This course will examine the myriad ways in which social movements have mobilized dominant and alternative modes of representation and visuality to represent the rights of oppressed groups.
Specifically, we will explore how rights have been articulated through the media of photography and visual materials. How might photography provide insight into critical social problems such as poverty, labor abuses, racism, and war? What might photography obscure in the process and how does this fit into the contemporary digital media age?
Through these questions and our readings, this course will address theoretical questions such as: How does one represent the rights of a group of people through visual materials? What are the rhetorical possibilities and constraints of photographs—that is, how do photographs simultaneously communicate “truth” and point to the construction of knowledge and culture? How have historical and technological changes altered the relationship between photography and social movements? How are some groups privileged in the ways of seeing and visuality available to them and how might photography be used both as a resource for justice and as a tool for the perpetuation of injustice? How might empathy, logic, prejudice, and fear be both culturally and neurologically related? Are we naturally predisposed to trust or distrust certain people or certain representations?
The readings and class discussion will provide a theoretical and applied framework within which students will develop skills in developing, planning, and producing high-quality analyses of the visual strategies employed by distinct social movements. Students who successfully complete this course will develop experience and knowledge in analyzing visual materials and critically evaluating the rhetorical practices linking social movements and visual representation and in analyzing historical and contemporary rhetorical practices.
Specifically, we will explore how rights have been articulated through the media of photography and visual materials. How might photography provide insight into critical social problems such as poverty, labor abuses, racism, and war? What might photography obscure in the process and how does this fit into the contemporary digital media age?
Through these questions and our readings, this course will address theoretical questions such as: How does one represent the rights of a group of people through visual materials? What are the rhetorical possibilities and constraints of photographs—that is, how do photographs simultaneously communicate “truth” and point to the construction of knowledge and culture? How have historical and technological changes altered the relationship between photography and social movements? How are some groups privileged in the ways of seeing and visuality available to them and how might photography be used both as a resource for justice and as a tool for the perpetuation of injustice? How might empathy, logic, prejudice, and fear be both culturally and neurologically related? Are we naturally predisposed to trust or distrust certain people or certain representations?
The readings and class discussion will provide a theoretical and applied framework within which students will develop skills in developing, planning, and producing high-quality analyses of the visual strategies employed by distinct social movements. Students who successfully complete this course will develop experience and knowledge in analyzing visual materials and critically evaluating the rhetorical practices linking social movements and visual representation and in analyzing historical and contemporary rhetorical practices.