COMM2124 Visual Communication
Module manager: Marcia Allison
Email: m.c.allison@leeds.ac.uk
Taught: invalid View Timetable
Year running
This module is not approved as an Elective
Module summary
This module is designed to develop students’ visual literacy and enables students to read key visual texts, deploying a range of historical, critical and contextual approaches. Over the course of this semester we will look at some dominant visual cultural forms such as photography, cinema, television and websites, developing the ways in which we try to understand these key modes of communication.
Objectives
The module aims to introduce students to frameworks of understanding related to visual media through lectures, seminars and literature, as well as enabling you to utilise these through research, to develop appropriate critical questions about visual media, and to develop appropriate methodologies to interrogate visual texts.
Learning outcomes
On successful completion of the module students will have demonstrated the following learning outcomes:
1. Recognise and explain a range of key theories, arguments and concepts from the academic literature on the interpretation of visual communications.
2. Critically analyse visual texts using appropriate theoretical concepts
3. Recognise and explain the political and ethical issues raised by the use of imagery as a persuasive tool in different national and cultural contexts
4. Devise and conduct a research project that investigates an original research question in visual communication
Skills Learning Outcomes
On successful completion of the module students will have demonstrated the following skills learning outcomes:
5. Interpret and analyse data (or information) from a number of sources in order to solve a defined problem
6. Communicate complex information against competing needs and demands to a target audience
Syllabus
Details of the syllabus will be provided on the Minerva organisation (or equivalent) for the module
Teaching Methods
| Delivery type |
Number |
Length hours |
Student hours |
| Independent online learning hours |
2 |
| Private study hours |
173 |
| Total Contact hours |
0 |
| Total hours (100hr per 10 credits) |
175 |
Opportunities for Formative Feedback
Formative exercises: written reading responses and participation in activities at seminars, including group and individual analyses of visual texts. Students will receive ongoing formative feedback on the individual tasks via Minerva and in seminars.
Reading List
Check the module area in Minerva for your reading list
Last updated: 30/04/2026
Errors, omissions, failed links etc should be notified to the Catalogue Team