Multimodality as a Communicative Tool for Social Engagement and Reform

by Brennan Thomas
Faculty of Literature & Languages, Saint Francis University, Pennsylvania.

10.46679/978819484836304

Thomas, B. (2021). Multimodality as a Communicative Tool for Social Engagement and Reform. In D. Koyama (Ed.), Development of Innovative Pedagogical Practices for a Modern Learning Experience (pp 97-114). Jagadhri, HR: CSMFL Publications. https://dx.doi.org/10.46679/978819484836304

Abstract

This article acknowledges the viability of multimodal projects in first-year college-level writing courses in accordance with the evolution of composition pedagogy over the past forty years. Since the 1982 publication of Hairston’s article “The Winds of Change” forecasting the end of the then-ubiquitous current-traditional approach, composition pedagogy has undergone paradigm shifts from process to post-process theory and from textual to digital modes of composition. Inspired by Goodwin’s (2020) research on students’ multimodal responses to local community issues, I developed a public media project for my first-year writing course for which students created media texts addressing local, regional, national, and global issues of their choosing. The project synthesizes the public and interpretative dimensions of writing identified by post-process scholars with elements of multimodality and civic engagement to help students understand how public media texts raise social awareness of current issues and mobilize community efforts toward unified resolution of such issues.

Keywords: post-process movement, digital composition, public media, social awareness, social justice

This is a part of: Development of Innovative Pedagogical Practices for a Modern Learning Experience (Eds. Dennis Koyama, Ph.D.)

© CSMFL Publications & its authors.

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