Bret Lefler
Research Interest Paper Introduction/ Problem:
Look around you, what do you see, what is your environment like and what are the images you find yourself immersed in? The imagery of your everyday life that is what visual culture could be considered. It is the abundance of imagery that circles around us at all times, in several different ways and has a profound influence on us. Visual culture consists of artifacts and performances of all kinds as well as new and emerging
technologies, inside and outside the art museum, and the beliefs, values and attitudes imbued in those artifacts and performances by the people that make, present, and use them (Anderson, 2004.) Visual Culture includes all of the visual arts, aspects of the performing arts, videos, television, computer graphics, toys, billboards, comics, fashion, landscape design, packaging, malls, automobiles and any other humanly-made visual influences on our lives. It includes the ideas, beliefs, and other conceptual realms that function in and around visual objects (Freedman, 2000.) It is possible that visual culture has become an entity in itself and one definitely worth consideration when taking into account how it affects the classroom setting. It teaches people what to look at and how to look at it (in the interests of its creators). As a result, students learn many things from visual culture (e.g. social habits, values and mores) and about visual culture, regardless of whether we include analysis of it in curriculum (Freedman, 2000.)
With this being said it becomes painfully obvious that there are two influences at work in art classrooms today; the information that is introduced to the student by the teacher and the imagery that exists outside the school on t-shirts, billboards and
television. For the most part, American art education ignores the importance of vernacular imagery as a means for developing a more critical pedagogy in the art
classroom. By limiting their students’ analysis to museum art, art educators, consciously and unconsciously, ignore powerful imagery powerful to their students’ lives and
continue their absorption into the modernist paradigm of high culture (Tavin, 2000).
Contemporary artists are increasingly producing works that mimic fashion photography, derive from television, or otherwise struggle to compete with the production values of the entertainment industries. This is hardly news. But the theoretical discussion of fine art as a cultural practice is still largely dependant on outmoded ideas that “art” defines itself in critical opposition to mass culture. Clearly there is a problem there. The gap between the reality of the artists’ sensibilities and the theoretical apparatus of much (especially academic) art criticism suggests that the understanding of the relation between fine art and visual culture needs a major conceptual overhaul more in keeping with what is actually going on ( Drucker, 1999). This gap is becoming increasingly more evident art in school is being seen as “what art is,” when it has become apparent that art has broadened its scope almost as extreme as to be a subliminal component of our lives. Stokrocki posed this question to a group of high school students, what is art? When I inquired about the nature of art, of the six students who answered, three of them considered art an
expression of someone’s emotion, imagination, or thoughts. Other students surmised art to be a studio form (drawing (3/30, painting 3/30, photography 1/30, sculpture 2/30, and crafts 2/30). Students conceived of art only in terms of school art concepts (Stokrocki, 1999). The ironic thing is that visual culture is much larger in its scope and seems to have a much more powerful grip on the minds and imaginations of our students than what
is visible in the fine arts. It would be remiss of any art educator to ignore the presence of visual culture entirely.
One component of visual culture that I believe has a profound influence on our students is the world of advertising. It often has an agenda which is seldom in line with what is being taught in school and the fine arts. Skillful alignment with popular culture has given advertising certain resonance through the years. As a result, through history ads often overreached their target audiences and outlasted their aims. Their language became the vernacular; their images infused America’s collective fantasy. In spite of their bias and persuasion these ads transmitted ideas that became society’s cultural currency, a currency still viable in today’s marketplace of ideas (Coleman, 1998). Our students interoperate and retain these images and eventually they filter into our modes of
expression. The use of mass advertising techniques in the promotion of the arts and arts education highlights two fundamentally incompatible approaches to cultural formation.
Advertising campaigns are designed to address segments of the masses and to foster mass values; some arts marketing strategies have adopted this approach and have sought to foster a collective response to art (Barton, 1988).
The question then becomes how can art educators integrate and use visual culture;
specifically the world of advertising in the classroom. If art educators are going to acknowledge and embrace the changing conceptions of self and world brought about by visual culture, they must learn to cross disciplinary borders, develop new language, and challenge themselves and their students to think and act in new ways. This of course, is no easy task. Because the study of visual culture has no totalizing methodology, no rigid set of discourses, and draws from whatever fields are necessary to produce results, this
paradigmatic shift is fraught with discomfort and indeterminacy, and offers no guarantees (Tavin, 2000). The mass media and other forms of popular culture influence the
knowledge students construct for themselves about the visual arts, including fine art.
Because students will increasingly encounter such information, they need help in learning how to think critically about mass media representations in general and representations of art in particular (Freedman, 1997). Incorporating visual culture into the field of
educational research, then, goes beyond the mere use of photos, drawings, and other images as fashionable accessories, illustrations in passive functions to the almighty text.
Such critical incorporation, whether through the utilization and inclusion of visual technologies to record data, engaging in the study of the visual aspects of educational and cultural situations, using graphic images ( photo essays, cartoons and films) in the process of an investigation, requires attention, yet is not limited to the phenomena of vision and images (Fischman, 2001). Teachers must acknowledge the world of images that expose and impose themselves on the people we are trying to teach. They must also be able to integrate the whole of a student’s visual realm within their classroom. They must seek to validate, interoperate and utilize visual culture to their advantage in the classroom as opposed to seeing at something that is not relevant to what they are trying to teach. Art educators can begin by asking themselves: What images are students currently exposed to in visual culture? What investments do students have in certain images? What are these investments? What do students (not) learn from these images? Do these images signify a certain lifestyle or feeling for students? Do these images help mobilize desire, anger, or pleasure in students? Do students believe these images embody sexist, racist, ablest, and specific class interests? What are are the historical conditions in under which
these images are produced, organized and regulated? How is power connoted throughout these images? By focusing on everyday experiences students will see how popular practices and beliefs wield power in ways that seem invisible, natural or unproblematic.
This process becomes a tool for social reconstruction and offering alternatives to traditional frameworks and processes (Tavin, 2000).
Possible Research Questions/ Purpose/Methods:
It is the goal of this study is to find out what students are being influenced by from visual culture and how it affects their view toward art and aesthetics and hopefully
answer some of the questions that Tavin puts forward. I want to know what is “Cool” and why. What I propose to do is initially conduct a survey of what students are interested in, that stems from visual culture, specifically in the realm of advertising. After the survey is completed I will conduct follow up interviews in order to verify the participants
responses as well as ask more specific questions about there responses and how
advertising has had an effect on them. After the data is collected, I will then categorize according to specific age group and gender due to the fact that advertising in general can be very gender specific especially when considering the world of men and women’s fashion. Fashion, where choices are many and rules are few, offered freedom and rebellion, especially to the youth (Stokrocki, 1988). Then I will select 2-3 of their advertising campaigns or slogans that the students place value in and conduct a critical analysis of these advertising campaigns. I want to find out who these ads are targeting and why? What they are trying to sell? What moral and ethical standards are being pushed by these campaigns; what do they place value in? How do these campaigns operate within visual culture and our social realms? I want to provide a framework for art
educators to interoperate these images that students are receiving from advertising through visual culture. So that teachers may incorporate in their curriculum the tools that are necessary for their students to be able to get to the marrow of the visual information that they receive outside the classroom.
The ultimate purpose of this study will be to see how visual culture influences and informs our classroom today and to provide a blueprint for teachers and students to analyze and interoperate the visual information that is imbued in their daily lives through visual culture.
I am considering conducting this study on a group of middle school students for two reasons. First I taught middle school for 4 years and it is an age group that I have had some experience with and can relate well too. Also I believe that advertising seems to be directing itself with ever more intensity toward younger markets in order to sell their products. I also believe that because of this ad campaigns are starting to have an effect on how students relate to their visual environment and each other. The age and ethnic
background of those within ads doesn’t matter so much any more as long as the ad sells product. People portrayed as having successful careers pitch upscale products – yet in many cases, the youth market remains the implied target audience (Coleman, 1998).
Advertising’s assault on the youth market is perhaps the most significant aspect of that contribution because young people eventually help to shape cultural life by their
participation in cultural and artistic endeavors and by the decisions they make regarding their children’s education in the arts (Barton, 1988). Also one thing to consider is the intake and use of media by students on a daily basis which is almost parallel in duration to how much time is spent in school by any particular student. This consumption of
imagery is at its peak in the junior high school years. Media use peaks at about 6 and 3/4and exposure at just over 8 hours daily around 12or13 years of age, just before kids enter middle or junior high school (Roberts, Foehr, Rideout, Brodie, 1999). Due to the fact that students at this age or taking in so much imagery I believe it is the prime age group for me to conduct my study.
This study will take place at a yet to be determined middle school in Tallahassee, Florida.
Review of Literature
Something to consider is what has already been done to address advertising/ visual culture in school curriculum. I have come across two examples that seem to illustrate how visual culture is addressed in the classroom setting.
The first of these is a study put forward by Margaret Dee Marion (1986) which focuses more on the music associated with advertising. However it does address some key concerns about advertising that can easily be integrated into other subjects. Using this unit with nine-, ten-, and eleven – year old children we chose advertising as the theme because (1) it presents natural, albeit commercial, examples of integration of various art forms and basic curriculum content, and (2) it permeates our lives—our students must learn to be wise consumers as well as producers. We viewed advertising as a form of communication which influences people to buy a product, service or idea (Merrion, 1986). She begins her unit of instruction by briefly going over the history of advertising in America and how it is evolved from the human voice into what it has become today.
Then she dissects advertising into ten basic components. The preceding discussion
provides ideas for at least twenty different mini-research projects which could be shared in class. Some might be:
1. Types of advertising
a. print or space advertising b. broadcast or time commercials c. outdoor advertising
signs billboards posters
2. Street cries and chants
3. Benjamin Franklin’s contributions to advertising 4. Signs of long ago
5. Classified ads
6. Television advertisement
7. Radio and newspaper advertisement 8. The work of an advertising agency 9. How commercials are made
10. Famous billboards of the United States (Merrion, 1986).
The unit began by asking the students what advertising is and what function/ functions does it serve. The students were then given a worksheet that asked them to generate more ideas and thoughts regarding the world of advertising where the students were asked to consider the relationships between the ad and the audience the buyer and the specific medium in which the advertisement was delivered.
After the initial discussion the students were asked to consolidate their responses and a chart was then made to illustrate the student’s interests and types of advertising. The next activity involved an analysis of an existing advertisement specifically the jingle that was associated with it. In the analysis the students were asked to focus on specific musical elements (tempo, direction, orchestration and tone). After the analysis of an existing advertisement the students, as a class, were asked to generate an advertising jingle of their own whose ultimate purpose was to sell a book. In their production they were to consider the elements that had been used in the analysis of the preexisting advertisement they discussed as a class. The final activity involved with this unit was that the students were then divided into groups and asked to come up with a jingle in order to sell a specific book. Opportunities to function as dramatists and graphic artists cropped up, as well as the previously mentioned role of musician, as children completed their projects and staged their final products. In these artistic activities, the children learned to employ the arts as nonverbal ways to communicate their verbal messages (Merrion, 1986).
Although this article doesn’t address the realm of visual arts in advertising directly it does recognize the importance of integrating our student’s daily experience into the classroom. It also recognizes that the goal of advertising is to communicate a message and provides a framework for analyzing that message within the context of specific subject areas. Students make art not merely for its formal, technical, or even private value, but to communicate about social issues in social ways (Freedman, 2000). These activities provide a framework for students to interpret advertising within the context of a specific subject. However these activities only seem to scratch the surface when it comes to addressing the specific message within and advertisement. This would be central to the
focus of my study. Especially when considering that the message in advertising is not always visible at first glance. The findings of advertisers and psychologists as they joined forces to discover why consumers behave as they do enabled marketers to improve significantly their attempts at manipulating choices, attitudes and habits. More
specifically, they found that appeals to the subconscious mind work better than appeals to reason – playing on hidden needs, weaknesses, anxieties, and desires is more effective than encouraging rational choice and self governed autonomous behavior when influencing consumer decisions (Barton, 1988).
Another program that examines visual culture and how it has an effect on our classrooms is examined by Duncum (1997). Media education is informed by a semiotic critique of contemporary forms. Moreover, media education has long been centrally concerned with the representation of marginal groups, especially in relation to gender, race, and class (Buckingham & Sefton-Green, 1994). It attempts to offer strategies for broadening the art curriculum to incorporate social, economic, and political issues in ways which students can relate to their lived experience (Duncum, 1997). Media
education, in this case, is then broken down into four areas production, values, audiences, and the media industry. It is structured this way so that students will be able to look at how specific media is produced but also the people it affects and the infrastructure that feeds it.
The activities that Duncum examines are designed for “young adolescents” to examine a soap opera. Students begin this unit by watching a short sequence of the soap opera and coding it according to facial expressions, gestures, costumes, sound effects etc…. Then a discussion occurs where the students examine how these codes work
together. A reading from the script is done and the students are asked what codes they would use and then act it out using their new interpretations. Then students watch a video where the specific roles of the people behind the scenes are explained and the conditions under which these professionals work, where specific attention is paid to the deadlines and the “assembly line” nature of the process. Students then move into a more behind the scenes, production, phase of the unit where sets are designed and mapped out. In this stage of the process they are asked to consider monetary concerns as well as what props will be required for their production. After which they watch another video where ethical and legal concerns are addressed, for example, what can be shown on the air during that particular time of day. This allows for a class discussion where issues regarding race, class and religious affiliation are considered. Attention is then paid to their target audience and what advertisements may or may not appeal to them during there
commercial breaks. They also look at how ratings are gathered and how their soap could be adjusted to cater to other audiences. Students then address the issue of how soaps do or do not address real life concerns and problems in relation to their own experiences.
Production then begins on their soap where the script is written and storyboarded, the production schedule is laid out and how many episodes will be produced. Class members play the parts of actors, directors and production staff.
Although this unit takes a turn more toward the dramatic aspect of the arts it still addresses the biases and stereotypes that are put forward by specific forms of media . this unit attempts to address those concerns by allowing the students to take some semblance of ownership in the process as well as seeing how the process is broken down. It is also put in a framework that is relevant top their daily lives. For art education to have a
healthy future, it must be remade. It requires a paradigm shift toward a socially leveled, semiotic conception of culture. An inclusive conception of culture could begin to address the proliferation of mass media images and their multiple readings by our multifaceted selves (Duncum, 1997). This perspective is furthered by Freedman (2000), where the participants, context and inner workings of visual culture help shape it in the long run.
The study and articulation of multiple perspectives of visual culture, professional and lay interpretations, and their sources can inform students about the ways in which human beings use and make meaning from art. Functions and meanings cannot be understood as either only individual or social because the interrelationships of symbols, metaphors, and other cultural aspects of context influence individuals who in turn influence culture. In order to understand such complexities students should investigate both consensus building around opinions about art (including the importance of art) and the acceptance of conflicts in interpretation (Freedman, 2000). Strategies for understanding how images travel between different conceptual labels can in turn be used to develop students’
understandings of their own movements between locations and social and cultural groups (Coleman, 1998).
I think what is important to understand and is put forward by these two examples is for educators to be able to relate and dissect popular imagery that enters into our students lives. These examples also illustrate the ability of visual culture to transcend boundaries related to specific subject matter and touch us on a variety of levels through a variety of media.
Ethical Considerations
Some potential problems and conflicts of interest that may arise from this study should be considered before hand. First I should state that my first priority in this study is to the students, their guardians and any professionals that may be involved in the study. I will allow full disclosure of my research and make it available to any of the parties involved that may be interested. Also I will adhere to the guidelines put forward by the human subjects committee at Florida State University. Also there will be no financial compensation for response or any other rewards given to anyone involved in the study as to insure the quality of the responses.
There are some problems I can imagine occurring with this study. The first problem may occur in the initial survey and interview section, where students may respond in a fashion that could be illegal, potentially embarrassing or generally frowned upon by figures of authority. A good example would be that if I were to ask the question what advertising do you find appealing? A male student (especially considering the age group I’m considering studying) might respond with The Girls Gone Wild video infomercials that can be viewed on late night television. Or perhaps a student might respond to an advertisement that sells alcohol, which may lead to that student disclosing his/her partaking in what is being advertised. If this should be the case then the proper people/
authorities will be contacted and the individual will no longer be considered part of the study.
Another ethical consideration to consider is what this might tell about advertisements view toward culture and how it filters and interprets or perpetuates our society as a whole. Several authors recognize the ability of advertising to push stereotypes, class differences and certain dominant notions of sex and sexuality. The question then becomes
how this get interprets by our students. Are students more likely to believe these stereotypes and do they present them in their daily lives? The question then becomes what is to be considered the appropriate view, without becoming to politically correct.
