A few notes and some references on this subject
The distinction between writing and pictures is not supported by contemporary practice, research, and thinking on these subjects.
The idea that there is thinking and seeing as separate mental/cognative processes; that we think in words and see pictures; that one of these is cerebral and the other purely sensory,
A number of seminal texts have offered us the opportunity to radically change our thinking in this area. Here are just a few of the titles:
Paul Klee, The Notebooks of Paul Klee. Volume 1. The Thinking Eye.
Abercombie, The Anatomy of Judgment
Yates, The Art of Memory
Bartlett, Remembering
Neisser, Cognition and Reality
Gibson, The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception
Gombrich, Art and Illusion
Illich and Sanders. The Alphabetization of the Popular Mind
Arnheim, Visual Thinking
McKim, Experiences in Visual Thinking.
Armed with these, and many others I was able to write two books on the subject as it related to education and information design in the i970’s and 80’s.
Sless, Visual Thinking
Sless, Learning and Visual Communication.
But far more interesting are the many texts and other works which demonstrate some of the great insights and applications of merged text and illustration applications. We all know about comics, but it is worth having a look at the rich history and contemporary practice in this area. Here are some names.
William Playfair’s graphs
Otto and Marie Neurath’s Isotopes
Robert Horn’s Visual Language.
The last of these, Robert Horn, is working today on visualising so called wicked problems, or what he prefers to call ‘social messes'. This is a tour de force of advanced work in the field and he is working on a new book on the subject which I would expect to be essential reading in the field of complex social system design when it is published.
For those of you who want to track the long history of work in this area, I suggest you get hold of
Graphics in Text: A Bibliography
Institute of Educational Technology, open University, 1977
PS. Sorry not to have this in proper bibliographic style. I have just had a minor operation on one eye which is now behind a patch. Writing with one eye is more challenging than I thought it would be. Everything has been flattened!
David
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blog: http://communication.org.au/blo <http://communication.org.au/blo>g/
web: http://communication.org.au <http://communication.org.au/>
Professor David Sless BA MSc FRSA
CEO • Communication Research Institute •
• helping people communicate with people •
Mobile: +61 (0)412 356 795
Phone: +61 (03) 9005 5903
Skype: davidsless
60 Park Street • Fitzroy North • Melbourne • Australia • 3068
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