Week 1
Aug 25: Class introduction, syllabus overview. Begin reading “Pepper Spray Cop” together. In-class writing exercise: creating a narrative: the near-death story.
Homework: Create a WordPress blog and email the url to your site (e.g. http://wrdblog.wordpress.com). My email is steven.alvarez@uky.edu. For your first post, type up your near-death story. Also, add an image for an illustration.
Week 2
Aug 30: Continue with “Pepper Spray Cop” article and reviewing visual rhetoric. Breaking down terms. Reviewing near-death stories and using WordPress.
Homework: Recreate in a series of 10 digital images of the near-death story as an update to your first post. Be sure to give five sentences of explanation behind the visual rhetorical choices in your images as captions. Consider also the angle of the images you choose.
Sep 1: Continue with “Pepper Spray Cop” and rhetorical terms. Continue with the near-death story as setting up a storyboard for the story as a comic.
Homework: Read McCloud’s text, Chapter 1. Complete your graphic narrative and upload before next class to your WordPress site. You should have 10 panels of a comic work started.
Week 3
Sep 6: *16 IG POSTS DUE WEDNESDAY, 9/7: 5PM
Continue with McCloud. Reviewing visual tactics for composing graphic narratives. Bring in your narrative to share with classmates and making plans for revisions. Being specific with aspects of McCloud to work with in revising your text.
Homework: Revising your graphic narrative. Continue reading McCloud chapters 3-4.
Sep 8: *6 WordPress posts due, 9/11, 3PM Discussing McCloud and your texts.
Homework: Assignment 1 due next class. Your graphic panels must total 40 panels, include titles, and incorporate ideas from McCloud. You are also to write a one-page reflection on your process and how reading McCloud affected your aesthetic choices.
Week 4
Sep 13: Continue with McCloud and review with “Pepper Spray Cop.” .
Homework: Continue with McCloud–Chapters 2 and 3. Continue working on your graphic narrative.
Sep 15: Continue with McCloud
Homework: Complete Assignment 1, due Sep. 20.
Week 5
Sep 20: Assignment 1 due on Sep 21 at 5 pm. Begin reading “Mythologies” in class (109-126).
Homework: Continue with Barthes for discussion for next class (109-126).
Sep 22: Continue with Barthes. Also visual arguments film: “Akira Kurosawa: Composing Movement.” Practice making black and white films around the building: music and movement.
Homework: Upload your group video (through YouTube) to your blog. They must total 45 seconds maximum. Do your best to capture motion or other aspects touched upon in the analysis of Kurosawa’s aesthetics. Also add music to a song you are familiar with that matches the movement of the music.
Week 6
Sep 27: Group work: Completing group video projects. One student should upload the video to YouTube to share with classmates. Each member of the group, however, should post the video on their individual blogs.
Homework: Explore three album/game/film posters that you can imitate for next class.
Sep 29: Album covers and visual rhetoric. Music and visuals exercise. Returning to Mythologies.
Homework: Begin to think about the cover your design, and also how to first unravel how the designer made the cover, and how you could imitate it.
Week 7
Oct 4: Continue with Mythologies. Begin examining ideology and visual arguments. *16 Instagram posts due, 5pm Oct. 5th. Upload your alternative album cover ideas or any drafts you have. Describe the choices for your design, and why you used those elements.
Homework: Continue with designing your covers, and preparing for the second assignment. Consider how you can use the ways of reading culture in Mythologies to reading your cover.
Oct 6: CLASS MEETING AT UK ART MUSEUM.
Homework: Work on filling your blog posts, feel free to use material from the museum visit for inspiration for your design ideas.
Week 8
Oct 11: More with Barthes on Instagram, and introducing Assignment 2 further. Start reading: “An Illustrated Guide to Guy Debord’s ‘The Society of the Spectacle’”.
Homework: Read . Also continue working on memes that speak to the ideas in the book with cartoons. Also read Making sense of memes: (http://www.studentpulse.com/print?id=879). Continue working on Assignment 2.
Oct 13: No Class. *6 WordPress posts due.
Week 9
Oct 18: Continue with “Guide to Debord.”
Homework: Continue reading the “Guide to Debord.”
Oct 20: No Class. Assignment 2 due.
Week 10
Oct 25: Continue with “Guide to Debord.” Using visual techniques for parody.
Homework: Continue with “Guide to Debord.”
Oct 27: Workshop with Situationist techniques.
Homework: Continue with “Guide to Debord.”
Week 11
Nov 1: In-class The Hundred Headless Woman and creating visual collages / memes.
Homework: Create three collages inspired by the aesthetics of Ernst. Be sure to include captions for your “surreal” texts.
Nov 3: Surrealist visual rhetoric and psychoanalysis.
Homework: Experiment with two surreal images for your blog and Instagram. Use Photoshop to mix elements.
Week 12
Nov 8: No Class, Election Day.
Nov 10: *16 Instagram posts due. More with images and sharing.
Homework: Continue to experiment with surreal images and giving comments to your classmates.
Week 13
Nov 15: Reviewing your remixed assignments. Toward end of class turning to visual writing, concrete poetry. Reviewing Typortraits by Kevin McPherson Eckhoff
Homework: Complete WordPress posts.
Nov 17: No Class. *6 WordPress posts due, 10 PM
Week 14
Nov 22: Reviewing Assignment 3.
Nov 24: Thanksgiving break.
Assignment 3 DUE Nov. 27, 5pm
Week 15
Nov 29: Reviewing arguments about visual arguments. Begin reading Typortraits by Kevin McPherson Eckhoff.
Homework: Continue with Typortraits by Kevin McPherson Eckhoff.
Dec 1: Continue with Typortraits by Kevin McPherson Eckhoff. *16 Instagram posts due, 5pm, Dec 2*
Homework: Continue with Typortraits by Kevin McPherson Eckhoff.
Week 16
Dec 6: Continue with Typortraits by Kevin McPherson Eckhoff. *Last set of WordPress posts due, Dec 7 5pm.*
Homework: Continue working toward your final portfolio project.
Dec 8: Last Class. Review semester and terms for final assignment.
WRD 308 Visual Rhetoric 