Bernhardt Reading Response

Summary

            Stephen Bernhardt, in his article “Seeing the Text,” makes the case that visually informative texts should be considered within the classroom as legitimate forms of written communication. He extols to his fellow teachers and scholars the capabilities of visually informative texts to achieve the same rhetorical goals that traditional essays do. Furthermore, Bernhardt contends that a visual text is more versatile than the traditional essay because of its localization of text; different readers can easily eke out from the text as simple or as complex a reading as they would like. Bernhardt says that visually informative texts must be studied and taught in the classroom to correlate with the advances in technological media.

 

Synthesis

            Bernhardt’s essay questions the construct of the traditional progressively organized essay, in which the argument pushes the reader down the page. His questioning of the traditional essay form and support of visual texts cannot help but remind me of Scott McCloud, who so memorably draws our attention to the power of the visual with his comic.

 

Pre-reading Exercise

2) In a text heavy advertisement for an audiobook, I notice the use of different texts and font sizes. The larger fonts emphasize the author’s name. To advertise the title of the book, they have contrasted white lettering against a dark, rectangle shaped background. As such, my eyes are most drawn to those two elements. There is an image of a character from the book, but it only serves to fill the blank space beside some smaller print of other available audiobooks.

 

Questions for Discussion and Journaling

1) I sometimes have trouble reading this low-visual type of writing, especially when the subject material is unfamiliar. One think I like about visually informative texts is the fact that you can take a very simple reading from it if you like; it can serve to just give you the basics. Just finding the basics can be harder in a text which is not as visual, because you might have to sift through some unfamiliar terminology and ideas in order to find them.

 

Applying and Exploring Ideas

3) Bernhardt uses the term ‘gestalt’ to refer to the visual impression of the text as a whole. Knowing the definition of the term helps the reader understand the aesthetics of the whole page are important in the readability of the piece. Knowing what the term ‘gestalt’ means also helps explain why Bernhardt then spends the next several paragraphs talking about the physical looks and layout of the page.

 

After You Read

            Scott McCloud would have represented Bernhardt’s argument in the mode he is arguing for. That is, he would make the text visually informative rather than progressively so. Bernhardt seems a little counter-intuitive in his organization of the piece. If he is going to argue for the legitimate study and teaching of visually informative texts, then he should probably lead by example.

 

Personal Thoughts

            Although I think this article is helpful and informative in explaining the capabilities, strategies, and forms of visually informative texts, I could not help but find it exceedingly dull. I think if Bernhardt had made this essay into a visually informative text, I would have been able to better believe him in his testimony that visually informative texts are the wave of the future. With his tacit endorsement of the traditional progressive text, I question the validity of his claims. Did he choose a traditional essay style because he was afraid his work would not be published otherwise? If so, that just suggests to me that visually informative texts are not as important as Bernhardt makes them out to be. On the other hand, this piece was published in the eighties. I wonder if journals today would be more open to the publication of a visually informative text.