Analyzing a cover of a book.

Essay #2: Analysis of a Visual Text

Page Limits: 3-6 pages (i.e., 3 full pages minimum) in MLA guidelines with a Works Cited page.

Assignment Prompt: Write a detailed analytical argument about a visual text based on your own insights and using at least one quoted source. For this assignment, you’ll need to formulate an arguable, complex, and specific thesis, defending it with well-developed supporting paragraphs. Look for both obvious and surprising evidence to support your claims about the visual text you are analyzing.

The purpose of this assignment is to argue for a specific interpretation of the visual text by describing the manifest content and illuminating the latent content for the academic reader. Defend your interpretation by analyzing the visual techniques used. Think about what the image is arguing BEYOND the obvious message of the film or moral of the story.

Approved photos for analysis

· The American Born Chinese Book Cover

· Any film poster from a movie about coming of age

· Any image in the VTA Image Folder on Titanium

Note – you have to know where the image originated from, the creator (or film company), and year of publication. etc.

Steps to writing it:

--pick your image

--read Helmers’s “The Elements of Critical Viewing” (this is very important because it will remind you of what techniques to look for in the image.

--stare at the image for a long time, and make a list of all the things you notice about it. This will help you formulate ideas later and will help you engage with the image.

--research the rhetorical situation. Look online for context. If it’s a film poster, look at imdb.com for info about it. Find out who created the image, for what purpose, when, and the context around it (if it’s for a book or movie, who was the creator of that, and when, where was it produced? What do we need to know about the cultural significance, history, social issues surrounding it, etc? Anything that applies.

--create your thesis statement. Your thesis should state what the image argues or is selling or promising the viewer

--important note – the story behind the image (the actual movie or book itself) is not important for this essay. You are analyzing the elements of the image only. You shouldn’t be using plot or things in the story for support. You can certainly mention the film or book, but avoid tangents into the plot if you get stuck looking for things to analyze. If you are stuck, look deeper for symbolism. For example, for the Wizard of Oz film poster, it’s okay to say that the image shows them on a journey (if they are standing on a yellow brick road), but it’s not okay to write a whole paragraph about the journey when the image just shows giant faces of the characters.

Organization

Introduction:

Here’s where you introduce the image (give as much background and context on it that you can, and the minimum is who created it, when, and why).

If it’s notable, you can also discuss who the target audience is (the target audience is never everybody or fans of a certain genre. It’s a specific age group, usually within 5-6 years, like the target age group for martial arts movies is teenaged boys, or romantic comedies is teen girls. The ages of actors in the film is rarely an indication, but if the film has more than one message or genre, it’s attempting to appeal to a wider audience. For example, The Wizard of Oz has elements of all genres, for its time. In other words, the target audience is sometimes complex. Think about who exactly would be attracted to the image, and why.)

BRIEFLY (1 or 2 sentences) describe what is happening in the image (what we see in it).

Give your thesis statement – your thesis doesn’t have to be one sentence, but it should answer the question: What is the image arguing? Or What is the image selling? How it’s doing that (what elements it’s using) will be the body of your essay.

Body

In whatever order makes sense to you and keeps the essay flowing well, the body is where you address the elements in the image (the Helmers article goes into detail about these):

-Historical and/or cultural significance

-Background

-Placement – larger means more important

-Lighting/shading – light usually means hope, God, enlightenment, or something like it

-Color – red means passion, yellow means fertility and happiness, etc (look online for basic color analysis if you get stuck)

-Text

-Name/Face recognition/celebrity (for films mostly)

-Object symbolism (anything shaped like a penis, like a knife, sword, stick, tall building, etc., is a phallic symbol, which means male dominance and power)

-Anything else that needs to be addressed, like what’s NOT in the image

Conclusion

Real conclusions from experienced writers do NOT repeat the thesis. The purpose of a conclusion is to take everything you’ve presented and draw a larger conclusion from it. We call these larger implications. Here’s some ideas:

--why is this image important? Does it leave us with cultural messages, political messages, social messages?

--if it’s a film poster, does the film deliver what it promises in the image, or is the image a bit deceptive?

--How well did the image work in capturing an audience? How well did the film do in theaters?

General Essay Tips

· The MINIMUM page length is 3 pages. You won’t be able to pass if it’s under that because the assignment is designed in such a way that less than 3 pages is simply not enough development, so you should aim for going a little over. If the essay is longer, there’s no problem with that as long as you are making significant, insightful points and aren’t repetitious. It also needs to be in MLA format. TNR 12pt. font, 1 inch margins on all sides, and a header on the first page. Please see the sample papers to see how it should look.

· You need to quote someone and have ONE source. You can use IMDB as a source, or Rotten Tomatoes, or a film critic, or the Helmers essay, etc. This isn’t a research paper, so you should not have a lot of sources, but you can have a couple. The analysis part should be all you. This means that you need a Works Cited Page.

· Your audience is the academic community, which is large. It’s not just me. It’s all the other students in the class, professors, the educated public, etc. Your language should be formal.

· You can use “I” if you like, but the essay is really not about you, so please keep that to a minimum. Avoid using phrases like “I think” and “I believe” because they sound weak and ruin your ethos. Imagine yourself as an analysis expert, so even though technically it’s all your opinion, it should sound like fact. Everything in life is just someone’s opinion (even science), but we believe it because of solid evidence to back up claims and an authoritative tone/language.

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