Activity IV

Ian E. Gonzalez

11/19/08

COMP 106

Prof. Yerks

Activity IV: Visualizing “Isms”

It is said that a picture says a thousand words. It’s a little cliché, but in some cases this holds true. Without visual imagery, it is difficult to get the whole picture, so to speak. In literature, pictures and images help the reader to empathize or at least understand the context of what the writer is writing about. Effective imagery can even evoke the proper reaction or emotional response if it is accurately portrayed. Some times imagery can evoke reactions that are completely unexpected, because the audience can be easily influenced by certain subtle stimuli that the author did not initially notice. The real trick is to use imagery that conveys exactly the kind of response that you are looking for. In a way, this was the purpose of activity IV, because it required us to be creative in our portrayal of certain words, called “-isms”. An “-ism” usually refers to a certain belief or doctrine. We had to visually represent at least ten of these “-isms” through the use of pictures and images on the internet.


The most difficult of my “-isms”, was the word “Probabilism”, which means that knowledge is only probable but never certain. I realized that I would have to get creative on this one, because most of the pictures relating to this topic, were those of mathematical problems and I thought those would be rather boring. I thought that perhaps I could show a deck of cards, which would represent probability, but I still didn’t think that this was effective enough. I decided to get a little creative with this one and chose a picture depicting weather patterns. This might be a little cryptic, but what I was trying to show in this picture was that we can only predict the probable weather patterns, but with so many forces that actually have an effect on the weather, it is near impossible to be absolutely sure of the weather until it happens.


For some of the “-isms” that I chose, it was actually quite easy to locate an effective image to go with it. The most effective image was for my word “Apocalypticism”, meaning a doctrine of the end of the world. For this one, I chose a biblical picture, depicting the four horsemen bringing final judgment on humankind. In actuality, most religions could be seen to be ones with elements of apocalypticism in them, because many of them depict human life eventually coming to an end. I chose the Christian one because it an image that we are all most familiar with.The next most effective image that I chose was “Quietism” which is a doctrine that one can achieve enlightenment through mental tranquility. The image I chose was one of a man sitting cross-legged on a flower with light shining behind him. It is clear that this man is at peace with nature and the world around him, because on his face is a look of complete relaxation. Relaxation and peace were the main points of the picture and I think that the image depicts it well. The final image that is most effective would be my image for “Scientism”, which means the belief that one can apply methods of science to everything in the universe. For this word, I chose cue balls arranged on a pool table. It also has several angles and speed calculations written on it, indicating the use of physics to determine the path of the cue ball after it collides with another ball. This indicates scientism well, because it shows that the laws of science can be applied to a game of pool through the use of physics.


Overall, I decided on my pictures based on their symbolic representation of each of the “-isms” that I chose. Some of my picture are more direct and display the meaning of the word quite clearly, while others of my images are metaphors that represent the meaning of the “-ism”. I tried to not be too clichéd, but in some cases, this was inevitable because of the lack of other images that accurately depict the word. I also tried not to be too cryptic, as to avoid confusion. I spent a lot of time, carefully choosing the most appropriate images, and I think that the ones that I chose were the best that I could come up with for each “-ism”.