Picturing Texts

Analysis considerations adapted from

by Lester Faigley, Diana George, Anna Palchik, and Cynthia Selfe. New York, W.W.
Norton, 2004.
Engaging Critically with Texts as a Reader (both word-based and visual) (18-19)
Who composed this text?
What else has this person composed?
What social, cultural, historical, or economic influences can you discern?
What point of view does the person adopt?
What does the author hope to accomplish?
What statement does the text make, and how is the message supported and conveyed?
What is the audience assumed to know or believe?
What is the intended audience?
How are key features of the text arranged? What is included, excluded, emphasized, minimized?
How would you characterize the styleacademic? hip? formal? informal?
How would you characterize the toneserious? humorous? satiric? something else?

Some Questions pertaining to Image Analysis (114-115)

What is your first response?
What is the subject or content?
What is the primary purpose?
How is the image arranged in visual space? Can you diagram its overall composition?
What impact does this arrangement have on your reading of the image?
What strikes you as remarkable, significant, moving, important or interesting about the image?
What is the genre? Does the image conform to conventions of that genre or does it represent a
break from such expectations?
How do others read this image? Serious? Comic? How do you know?
What does the image remind you of?
Does the image include words or a caption? How are those words used? Do they identify the
image or are they a part of the image? What do they contribute to the overall message?

Evaluating an Argument that Includes Visuals and Words (398)

What is the basic argument (the claim, the position, or viewpoint expressed in the text you are
examining)?
What seems to be the purpose of the argument? Is it asking you to do something? To think
differently about something?
What is the target audience and how do you know?
What is the genre?
Where does the argument appear?
Is there anything in the image or words that surprises you, makes you laugh, or think
differently?
What visual elements help you read the argument? Juxtapositioning? Visual metaphors? Visual
evidence?
Are any words used to state the main argument or to support the argument made by the visual?