Promoting visual literacy among undergraduate students in geography: teaching a visualized Latin America

Abstract

This study offers a discussion of the role of the visual in the professional training of geographers arguing that visual literacy is not necessarily promoted during geography undergraduate studies. It then analyzes an experience of teaching a visualized Latin America developed in Argentina, as an illustrative example: on the one hand, it reveals the general lack of visual literacy among geography students; on the other hand, it suggests strategies that call for a shift in what is classically understood as a technical skill. It concludes addressing the need to redefine visual literacy in broader terms within the discipline and its training.

Keywords::

• visual literacy
• Latin America
• geography
• undergraduate studies

Acknowledgements

Dr Inés Dussel's and Dr Jörn Seemann's critical reading and insightful feedback became an intellectual challenge throughout all the process of writing this paper. The author is indebted to the anonymous reviewers and the editor, Dr Tim Hall, whose stimulating comments encouraged her to fully strengthen this paper. The author would also like to thank both students of the different courses she has been teaching and professors who were present in the session of geography and education held in November 2012 in her home university where a first draft was discussed. Among her students, the author is particularly grateful to Paige Pokorney and Kayte Cole who made a final edition of the document in English. The author is also grateful to Dr Johnny Finn and his students for sharing the experiences of the Project Bahia Underground.

Notes

^1. Previous records of the interest in developing visual skills can be traced back to the period between 1918 and 1928 in the USA. This movement called “visual instruction movement” (in which a Professor in Geography has a key role) promoted the application of visual resources. However, its focus was primary education. Visual instruction was understood as a way of promoting national unity (Johnson, 2008).

^2. Undergraduate studies in geography are held in 21 public universities in Argentina. They have duration between 4 and 5 years and in most of the cases have a closed curriculum: as all the courses of undergraduate programs are compulsory, students do not have the option of planning the orientation of their studies.

^3. The monographs analyzed were submitted at the National University of the Center of Buenos Aires Province (Argentina) and covered the following areas: geography and education (2), economic geography (2), human geography (2), and environment and urban planning (1).

^4. There are wonderful books that propose studying Latin America through image analysis. Among them, the author would like to highlight the works of Gruzinski (2000), Penhos (2005), Andermann and Rowe (2005), Andermann (2007), and the recent compilation of Dym and Offen (2011). However, their inclusion in Argentinean university education is limited.

^5. It is interesting to note that research exploring teacher's visual culture done by Dussel (2009) in Argentina highlights the predominance of photojournalism in the repertoires of images chosen by teachers. As Dussel puts it: “Photojournalism provides the monuments of contemporary memory, and memory in return archives photos as its privileged material” (Dussel, 2009, p. 96).

^6. Images and music were selected by the instructor. Music “De Ushuaia a la Quiaca”, composed and interpreted by Gustavo Santaolalla. The video is accessible at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v = cLqbx_BSGDI&feature = youtu.be

^7. A group of researchers asked Latin American photographers, historians, and musicians the following question: which image speaks about Latin America? Images and narratives are available at http://www.tramas.flacso.org.ar/recursos/imagenes (December 2012).