Visual Language: Writing for the Ear
LAST303 included five “podcast tutorials” that imparted particular skills and knowledge related to producing a podcast episode. The podcast tutorials included:
- Narrative, Audience & Format
- Audacity & Your Sound
- The Outline & Script
- Ethics and Respect: Conducting Research on Indigenous Groups
- Music, Fair Dealing, and Segmenting your Podcast
As practice for the final project, each student created two brief podcast segments (3-5 minutes) during the semester. After podcast tutorials 1 and 2, they created a short interview segment on a topic of their choice. After podcast tutorials 3-5, they created a visual description of an object from the Museum of Anthropology’s collections. Their task was to leverage the description of the museum object as a way to go deeper into the history and labour practices of their assigned Indigenous group. Their assignment was graded on the ethical and respectful treatment of the Indigenous group, incorporating music available for use under Creative Commons license, and “writing for the ear rather than the eye.” This was a particularly interesting challenge, as university students (and professors!) are accustomed to writing research papers in a more formal register. So, while the podcast episode still required rigorous research, the transmission of that research sought to be less formal and more entertaining. The results did not disappoint!
