Prof. Sosa-Tzec publishes sketchnotes exploring the visual essay as an academic object of study

Omar Sosa Tzec — Mon, 15 Jul 2024 18:06:54 +0000

Prof. Sosa-Tzec publishes sketchnotes exploring the visual essay as an academic object of study

Author: School of Design

July 1, 2024

Photo Credit: AIGA DEC

Associate Professor Omar Sosa-Tzec, along with other design faculty in the United States, participated in the first AIGA Design Educators Community (DEC) Design and Writing Fellowship in 2022. The AIGA DEC published a book comprising the visual essays developed by these scholars during this fellowship, all available at https://doi.org/10.3998/mpub.14495980.

Prof. Sosa-Tzec's essay (starting on page 249 in the book) comprises sketchnotes where he explores the idea of a visual essay and humanistic approaches to develop and peer-review it. Below is one of Prof. Sosa-Tzec's sketchnotes (page 253), where he explores and defines the visual essay as a multimodal argument and research-through-design outcome.

Assist. Prof. Sosa-Tzec discusses critical approaches to the visual essay in the AIGA DEC Symposium

Omar Sosa Tzec — Mon, 16 Oct 2023 17:31:41 +0000

Assist. Prof. Sosa-Tzec discusses critical approaches to the visual essay in the AIGA DEC Symposium

Author: School of Design

October 12, 2023

Photo Credit: AIGA DEC

The AIGA DEC Symposium Lens 2023 took place this October 12 in New York City, within the AIGA National Conference. Assistant Professor Omar Sosa-Tzec participated in the panel "Making Space for Graphic Designers as Visual Essayists." In this panel, Dr. Sosa-Tzec discussed the notion of the visual essay as a multimodal argument and outcome of research-through-design and the application of poetics, semiotics, rhetoric, and aesthetics as critical approaches to peer-review the visual essay in graphic design academia. Sosa-Tzec also discussed sketchnoting as a form of pre-writing and content for visual essays. Accompanying Dr. Sosa-Tzec were Patricia Childers (CUNY/CityTech/Pratt), Heather Corcoran (Washington University in St. Louis), and Joshua Unikel (University of Houston). All the professors were AIGA DEC Design + Writing Fellowship members in 2022. This panel and their work from the fellowship seek to legitimize the visual essay as a research product in graphic design academia and pluralize and diversify its voices.