Visual Communication and Media Theory Practice Flashcards

This set of vocabulary flashcards covers key concepts from the lecture notes on semiotics, platform society, photography, cinema, television, and advertising theory.

Semiotics (Umberto Eco)

The study of communication organized as a system of signs, where visual messages are understood because they are inserted into a system of signification.

Circulation (Verón)

The concept that meaning is born from the movement and circulation of a communicative piece rather than just its location within a system.

Linguistic Message (Barthes)

The textual elements or brand marks in an image, such as 'Panzani sauce' or 'Panzani pasta.'

Coded Iconic Message (Barthes)

The cultural or connoted meanings recognized in an image, such as 'Italianness,' naturalness, or abundance.

Non-coded Iconic Message (Barthes)

The literal, denoted elements of an image including colors, shapes, and textures, stripped of added cultural meaning.

Visual Studies

Thinking of images not just as representations but in terms of the mediation they perform in society through institutions and practices of visibility.

Mediatization (Verón)

The exteriorization of a cognitive process that acquires autonomy and circulates through time, turning images into phenomena of technical mediatization.

Platformization

A structural dimension of visual communication where social flows are channeled through corporate global ecosystems driven by algorithms and data.

Diffusionist Model

A one-to-many communication system, also known as broadcasting, where one product is directed at an indeterminate number of users.

Reticular Model

A many-to-many communication system founded on collaboration and network connections.

Deep Mediatization

A system where mediatization irrigates the most intimate sectors of life to the point that consumption happens alongside mobility.

Snackification (Scolari)

The frequent consumption of micro-audiovisual narratives such as vlogs, gifs, and tutorials during small temporal gaps in daily life.

Datification

The process where social, cultural, and economic activities are translated into quantifiable data for collection and analysis.

Algorithmic Imagination (Bucher)

The ways of thinking about what algorithms are, how they work, and what they should be in the social imaginary.

Noema (Barthes)

The essence of photography described as the 'certificate of presence' or the consciousness that 'this has been' ($esto\,ha\,sido$).