Overview

"We see things as we are, not as they are."

How is meaning made in visual culture? How do the relations of looking created in painting, photography, film, animation, advertising, digital video, and new media reflect and shape how we define identity and interact socially? How do we see ourselves? Each other? How do visual images combine with words and other media to express different ways of seeing?

This interdisciplinary course takes a Cultural Studies approach to explore the methods and practices of "seeing" and what it means to be seen. We will combine creative and critical perspectives to investigate topics such as:

the gaze - double consciousness - the oppositional gaze - relations of looking - the human eye & the camera eye - the consequences of reproduction - relationships between word and image - abstraction & representation - modernism - animation - the moving image - comic strips - icons - point of view - subjectivity - identity - nature/artifice - interior/exterior - hypermedia/digital media - advertising - typefaces - hyperreality - the culture of the copy - surveillance - digital images

"Ways of Seeing" is a section of GCOR 111 College Writing 1: Structure and Style. In GCOR 111, students develop techniques for the writing of concise and lucid themes as a means of developing clarity and coherence in discussion and essays. The course focuses on effective writing skills ranging from mechanics (grammar, spelling, and punctuation) to paragraph structure and organization, and also includes more subtle considerations of style, audience, and tone. It covers the principle aims of writing--to express, explain, persuade, and create. Analyzing a range of assigned readings provides models of different forms of effective communication.

This is a "hands-on" course, and students will work individually and collaboratively on written and visual projects. In addition to the critical thinking, reading, and writing that are central to all GCOR 111 courses, activities will include mapping, Adobe Photoshop workshops, using the on-line resources of the course, and frequent trips to the Museum of Fine Arts.