A Critique on a multimedia of Tengger

Lee Haausing
Jul 10, 2017 · 3 min read

Title: Living in China’s Expanding Deserts

website url: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/10/24/world/asia/living-in-chinas-expanding-deserts.html

  1. A Brief Summary

The package mainly tells current situation of the Tengger Dessert in China. It was estimated that due to natural and human causes, the acreage and the harsh condition created by the dessert is probably going to expand. Thus, residential and economic life in local areas are likely to be inflicted. For example, Liu Jiali’s family now has to make seasonal changes of places of living. The government is trying to solve the problem, and one possible solution comes from Guo Kaiming’s row trees planting plan, though the fierce weather is hard to cope with. Economic life in Tengger is also suffering from the harsh condition. Huang Chunmei, and Mengkebuyin, have to change their ways to make their livings.

2. Basic Advantages

I enjoy this package because it first and foremost has a clear structure of a narrative, both from a macro and a micro level. The package gives both a panorama of the situation in Tengger Dessert in the latest survey and report. It also gives the readers some vivid examples. Local voices are heard, which makes the report contains more dimensions.

The other advantage will be the use of the visuals. The video of the little Liu Jiali will be attracting the readers in the first glance, which is very important of a media. Then, all the related images and videos accords with each other, so the there will be little discomfort when switching the pictures and videos.

3. Detailed Representation

I think that the package did a good job in linking the words to the visuals, and trying to give the readers information as well as the compassion of the situation in Tengger Desert. One significant example is when the package was telling about life of those families. Captions come up suddenly, so the readers know what’s going on with these families and individuals. In addition, the captions come up suddenly, so we can get a strong curiosity of seeing those captions, then get emotion through watching these subtitles.

There are still some visuals which take effect on their own. The first representation, which is the video of the little boy running through the desert, shows clearly of the beauty of Tengger Desert. However, the topic is a problem that occurs in this region, which can easily deliver readers with a somehow tricky feeling.

To use some statistical techniques with pictures is also a favorable representation of showing the situation in Tengger Desert and related information. For example, in showing desertification in China, the authors present readers with a map of China. Moreover, by shifting images which looks like scanning on the map, the author could clearly point out the basic problems of the expanding desertification, and the related sand storm, which is, to a certain extent, the most troublesome environmental problem in China.

4. Conclusion & Possible Improvements.

In general, the package of media is good in representing the problem. Readers can see clearly the structure and get a direct feedback from the texts, pictures and visual. Contents are rich.

However, I think that there are still some unnecessary details which can be cancelled from the package. The package totally gives four examples, however, the example of Huang and Mengkebuyin have something in common. Considering that their goal is to show the economic life in the Tengger Desert, I think it is dispensable to cancel one of the example. So that the content will be shorter and easier to read.

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