Assignment: Multimodal Visual Argument or Presentation
Multimodality describes communication practices in terms of the textual, aural, linguistic, spatial, and visual resources - or modes - used to compose messages. Where media are concerned, multimodality is the use of several modes (media) to create a single artifact. The collection of these modes, or elements, contributes to how multimodality affects different rhetorical situations, or opportunities for increasing an audience's reception of an idea or concept. Everything from the placement of images to the organization of the content creates meaning. This is the result of a shift from isolated text being relied on as the primary source of communication, to the image being utilized more frequently in the digital age.
The Project: You will create this project based on the same argument you made in your Argumentative Research Essay. Once you have thoroughly and carefully researched an issue of your choosing and written a research paper on that issue, you will be ready to take your place among those who have argued on this controversy and you are ready to make your own public argument. For this assignment, you will create a specific, multimodal argument about your controversy, and you will share it with the class.
The Multimodal Visual Argument: Visuals will play an important part in these arguments. Consider what form will best convey your particular argument. You will post your visual argument or a link to it. Your argument can take one of the following forms:
Video: Would narrative, live interviews, drawings, background music, and/or statistics be most effective for your audience? Fully-developed videos are usually about 2-3 minutes long.
Website/Blog: Think of how to effectively arrange information, how to create links, and how to incorporate visuals and/or music. How do you want people to move through your design? Make sure to be user-friendly and invoke ethos through your design.
Magazine Spread/Pamphlet: Pay special attention to the relation between visual and textual elements as you arrange your page. Think of how you want a person's eye to move across your spread.
Other Genres: Please see me if you have an idea for why a different genre would be particularly effective for your argument. I'm very open to creativity; please try to be as creative as possible.
Multi Modal Visual Argument Specifics:
- Create a visual argument in conjunction with your research paper
- Present the project to the class. Link us to your video, website, brochure etc, targeting a specific audience.
- Evaluate each other's presentations.