Digital Commons Network^™

Nonprofit Social Media Internships: A Handbook, Allison M. Laroy

The Cardinal Edge

This brief research report provides details on a study that examines how nonprofits can best prepare their interns and how interns can best prepare themselves for a role in engaging audiences through social media. Through a literature review on nonprofit social media and internships, a series of qualitative interviews with interns and supervisors, and the researcher’s lived experiences as a social media intern, a handbook was developed for nonprofit social media internships. This guide is relevant to the specific experiences of nonprofit social media internships, includes advice on training, mentorship, and best practices, and finally, it incorporates further resources on …

Morag Myerscough, Lukas Emory

Communication Design: Design Pioneers

No abstract provided.

Chiara Aliotta, Mary Ann Ganoung-Williams

Communication Design: Design Pioneers

No abstract provided.

Let’S Talk About Animals, Saskia Van Manen, Claudine Jaenichen, Klaus Kremer, Tingyi Lin, Rodrigo Ramírez

Art Faculty Articles and Research

"Pets and other animals can act as a protective factor in an emergency if we leverage design to communicate more effectively. A new prototype website does just that."

Shanti Sparrow, Catie Benner

Communication Design: Design Pioneers

No abstract provided.

Ctrl Shift, Kit Son Lee

Masters Theses

CTRL SHIFT makes a case for design under contemporary computation. The abstractions of reading, writing, metaphors, mythology, code, cryptography, interfaces, and other such symbolic languages are leveraged as tools for understanding. Alternative modes of knowledge become access points through which users can subvert the control structures of software. By challenging the singular expertise of programmers, the work presented within advocates for the examination of internalized beliefs, the redistribution of networked power, and the collective sabotage of computational authority.

Refiguring Relations, Daphne Hsu

Masters Theses

Refiguring Relations sets conditions for interdependence and visualizes the affective relationships that people have with one another. Through scripts and participatory experiences, my work explores, challenges, and formulates expressions of collaboration. I extend spaces of overlap between individuals to encourage connection and alliance building, however temporary, slow, or small. In reading experiences, both print and digital, models of circulation and accessibility allow the audience to see and affect each others’ interactions. This thesis assembles methodologies and blueprints for reciprocal engagement, between designer and collaborators, designer and participants, and among participants themselves.

Jettisoning The Frame: Strategies For Designing At The Threshold, Will Mianecki

Masters Theses

Jettisoning the Frame: Strategies for Designing at the Threshold explores graphic design’s capacity for facilitating critique and understanding of accelerating systems of technological control and complexity. Working across archives, architectures, and infrastructures, designing at the threshold is an approach that takes the opacity of systems and subjects alike as a starting point from which new possibilities, configurations, and relations emerge. It is a loose methodology predicated on shifting, jettisoning, and reorienting the role and frame of the designer from objectivity to subjectivity. From neutrality to implication. From scientific to messy. From solutionism to something else.

Parentheses Asterisk Ellipses, Everett Epstein

Masters Theses

Textual punctuation — those common marks that pace a text — are rarely static. They allow a message to flow, providing space and also emphasis. While words hold the stage, humble commas and periods coax the message.

This thesis urges another orientation to these tools, with the graphic designer assuming the role of one who principally punctuates. In Parentheses Asterisk Ellipses, punctuation becomes the primary driver of meaning — a perfect technology for rich associative networks of history, type, and the social. Tracing the grain of these forms, Parentheses Asterisk Ellipses offers a close reading of the three marks in …

Paperwork, Romik Bose Mitra

Masters Theses

This thesis is about the politics of identity and belonging. It is about the impact that practices of identification, government surveillance, and global systems of citizenship and nationality have on the people that live by them. Inspired by the various borders (both real and imagined) that I maneuvered around to get to Rhode Island, and enriched with perspectives gathered in conversation with theoreticians in the field, Paperwork is a set of documents and debriefs that details the work that I made in response to a migratory and investigatory journey. Through this thesis, I attempt to better understand various bureaucratic practices …

Remembrance, Nhu Ngoc Quynh Dao

LSU Master's Theses

The artwork in the collection, “Remembrance,” is a collection of three-dimensional paper toys inspired by the culture of Dong Son civilization. The study was intended as an investigation into a mysterious, once-lost kingdom that flourished in the northern delta region of Vietnam. The designs and art motifs found on bronze artifacts from Dong Son have been scrutinized, then compared with stories in Vietnamese legends to decipher their hidden message and symbolism. I collected and translated the design motifs digitally as part of the creative process before analyzing their philosophies and intentions to not only introduce the culture but also accurately …

Mixed (F)Ixed Messages, Lauren A. Verrett

LSU Master's Theses

Many individuals have an understanding that our lives have a timeline, and this timeline is full of objectives that we perceive as absolutes. Through personal observations it has become apparent that there are many amazing men and woman that are stagnant because they were raised to believe that meeting these goalposts are a priority. In an age of individualism, it is evident that every individual has control of their own life through their actions. However, in this same age of technology and social media, the anxiety of not meeting certain requirements or standards is even more apparent than previous generations. …

Using Graphic Design To Create Packaging For Myers-Briggs Personality Candles, Mary Elizabeth Horton

Senior Honors Theses

Throughout history, art has been used to communicate ideas, stimulate the imagination, and engage the senses. In recent times, with the advancement of graphic design in the art industry, creative boundaries have been pushed in the pursuit of innovative design approaches. Design is utilized not only to convey artistic meaning but also to engage the viewers’ senses and influence buyers’ decisions. Some consumers associate designs with different moods or feelings, and color and visual design can powerfully encapsulate personality. This paper and associated creative work show the versatility of graphic design to create candle packaging inspired by each of the …

Visualizing A Woman’S Journey Through The Old Testament Prophetic Books: Improving Female Study Methods Through Visual Supplementation, Olivia Martin Smith

Masters Theses

Christians are often less likely to read the Old Testament prophetic literature compared to other books in Scripture. This poses a problem within the Church for Biblical literacy and understanding Scripture as one complete narrative that points to Christ. The aim of this research was to discover what causes a struggle for Christian women understanding the prophetic literature, why Old Testament prophetic literature is important for women to study, and the best methods for communicating this information to a female audience. The following research questions were asked: 1. What is the standard perspective of an average Christian when studying Old …

The Multi-Sensory Design Of A Synesthete's Everyday Experience, Madeline M. Spicer

Honors Theses

Perception, which can be defined as becoming aware of occurrences in the world through the senses, is different for every person (Merriam-Webster). My thesis deals with perception in the form of a condition called synesthesia and the communication of this condition using graphic design. Synesthesia is a condition that involves the involuntary crossing of the senses, resulting in multi-sensory experiences every time a synesthete absorbs the world and visible language. Utilizing the field of graphic design, I created several projects to communicate my three goals of conducting research on synesthesia, sharing what I experience every day, and educating others about …

Sustainable Stories: Linking Graphic Design And The Environment To Inform, Educate, And Inspire, Shannon M. Stanforth

Honors Theses

The importance of the field of graphic design lies in its ability to communicate with others. It can serve to transcend barriers, to clarify messages, and to deepen universal understanding. Similarly, sustainability encompasses the three spheres of the environment, society and economy—demonstrating its interconnected complexities and multifaceted applications. In pursuing my Honors Thesis, I aimed to develop a project which would reflect the ideals of sustainability while simultaneously serving to educate about the importance of caring for the natural world. Furthermore, my research explores how the disciplines of sustainability and design overlap and interact, searching to discover ways in which …

Looking While Reading I, Ii, Iii, Sarah Minor

Journal of Creative Writing Studies

This article introduces the term “visual essay” by tracing the genre’s history through the concrete poetry movement and the rise of the lyric essay. In describing the aims of visual essays, Minor distinguishes between “illustrative” and “non-illustrative” shaped texts, and suggests connections between “non-illustrative” examples and the aims of “Intersectional Form,” a term coined by scholar Jen Soriano.

An Exploration Of Western Graphic Design Art Movements Through The Korean Lens, Hyunjung (Anna) Lee

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

Art history has historically centered around Western and European art. This creative thesis explores what Western graphic design movements could look like merged with Korean themes and subject matter. The movements in question include Art Nouveau, Plakatstil, Constructivism, Pop Art, and Memphis Design. What would Alphonse Mucha’s allegorical beauties look like if they were Asian? What would Korea look like represented through Ludwig Hohlwein’s reductive planes of color? Who would the celebrity-obsessed Andy Warhol make art about if it was a Korean actress? Each movement is combined with Korean events that occurred within the art movement’s lifespan. This amalgamation not …

How Will I Thrive? Developing Designer Professional Identity Among Undergraduate Communication Design Students, Denise Bosler

Education Doctorate Dissertations

A designer’s professional identity is constructed throughout a designer’s life and is developed through life experiences and education. While understanding the general importance of a professional identity is often clear to recent design graduates, developing it requires becoming self-aware of what traits constitutes designer professional identity (DPI). Kunrath, Cash and Yi-ling (2016) define DPI as the synthesis of personal attributes and design skills. However, the development of this full complement of DPI traits is often ignored and ill-supported in design education curriculum. A student’s DPI, if under-developed, can be a barrier to successfully transitioning from student to professional. Design educators …

≥I++ Wayward Self, Space, And Language, Mystie Do, Thu Tm Do

Theses and Dissertations

Having crossed different geographical and cultural borders, I can’t seem to position myself beyond society’s forced binaries of race, sexuality, and materiality. My personal diasporic experience drives me to bring together various presences, putting them next to one another, engaging them in dialogues. My works often share multiple space–time possibilities: a digital space, a physical site, a virtual alternity. Occupying these parallel worlds are varied ratios of mixtures of natural ecosystems, my own system of abstraction, and existing technological systems that allow us a level of individual engagement not previously available. I want to invite people to fluctuate between these …

An Escapist Utopia, Sara Eh Denney

Theses and Dissertations

As an active pursuit of avoiding excellence, my work acts as a space for failure, play, experimentation and imperfection. This document and final installation acts as a pause along a lifelong journey of object-making, creation, and spirituality. My work, specifically my working practice, rather than any one object or moment, is an escapist utopia for myself. My work is the process, the journey, not the ending or the completion of any one thing. The repetition, distortion, and production that I engage throughout my working practice acts as a spiritual exercise of meaning—making through creation. I fall deeply in love with …

Visual Infrastructures Of Covid-19 Messaging, Julia Ross, Claudine Jaenichen

Art Faculty Articles and Research

Infecting more than two hundred and nineteen million people internationally as of September 2021, SARS-Cov2 (COVID-19) remains a major health crisis despite the availability of vaccines in many countries and publicized guidance on effective preventative measures (WHO, 2021). To combat the spread of the virus, governments worldwide have found themselves relying on their ability to exert control over health behaviors in public and private spaces. Visual communication, which includes both graphics and text, is an integral component of how these behavioral advisories are communicated to the public. Authorities translate scientific information into digestible designs for the public to achieve effective …

Living My Best Life Gifting Program, Jessica Gilmore

Masters Theses

Living My Best Life (LMBL) is a qualitative research study that explores how creative products can help provide a positive impact on children. Research shows that various forms of art are utilized in therapy, classroom settings, outreach programs, and in homes to help children overcome complicated, disturbing, and disruptive behavior due to adverse circumstances they have experienced in their life. The research revealed how strategy that utilizes and implements creative products and activities can actually alter the perspective of children in a more productive and optimistic manner. The products serve as long and short-term interventions against negative thoughts and actions. …

Raising Consciousness: Challenging Diversity In Christian Publishing, Michael Omari Johnson

Masters Theses

The Christian publishing industry has overlooked the importance of diversity, particularly its impact on black American audiences. While studies show that diversity and inclusion can lead to more innovation through problem-solving, there persists a paradox where a lack of opportunities, disparities in wealth and employment and systemic prejudices can play a role in the ethnic and racial homogeneity of the Christian publishing industry. Thus, there are many barriers preventing people of color from emerging to the market, reflecting in the storytelling, content creation and audience of African-descent followers.

Mia Gaskey: 1918 & 2020 Pandemic Poster, Mia Gaskey

COVID-19 Graphic Design: Posters

• Mixed-media digital collage
• 18 inches wide, 24 inches high

Turning The Page: A Design Thinking Approach To Increasing Literacy Advocacy In West Alabama, Justin C. Walters

Masters Theses

Through the problem/solution lens of design thinking, this research critically analyzes the promotional activities and materials used by the Literacy Council of West Alabama (LCWA) to determine their effectiveness in reaching both functionally illiterate populations as well as the fully-literate population aiming to work the advocacy front with this nonprofit organization. Qualitative data was gathered through the utilization of a web heuristic evaluation, as well as the evaluation of current marketing materials for LCWA; these insights were used to guide the design and creation of new print and digital marketing materials for the organization. Results of this research aimed to …

Cultural Heritage And User Interface Design, Narges Tavakoli

LSU Master's Theses

This study centers around localizing the user interface and experience design of digital products considering the culture of the audience and their visual heritage. Even though it seems the internet has made the distance between developing and advanced countries less than before, there are still fundamental differences between people’s beliefs and expectations. As a graphic designer who is based in The United States and is from Iran, I noticed the digital products (web, mobile applications) produced in Iran disregard the Iranian’s specific needs and emulate western patterns. So, I researched the dissimilarities between the two countries by using Greet Hofstede’s …

Temporal Collisions, Lizzie Baur

Masters Theses

We live during a time of smoothly effortless design that encourages instant gratification. In this sea of pre-existing content, most of which we experience through layers of mediation, my practice encourages drifting. As a graphic designer, I try to decondition myself from reductive thinking. In response, this thesis operates on the fringe, cycling attention to unexpected associations, harnessing temporal collisions and formal play towards diminishing cultural baggage and preconceived notions. I deliberately attune the reader to the labyrinthine as an experience by which to interrogate common sense and steer the imagination towards moments of uncertainty.

This work engages a kind …

Counter Formation, Fabian Fohrer

Masters Theses

Counter-formation establishes a foundation to envision a more accurate shape and field of inter-relations across disciplines and contexts that are not only receptive but appropriative and elaborative.

By approaching the space of the counter-form, my ambition is to generate a responsive structure and an archive of fragments to build upon - a blank canvas with a variable format to recast vision and action.

Counter-formation places emphasis on the transformative, liminal space that allows one to encounter contexts from within, between, and around to organize or break them in a different fashion.

How To Do Things With Things, Emily Guez

Masters Theses

Humans have always done things with things. It’s at the very origin of who we are as a species: we’ve gone from being bipedal homonins to people who live in complex societies by making rocks into tools. Things can serve a practical function, but they also carry cultural and symbolic meaning: they can tell our personal stories, allow us to connect with each other, and be the outer manifestations of our inner lives. The things we use in our every day lives, by implying a set of actions we can take when interacting with them, participate in shaping our reality: …