Pixelgawker

pixelgawker started out last fall as an experiment. there was and continues to be a need for critical writing in the classroom as well as a forum to articulate observations, tendencies and sometimes frustrations about being a student and faculty. since then, this blog has slowly emerged as a focal point for conversation, rants and a good dose of perspective. Since August, traffic on this site has reached over 75,000 visits. In 2008 alone, our traffic was over 46,000. Numbers can be deceiving but what this traffic honestly depicts is a demand for content.

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I’m a transplant. I was born and raised on the southside of Chicago. Until I moved to Michigan 3 years ago, I didn’t know a tremendous amount about the state. Sure, I spent time at the beaches on the “west coast,” I knew that a place like Frankenmuth scared me and Detroit was a place that I thought I would never want to visit. I now work in Detroit and call SE Michigan my home. I commute downtown every day and live in the shadow of a city struggling to rediscover itself. To outsiders, Detroit is defined by high crime, misery (see Forbes) and a sinking automotive industry. To those same outsiders, Michigan is characterized by foreclosures and the mass exodus of unemployed individuals. Unfortunately, I have learned that most of these are accurate assessments. What I have also learned is that many of these characterizations can be applied to other states throughout the country. The difference is Michigan has done a better job of mismanaging their economy and a poor job of diversification.

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By: Megan Deal    This past week the CCS community was introduced to the premier issue of the student produced publication, Perspective. Perspective appears to be one student’s abortive attempt to unite the CCS student body, mixed with an amateur’s undertaking in DIY desktop publishing. If the “Top 10 Reasons Why its Sweet to be a CCS Student” hasn’t turned you away yet, the “Go Green” sex advice surely will. The eight page journal seeks to explore issues presumably relevant to CCS students, yet fails to move past the cliche. Where to eat in Detroit? How to make a salad? How to forward your email? This type of information, however pertinent it may be thought, is best left for the annual New Student Orientation, or at the very least on a flyer hung around the ACB. Lee DeVito’s insight surrounding controversial art shines the brightest, but is under served among the remaining inanity. If a student publication is to succeed, its creator must carefully assess the need of its audience, and consider the question of value. Perspective hasn’t concerned itself with either. (more…)

By: Megan Deal

There has been a lot of discussion lately surrounding the issue of critical writing, and whether design students should practice their writing in a formal, edited way or through casual means like blogging or “i-chatter.” Many views have surfaced just among our own peer network, but the issue is also being discussed on a more global level. Design critic Rick Poynor suggests that design educators must write in a way that “ordinary designers” can understand, avoiding the complex academic writing that requires a post-graduate degree in literary theory to comprehend. Contrarily, designer and educator Rob Giampietro argues that design criticism must “create it’s own language,” if it is to evolve, a language not concerned with the “lowest common denominator.” The debate then, seems to center around the issue of form. Does the format or style that we choose to convey our written thoughts say anything about the meaning of our words? Do the ways in which we communicate our written ideas add value to our thoughts? Does form in writing matter? (more…)

By: Megan Deal

I’ve come to realize that this blog may be contradicting itself. If it’s ultimate goal is to examine the issues that are emerging from within the exchange of student dialogue, then perhaps this blog should allow an opportunity for more students to instigate conversation. Up until this point, a singe voice has dictated the topics of discussion. If more critical voices are to emerge, then this venue must give all students equal opportunity to test out their ideas and stimulate thoughtful debate. (more…)

by: Megan Deal

At some point during our elementary years, between sessions of cursive writing, and bouts of long division, we learned the proper way to structure a sentence. In the following years, we practiced and practiced, until our poor little minds were unconsciously identifying adjectives and composing compound sentences. Then, in our high school careers we were taught the best way to structure sentences into paragraphs, and then subsequently paragraphs into essays. We learned various rhetorical and stylistic devices that aided us in this process, until we were able to develop clear ideas into syntagmatically coherent sentences. Again, we practiced. Practice perfected. (more…)