TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
... You don't need to be able
to read to know that a pictograph of a skull and bones, wedge between an
arm and a hand, or a red triangle with an exclamation point in it mean
DANGER. You can also communicate an overview of an assembly process
quicker with an image than words, or communicate how a circuit is
constructed, or any workflow, hierarchy, or system.
What you need for these types of visual cues is a cultural basis for
interpreting them.
Quite often, we forget how much cultural baggage is associated with
pictorial information.
There have been many studies on how American-designed pictures/glyphs/icons
used in technical docs are interpreted in foreign countries by local
document users. Often the information is misinterpreted and the mistakes are
compounded by the fact that the pictures and text "seem" at odds.
I do not mean to imply that pictures are not useful, but that as information
technicians, we need to understand the limits such communication.
walden
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