Graphic Design Semiotics students, UCLA Shortlisted
Semiotics is one of the most interesting course materials that the Graphic Design program offers. Semiotics generally is the study of signs and symbols and how they are used to communicate meaning. It is a field of study that focuses on interpreting signs and symbols and how they create meaning in various contexts.
The Semiotic Design course really helps students understand how to think of meanings and how to convey them with different levels of complexity based on the target audience. It uplifts students’ design-thinking skills and makes them more analytical. Semiotics in design involves understanding of how people interpret and understand signs and symbols in different cultural contexts.
Five students from this course submitted their work and were shortlisted for the UCLA Extension competition. These students were Jana Tarek, Mireille Farid, Nisrine Alaa, Omar Yasser and Ziad Osama.
Diversity for me leads to Unity, it is the difference between several elements that can eventually be united together. Therefore, every element in my designs is different, but we can relate them together. It is the diverse blocks and elements that can come together to build unity. It is basically the harmony and unity between dissimilar elements. I used collage technique in order to design the posters,”
Mireille Farid expressed
Mireille designed a poster that depicts Egypt’s diversity through different old, modern, aesthetic, ruined elevators and stairs that are actually present in Egypt. It explains how different blocks could in the end build unity and harmony. The second poster showcases Egypt’s diverse History through different historical palaces and buildings. Each palace has its own history and culture. These diverse cultures are all building one unit, a block; which is part of Egypt’s history.
One of the other student participants, Ziad Osama elaborated
Diversity builds unity is a campaign that aims to highlight what diversity means to me. For me, diversity means unity, keeping people together,”
People have different skin tones, hair colors, eyes, features, beliefs, etc., but we all have the same inner organs. The poster features flying doves representing the peace and freedom that occurred due to the unity expressed in the bigger picture by the lungs. The freehand lettering of Arabic letters of the Word (حرية), which means freedom.
The brief of our project was what diversity means to us visually. Nisrine Alaa expressed
How I interpreted such an open-ended question rather than the conventional representation of different races was through the fashion Industry.
Nisrine decided to focus on how on the runway people from all over the world walk the runway to represent famous brands. It is not necessarily because the brands' care or vouch for diversity but it is mainly to maximize their sales.
That is my concept of design, real identity, and culture have been lost in the face of money hence the title “Diversity for Money.
Omar Yasser emphasized the concept behind my work focused on unification
The continents as we know them today once existed as a unified landmass called Pangea, approximately 300 million years ago. With the recent advancements in technology and the Internet (symbolized by colorful background pixels), people of diverse backgrounds are now more connected than ever before. Virtually crossing borders on a daily basis, we celebrate and immerse ourselves in different cultures, creating a unity reminiscent of Pangea.
Language is a crucial component of human interaction especially when it comes to language. Even if our languages are different, it enables us to communicate our thoughts, feelings and ideas with each other. Cultures can be built and connected through language.
Jana Tarek concluded
I therefore wanted to develop something that is connected yet applied in different languages but when you look at it without understanding either language, you would instinctively think that they are different languages.
