"good manners are, after all, nothing but courteous consideration of other people’s interests and feelings." (Post 1922, pg 532).
Basing our work on Emily Post's book ‘Etiquette in Society, In Business, In Politics, And At Home’, we were asked to create three artefacts for IPD; each being a representation of a different etiquette, and each design being influenced by such theorists as: Kress, Parker, Reep, Walsh and Schriver. These theorists provide knowledge on communication, genre, interpretation and representation of text and graphics, of which we were to apply to the creation of our multimodal artefacts.
Emily Post was an American author who, in 1922 published a book on etiquette titled ‘Etiquette in Society, In Business, In Politics, And At Home’. She firmly believed that there was a right and wrong method of how to act in almost every occasion of life. The book was set out into chapters, advising the reader on manners of behaviour, dress and speech in certain life situations including formal events, greetings, and even the household. Post described etiquette as "merely a collection of forms by which all personal contacts in life are made smooth" (Post 1922, pg 535).
The etiquettes I chose to base my artefacts on are bar etiquette, church etiquette and job interview etiquette. The aim was to design and create these artefacts so that they are multimodal, meaning they possess more than one ‘mode’ (Walsh 2006). Therefore, a multimodal text may incorporate written or verbal language, moving or still images, they may be produced on an electronic screen or paper and may include music or sound (Walsh 2006).
Artefact 1: bible, visual, text and audio.
The first artefact, representing church etiquette is in the form of a bible, as the Holy Bible is a commonly associated symbol of church. The visual aspect of this artefact is the Bible itself. The cover and pages within are made of white cardboard. I chose white cardboard as white symbolises purity and good (Sherman & Clore 2009), which is what the Holy Bible represents. I considered adding more detail on the cover of the artefact, however took into account Reep’s (2006) rule of white space under ‘balance’ in document design and decided the words ‘Holy Bible’ were effective enough.
The text element of the artefact is found within the bible, and is a creative writing piece titled ‘the ten commandments of church etiquette’; this is my own piece of etiquette, written with the influence of Emily Post and the actual Ten Commandments in the Holy Bible. I ensured my creative piece reflected the artefact it was on. This is because the two need to complement each other so that the reader can comprehend and decode the reading quickly and simply, in order to maintain the readers interest (Walsh 2006). For the formatting of the artefact, there is one commandment on each page to ensure there is enough white space on the page to avoid cluttering, as too many items on a page can diminish the appeal and effect of a document (Reep 2006). The ‘ten commandments’ are as follows:
‘Thou shalt not attend church intoxicated;
Thou shalt not eat during the sermon or time of worship;
Thou must turn phone off or on silent during sermon and worship;
Thou must take crying baby out of room during sermon and worship;
Thou shalt be dressed in their ‘Sunday best’ attire;
Thou must bring their Bible to follow sermon;
Thou shalt not put their feet on the seat in front of them;
Thou shalt not chit-chat at any point during sermon or worship;
Thou shalt stand during worship unless disabled or injured;
Thou shalt remove any form of headdress when entering church’.
The commandments were based on Post’s writing of etiquette in public gatherings, as an example commandment number 8 is based upon this quote: "It would be shocking to enter a church and hear a babble of voices!" (Post 1922, pg 19). All text elements written on and within the bible are written in gold pen; again as a means of keeping consistency and to signify not only the importance of church etiquette, but as a representation of the actual Holy Bible, as the colour gold symbolises precious connotations (Wood 2009), and the Bible is deemed to be precious to its followers.
The audio element for this artefact will be I, reading aloud ‘the ten commandments of church etiquette’. I chose this to be my audio element as verbal communication of the text can maximise engagement with the information and create effects such as humour (Walsh 2006, p.34). Together, with the visual of the bible the text on and within the artefact, and myself reading aloud the commandments, means that this artefact is multimodal.
Artefact 2: suit jacket and resume, text, audio and visual.
The second artefact is a small suit jacket with a resume attached to its arm, to represent the etiquette of a job interview. I chose a suit jacket as part of the dress etiquette element of a job interview, as presenting a polished image is a basic key element to making a good impression on the employer (Usitalo 2004). The suit jacket, being the visual element, is made out of black cardboard, as black clothing within fashion is stylish, timeless and symbolises power (Wood 2009). The collar and arm lengths were measured to ensure Reep’s (2006) principle of consistency.
For the text element of this artefact I printed the text already provided for ‘job interview’ onto a piece of paper with the heading ‘RESUME’ and glued it to the suit jackets arm. The text resembled a resume, which is an expected item to have at a job interview and therefore reflects the etiquette.
The audio I chose for this artefact was a clip found on YouTube titled ‘Office noises’. I decided to include audio in artefacts one and two, as written text is merely an individual part of a message and not the dominant component (Walsh 2006). Using a sound recording to complement Post’s etiquette allows the audience more interaction with the text, maintaining their interest (Walsh 2006).
According to Walsh (2006) how we write, can mean more than what we write. For instance, using bold, italics, the font, size, colour and format all give a new level of meaning to the text. This is due to personal interpretation, as people interpret texts differently based on personal experience and individual meanings derived from their knowledge attitudes and values (Schriver 1997). Therefore I considered these theories when writing my piece on church etiquette and designing the resume sheet for job interview. I used the most basic knowledge on the Bible and church in order for readers to understand regardless of their religion.
Artefact 3: ID (licence), visual and text.
The third and final artefact to represent bar etiquette will be in the form of an ID, a driver’s licence. I designed the licence using the program ‘Microsoft Publisher’. I chose to use a computer program as a variation from my other artefacts that have been handmade. While the artefact is in the formatting of a licence, it will be presented on an A4 piece of paper, much larger than life size. I have chosen the form of an ID to represent the ‘age appropriateness’ section of bar etiquette, and the decision was influenced by Karen Schriver’s chapter ‘The interplay of words and pictures’.
The text element on this artefact will be the section under ‘Attire’ of bar etiquette, and will be printed on the back of the ID. I have designed the licence using my own details and photo. The photo of myself on the ID will represent this section of etiquette, as normally ID photos are a head shot of the person, I have chosen to use a photo of myself wearing suitable bar attire as stated in the etiquette, "an upper garment covering at least half of the bosom and a lower garment three inches longer than the bottom of the buttocks". I chose to keep the traditional formatting of a drivers licence as the audience will be familiar with the layout making the text easier to interpret (Schriver 1997).
As technology improves and means of communication changes, presentation of information needs to adapt (Kress 1997), technology allows me to make this adaptation, and is a significant aspect in the creation of this artefact. It allowed me to construct the ID, using text boxes to apply the personal information needed in the right areas, uploading the photo to represent attire in bar etiquette, and change various colours to imitate an actual driver’s licence.
Contemporary technology allow us to easily combine different modes of representation, as I have shown, image can be combined with language and sound can be combined with image (Kress 1997), making these multimodal texts. In order to interpret these texts, readers draw on multiple cues including their knowledge of the topic of etiquette, personal experience and other texts of the same genre (Schriver 1997). So in conclusion, each element included in your design should be judged on its ability to help the reader understand the text quickly and easily (Parker 1990) and remember, the first rule of etiquette is:
"Never do anything that is unpleasant to others. Never take more than your share—whether of the road in driving a car, of chairs on a boat or seats on a train, or food at the table." (Post, 1922, pg 34).