Visual Media and Communication

                                 Autumn 2020 Thursday 12:00 PM AVC


Lecturer: Tae-Sik Kim, PhD

Office Hour: Wed 14:00 – 16:00 & Wed 13:00 – 14:00

Contact Information: beinkid@mail.muni.cz  Office Number: 5. 50

Ø Course Objectives

This course examines the cultural meanings of visual communication on various media. Grounded in
the understanding of various theories from semiotics and cultural studies, this course looks
closely at media practices delivering visual messages firmly based on certain sociocultural
contexts. This course also covers broader issues related to visual messages and our everyday lives.
By reading a variety of research articles assigned in the course and participating in class
discussions, students learn to develop their own research projects focusing on visual communication
and cultural understandings.

·         Comprehend the cultural meanings of visual communication

·         Understand the role of the media in distributing visual messages

·         Review and analyze a variety of research articles on visual communication.

·         Find important themes and methods of semiotics

·         Lead insightful discussions.


Ø Syllabus

Week 1. Introduction to the course

Week 2. Semiotics Theories: Saussure, Peirce, Barthes, and more

Week 3. Semiotics and Culture – Theories: Geertz and Bourdieu

Week 4. Reading Week

Week 5. Visual Representation

Week 6. Visual Public Communication

Week 7. Advertisement

Week 8. Images of Spaces: Cities as Visual Media

Week 9. Digital Photography - Interpersonal Media

Week 10. Image Analysis Presentation

Week 11. Research Preparation (Individual Consultations)

Week 12. Visual Social Media

Week 13. Student Conference

Ø Literatures

Reading Articles: See, below.

Ø Teaching Methods

The format of the course is a combination of brief lectures and controlled discussions of various
assigned readings.

All students are expected to read all articles assigned and to develop appropriate discussion
questions. Each student is a discussion leader for an assigned week.

Students submit a research paper (topic of student’s choice in consultation with instructor;
minimum 14 pages).

Ø Assessment Methods


v  Attendance(50) : 3 unexcused absences during a semester shall be denied academic credit

v  Three Essays (450) Each 3-4 Pages


ü  1. Semiotics of our everyday life: Exemplify visual symbols used in our everyday life. Explain
how it has been contextualized in our society by using theories from Week 2 and 3 readings (Due.
22. 10. 2020).

ü  2. Decoding Culture: Analyze a visual material on social media by using theories covered in
class (Due. 19. 11. 2020)

ü  3. Urban Visual Media: Analyze your own pictures taking in Brno (Due 7. 1. 2021)

ü  No Late Paper Accepted


v  Presentation Week 10 (100)

ü  Analyze and Present a case of advertisement



v  Final Paper + Presentation (400): Due- 11 February 2020 (Late Paper – Subtract 5% for each day
after the due date)


Ø Study Materials

All materials, with the exception of book chapters available in the library and articles available
online, will be provided in PDF format.


Week 2. Semiotics Theories: Saussure, Peirce, Barthes, and more

Barthes, R. (1972). Mythologies. New York: Hill and Wang. Chapter, Myth Today.

Eco, U. (1979). A Theory of semiotics. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Chapter 0.
Introduction

Week 3. Semiotics and Culture: Geertz and Bourdieu

Geertz, C. (1973). The interpretation of culture. New York: Basic Books. Chapter 1

Swartz, D. (1998). Culture and power: The sociology of Pierre Bourdieu. Chicago: The University of
Chicago Press. Chapter 4.

Week 5. Visual Representation

Hall, S. (1997). Representation and the Media. Lecture.

Ben‐Porath, E. N., & Shaker, L. K. (2010). News images, race, and attribution in the wake of
Hurricane Katrina. Journal of Communication, 60(3), 466-490.

Week 6. Visual Media as Public Communication

Eberhardinger, M. J. (2012) "A Semiotic Analysis of Iconicity in Japanese Manner Posters."

Joffe, H. (2008). The power of visual material: Persuasion, emotion and
identification. Diogenes, 55(1), 84-93.

Week 7. Advertisement

Bianchi, C. (2011). Semiotic approaches to advertising texts and strategies: Narrative, passion,
marketing. Semiotica, 2011(183), 243-271.

Kara-Jane Lombard (2013) From Subways to Product Labels: The Commercial Incorporation of Hip Hop
Graffiti, Visual Communication Quarterly, 20:2, 91-103

Week 8. Images of Spaces: Cities as Visual Media

Kim, T. S. (2011). Three faces of Chinese modernity: Nationalism, globalization, and science.
Social Semiotics, 21, 683-697.

Greenberg, Miriam. "Branding Cities A Social History of the Urban Lifestyle Magazine." Urban
affairs review 36.2 (2000): 228-263.

Week 9. Digitized Visual Media

Machin, D. (2004). Building the world’s visual language: the increasing global importance of image
banks in corporate media. Visual Communication, 3(3), 316-336.

Van House, N. A. (2011). Personal photography, digital technologies and the uses of the
visual. Visual Studies, 26(2), 125-134.

Week 12. Visual Social Media

Kim, T-S. (2015) Defining the Occupy Movement: Visual Analysis of Facebook Profile Images Posted by
Local Occupy Movement Group, Visual Communication Quarterly, 22(3), 174-186

Borges-Rey, E. (2015). News Images on Instagram: The paradox of authenticity in hyperreal photo
reportage. Digital Journalism, 3(4), 571-593