The purposes for which the Association was formed are:
- To provide education, instruction, and training for individuals, groups, and organizations, and to the public in general in modes of visual communication and the application thereof, through the concept of visual literacy that was defined as:
“the group of vision competencies a human being can develop by seeing and at the same time having and integrating other sensory experiences” (Jack Debes, 1969).
and more recently, as:
“. . . a set of abilities that enables an individual to effectively find, interpret, evaluate, use, and create images and visual media. Visual literacy skills equip a learner to understand and analyze the contextual, cultural, ethical, aesthetic, intellectual, and technical components involved in the production and use of visual materials. A visually literate individual is both a critical consumer of visual media and a competent contributor to a body of shared knowledge and culture” (Visual Literacy Standards Task Force, ACRL, 2011).
and most recently, as:
“an interconnected set of practices, habits, and values for participating in visual culture that can be developed through critical, ethical, reflective, and creative engagement with visual media” (Maggie Murphy, Unframing the Visual: Visual Literacy Pedagogy in Academic Libraries and Information, forthcoming, Fall 2023).