. The form and the ability of the form of comics has potential that far outstrips any limitation of content.

This refers back to Ch. 1 in Understanding Comics where McCloud defined what comics are. His definition was very generalist, but as he explained, that was intentional. The more general and expansive the definition, the more room for inclusion was available.

McCloud notes here the 1896 publication of “The Yellow Kid” which is held up as the first modern example of the comic. However, comics as a form or medium go much much further back and McCloud asserts this early on in Chapter 1.

Topffer’s quotation highlights both the ability of comics as a medium or form while openly noting the traditional assumption often attached to it. Topffer in his mentioning of “the lower classes . . .” is making note of the fact that early comics were employed by newspaper syndicates to promote distribution among illiterate and non-English speaking immigrants in large cities such as New York.

What assumptions, the traditional assumption, created was a divide:

As noted in the two images above, some cartoonists were allowed to be upheld with those of “high culture” and “literary merit,” while others were segregated to a “low culture” kind of Hell.

Burke’s idea, and one that McCloud appears to second, is that via identification and understanding of the shared substance of the form of comics, this divide can be overcome.

In the end though, the form is what is most important for McCloud. It is also a form of massive potential as he launches into:

Growth and Variation –

Aspirations…

McCloud is aserting here the fact that comics have (and always did have) the potential to reach out, as a form and medium to the highest kinds of aspirations: Fine Art, Truth, Literature. Why not? Why can’t the form allow for the visual expression of deep ideas found within the human condition?

Well…

Of course, this is a major problem, but not an insurmountable obstacle. Comics creators often times, and in a digital age almost anyone can, find the freedom to express their ideas.

Of course, from personal experience, I believe in McCloud’s argument. Additionally, his text, Understanding Comics, helped open the eyes of many of my students as well.

RESPONSE AND REFLECTION on McCloud

Student Responses

As noted earlier, I specifically asked my students in the original lecture to take notes and be prepared to discuss afterwards their thoughts on McCloud’s text in its whole. All of them agreed that his work would be invaluable resource to them in their research papers.

When asked about the work itself, here are some of the things, summarized, what my students responded with:

The combination of images and words is crucial to help thinning the wall that separates communication. In fact, the book itself would not work without the use of both really. The combination of words and images helped produce a profound and deeper understanding.

It helped some students see comic books as truly an artistic field rather than one concerned solely with making money (I called it artistic over avaristic).

Many of them also expressed a deeper understanding of comic book form as a result of their reading.

They also enjoyed the way that McCloud not only told you about something but showed you as well (visual rhetoric). It also helped show the potential of comics beyond the newer/modern assumption that comic books are just about superheroes (thanks to the movie success) and simplistic (good guy vs. bad guy).

McCloud helped expand their perception and helped move beyond the one postulated by Tara Schultz in the recent controversy at Crafton Hills College that she expected to read “Batman and Robin.”

McCloud offered many a feeling that the comic book form and certain materials expressed in it could rise to the level of literature. This was particular for one student who felt a deep connection to a character in her graphic novel.

Finally, one student who had been a fan and studied art found that McCloud had something to teach her too. He pointed out for her a deeper meaning in how it all worked, it showed her and helped her see the depth in her graphic novel. She specifically made note of an image from her chosen graphic novel, Marvel Civil War by Mark Millar and Steve McNiven.

She pointed out this image:

Here is Daredevil, being put in prison by Tony Stark (Iron Man) and she specifically pointed out an Additive combination at work. Without words, one simply has an image of Stark with a coin in hand, looking at it, and Daredevil turning his head to the side. With the words you have a mentioning of a reference to Judas’ betrayal of Jesus from the Bible with the “silver dollar” standing in for “thirty-one pieces of silver.” This gives an enhanced meaning to the images, where Daredevil is about to be imprisoned, and turns it into a image of guilt, anger, and betrayal.

My hope is that students take this high level of inspiration and carry it forward into their Literary Analysis and Research Papers.

WORKS CITED

Aristotle. The Rhetoric. Trans. W. Rhys Roberts. New York: The Modern Library, 1984. Print.

Booth, Wayne C. The Rhetoric of Rhetoric: The Quest for Effective Communication. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2004. Print.

Burke, Kenneth. A Rhetoric of Motives. Berkeley: U of California P, 1969. Print.

—. Language as Symbolic Action: Essays on Life, Literature, and Method. Berkeley: U of California P, 1966. Print.

Application Approach 2.1

July 23, 2015 / Dr. Evans / Leave a comment

As the students are now progressing deeper into the creation of their Literary Analysis papers, I found it incredibly fitting (since students already have access to materials about conducting textual analysis of works) that their reading of McCloud offers up McCloud’s own thoughts about ways to approach an understanding of the steps taken in the creation of work by any artist (writers included).

Students were shown a PowerPoint covering the same material found below.

McCloud starts off here by addressing the fact that up until this point he has been dealing with elements “unique” to comics.

Of course, this issue of “comics as art” is still a question today. Even more important, one that some of my Composition 2 students are particularly tackling is the flip side of that coin: “can comics be literature.”

At the core of any art, and McCloud notes that this can be “comics . . . painting, writing, theatre, film . . .” there is always a “purpose.”

McCloud moves forward here to presenting us with his path, consisting of 6 steps:

STEP 1

In the Composition 2 classroom where we are writing a Research Paper, “how” these steps function offer up not only a way to create comics, but as McCloud alludes to and clarifies later, but as a means for visualizing and approaching the writing process as well.

Step 1, then, represents the genesis point for students. Now, in the Composition classroom as I normally employ, students are given a fairly open range and latitude to select their purpose or idea to write upon. This is, of course, subject to guidance from me as their instructor. However, in the Graphic Novel Composition 2 classroom I am currently running with students, and as seen in Application Approach 1.0 posting,

I presented a somewhat arbitrary condition to their ideas and purpose via the selection of a Graphic Novel from a provided list and the choice between three possible thesis questions to generate their actual thesis statements.

STEP 2

What jumped out as I was discussing this step with my students is the fact that, for the moment, this is a “locked in” or “predetermined” feature of my Composition classroom. However, on a side note, and as mentioned to be discussed further in my posting Looking to Re-Think How I Teach Composition, Part 1 about “re-defining” the use of course objectives, I want to find ways to allow students greater creative latitude in the process. More on that to come.
As for Step 2, this step is often the one students meet first in the process. This is where they are told on Day 1, “hey, you get to write a research paper for this class.”

STEP 3

Like with Step 2, this is another example where the “Research Paper” assignment that I give students provides them with the genre they will work with. That genre comes with a style too, the academic style of writing. This style comes with formatting and a whole host of other guidelines and expectations.

STEP 4

The Structure is something that, usually dictated by genre, is something that I often find myself taking time to explain to students.

One example comes from Composition 1 where I teach the genre of the Article Analysis. In this analysis, I make a point, often visually, of walking students through balancing of summary and analysis parts of the paper. I often, given the length, point out to students that I like to see 3 paragraphs of summary. This is then followed by 3 paragraphs of analysis (using the material from Norton’s Field Guide I have students use the investigation of purpose, audience, and stance to act as things to analyze).

Another, more pertinent to Composition 2, is my preference for the use of the Classical Argument Structure I ask my students to apply in their Research Papers. This again is a structure that presents some form of arbitrary formatting for the students to follow: Introduction, Background/Narration, Argument, Counter-Argument, Conclusion, and Works Cited. However, within sections of this structure I point out that there are still decisions by the students that need to be made: what to include, what to leave out, etc.

STEP 5

This is the part where the student is, as I discuss it in application to writing, applying themselves and putting themselves to task in drafting and revising, and polishing, their paper. I point out that this is the step also where students not only have to figure out how the paper should come together, but also take time to revise, edit, and proof the paper. This is where they should attend also to MLA formatting as well.

STEP 6

In particular with writing, this encompasses both elements of polishing for publication, as well as, as I put it to my students, checking and turning over time to crafting a good title. When we talk about initial contact between a paper and an audience, titles can provide the first point of entry for whether or not someone chooses to go further in the reading. This “exposure” can also branch out to include the introduction and thesis statement as well here.

Visually, McCloud sums this up with a representation of the steps as an “apple.”

Now, taking this specifically from the writing process and moving it to the Literary Analysis assignment my students are engaged in with their graphic novels, I took a moment to illustrate not only how one uses the steps to form and create, but also to analyze as well.

Arrow 1, moving outward, represents of course the general process. The specific process my students are using for the Literary Analysis is Arrow 2. I specifically mention that the analysis for them is about getting to and uncovering the purpose at the heart of their graphic novel. Along the way they should also take note of an specific use of the other steps that may or may not stand out as significant upon closer analysis. For instance, if any of them had chosen to pick some work of Alan Moore’s, such as Watchmen, I would have asserted to them the fact that Moore is one of those who makes use of ALL the steps in a significant fashion.

Moving beyond the steps, McCloud points out some examples of the ways that people come to comics and ways that the steps play out in that process.

The notion here of someone going beyond exposure and deciding to apply skills to create comics of their own is something that I myself am beginning and working on. It is something I plan to share as part of my Adaptation Approach postings.

ARTIST 1, EXAMPLE 1

ARTIST 2, EXAMPLE 2

ARTIST 3, EXAMPLE 3

ARTIST 4, EXAMPLE 4

ARTIST 5, EXAMPLE 5

ART for ART or ART with a PURPOSE

Application Approach 2.0

July 22, 2015 / Dr. Evans / Leave a comment

Entering into Week 2 of my Composition 2 applying the use and having students argue for graphic novels, students are working on their Literary Analysis papers of their graphic novels. Many of them are choosing to approach the graphic novel as either Appropriate for the College Classroom or as Worthy to be a Work of Literature.

The Literary Analysis Paper is serving for them as a kind of “rough” Rough Draft of their ultimate research paper. The analysis will act as a kind a close reading of their graphic novel that should help solidify their thesis positions, provided background and research source material for their Research Paper, and spark ideas for elements to explore further for their research.

CLOSE ANALYSIS OF WORDS AND IMAGES

We began by reviewing Scott McCloud’s Ch. 6 of Understanding Comics. This chapter in particular is where McCloud discusses the different kinds of interrelationship that words and images can share.

Specifically, McCloud highlights SEVEN combinations:

Word Specific
Picture Specific
Duo Specific
Additive
Parallel
Montage
Inter-Dependent

Part 1: What McCloud says

Word Specific basically relies on the words to tell the narrative while imagery acts as a kind of ornamentation.

Picture Specific is the inverse of Word Specific. Here the use of words acts as ornamentation to the imagery or pictures that are conveying the actual narrative.

Duo-Specific acts as a situation where words and images are complimentary to one another in the fact that they basically convey “the same message.”

Additive is where the words serve as a means of amplifying or elaborating on the image that is communicating the narrative.

Parallel demonstrates a situation where the words and images appear to be conveying “parallel” but separate narratives. This can be more easily identified or isolated often times when one is only shown a page or panel or two of a comic or graphic novel without knowing the entire context. It can also represent some esoteric storytelling too.

Montage is where the words and images are part of the same framework. This is where the words in particular become part of the actual image.

Inter-Dependent is noted by McCloud to be the “most common” combination. This is where words and pictures/images convey different meanings separately but in combination convey a meaning that neither has without the other.

Part 2: Putting McCloud Into Practice

After we reviewed this section, I then presented my students with a completely random selection of images that I had put together from digital graphic novels that I own, mainly from the superhero genre, and asked the to look at each and using McCloud’s definitions, define which combination each image appeared to embody.

The images I showed the students were selected at random:

Images 1-3

Superman: Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow by Alan Moore and Curt Swan

Images 4-5

Flex Mentallo: Man of Muscle Mystery by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely

Image 6

Justice League #1 by Geoff Johns and Jim Lee

Images 7-9

Kingdom Come by Mark Waid and Alex Ross

Images 10-11

All-Star Superman by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely

Image 12

Batman: The Killing Joke by Alan Moore and Brian Bolland

Here is what the students came up for as a consensus as combinations after reading McCloud and examining the following image:

IMAGE 1

This image after close examination of wordy introduction was ruled to represent a “Word Specific” combination because of the way that the imagery acts as a kind of ornamentation to the introduction to the story of Superman’s “death.”

IMAGE 2

The image of Superman crying as Krypto stands by him is a “Duo-Specific” combination for the way what is said, briefly “He looked as if he’d been crying.” This could also be argued to be perhaps a “Picture Specific” combination as well.

IMAGE 3

For this panel shot, I asked students to focus on the last 3 panels of the page. The first panel it was decided to be a “Duo-Specific” combination for the way that the words and images complimented one another

The second panel provided an “Additive” combination. It was decided to be “Additive” rather than any other for the presence of the sign on the door helping establish the words as helping elaborate or amplify. Finally, the third panel was ruled to be another example of “Duo-Specific,” where the words compliment and demonstrate exactly what the imagery is showing the audience.

IMAGE 4

This example was quickly and clearly ruled to be an example of “Picture Specific” for the use of almost no dialogue or caption and the illustration driving the narrative.

IMAGE 5

The image here, with its lack of context to the complete narrative, presented the students with an example of a “Parallel” combination. The words and images appear to be conveying separate meanings and ideas that are not complimentary or related unless further context of the narrative is known.

IMAGE 6

Batman on the run from gunfire in a splash page by Jim Lee helps provide an illustration for the “Montage” combination. This is made possible by the placement of sound effects given off by the impact of the bullets hitting Batman’s cape and the ground, as well as the sound of helicopters. In particular, the entire wording is incorporated into the picture itself.

IMAGE 7

Again, lacking the specific or larger follow-up context of the overall narrative, this image provides another example of “Parallel” combination. The words of the Biblical Book of Revelation are here juxtaposed with violent, dream-like imagery with no specific or obviously established connection.

IMAGE 8

At first glance this image appears to be and can be argued to be like Image 7 and be an example of a “Parallel” combination. However, if one goes deeper and looks more closely, there is potentially a case that this image is perhaps an example of “Duo-Specific.” This case exists if one makes a case that the worded description of “seven angels,” “golden censer,” and “filled it [the censer] with fire” are correlated with the seven shadowy figures in the image, the torch as censer, and the fire burning in it.

IMAGE 9

After close discussion it was decided that this image represented either an “Additive” but more likely a “Duo-Specific” combination example of words and images.

IMAGE 10

This was another example where the first impulse of the students was to look at it as “Parallel” but more likely as “Duo-Specific” but upon close examination, particularly looking closely at the two middle panels on the page, the general consensus came out at “Additive” combination choice. Of course, since McCloud’s combinations apply to panels, it is in fact both in all likely-hood.

IMAGE 11

This is perhaps one of my favorites, and I consider it incredibly powerful, image from any graphic novel. With the lack of words throughout, most of the panel is “Picture Specific” in its presentation of imagery. The two panels that do have words though serve up an “Additive” combination.

IMAGE 12

A great deal of this panel puts into practice a combination of “Picture Specific” and “Montage” combinations. The use of words in this page and in the panels is spare at best and acts as ornamentation, while the visual use of laughter “Ha Ha Ha” worked into this scene definitely places a shared enface between words and images but with the words acting in onomatopoeia fashion as actually part of the overall image.

Of course, ultimately McCloud’s method is meant to be put into practice per panel and some of the approaches used in this study with students was on a larger scale, incorporating the whole page. This works for some of the chosen images, while others would clearly have more and varied application of word/image combinations.

Part 3: Conclusions and Observations

As noted earlier, students are in the process of conducting Literary Analysis of their chosen graphic novel. The purpose of this exercise with the students was introduce and expand upon their own perceptions and vocabulary (to aid in their analysis process) of the combination of visuals and words they are encountering in their readings.

It is worth noting that the students took to this assignment quite eagerly and were willing and able to make small scale arguments for different types of combinations being at work in the image shown them.

I was happy to see both the level of enthusiasm that the students applied, along with the way that many of them continually glanced at their copies of McCloud and fact checking their assertions. The interchange of ideas and material was enjoyable.

Adaptation Approach 1.0

July 16, 2015July 16, 2015 / Dr. Evans / Leave a comment

The Adaptation Approach as I have named it centers upon:

Utilizing the creation of Graphic Narratives and other forms of Visual Rhetoric to communicate concepts, ideas, etc. found in the Composition classroom

Initially I wanted to partner up with an artist, such as my friend Dave Andrews, but I dragged my feet on writing the scripts. The project eventually took a back burner to my dissertation.

So, to get started, I made myself a “big board” of ideas, concepts, and assignments I really felt should be illustrated in order to help assist my students.

Here is what I came up with, for a start:

The left hand column covers material for my Comp 1 (1301) course while the right hand column covers information and material for my Comp 2 (1302) course. The material boxed at the bottom covers concepts and material relevant to BOTH courses.

Of course, this list is only a start.

Visually Re-think: The Graphic Narrative and the Research Based Composition Classroom

July 16, 2015 / Dr. Evans / Leave a comment

So, there are TWO ways I am using to approaching the idea of the Graphic Narrative (or as Scott McCloud might refer to it, Graphic Fiction) in the classroom:

Directly teaching and using Graphic Narratives such as Graphic Novels in the Composition Classroom

Utilizing the creation of Graphic Narratives and other forms of Visual Rhetoric to communicate concepts, ideas, etc. found in the Composition classroom

I am currently applying both of these approaches.

Interestingly I have come to realize that when examining both of these approaches, there appears to exist interlinked but distinct aspects. Approach 1 is perhaps the more surface level, generic (emerging) approach often used in the classroom. Approach 2 represents a more conceptual synthesis of the form, the Graphic Narratives, in applying them less as texts and artifacts to be explored, analyzed, and evaluated, and instead applying the form directly to the interpretation and synthesis of information for student consumption within the teaching process itself.

Both do share the fact that they are and represent an ongoing, evolution approach in the classroom instruction.

To help differentiate the fact that I plan to post and discuss both approaches I have given here (both are ongoing) at different points and at varying times, it probably behooves me to name these two approaches to help. So, I will call Approach 1, the direct use and discussion of graphic novels in the composition classroom The Application Approach. Approach 2 I will rename here, the one about applying graphic narratives as adaptation of genres, assignments, and concepts, and refer to it as The Adaptation Approach.

A Rhetorical Quest For Identity

Abstraction Through Simplification and Beyond…

first year composition