Film-Making and Management Learning as (Multimodal) Design

In this paper, we advance the question: What are the semiotic (meaning-making) and learning opportunities offered by student-produced films? Our point of departure is a pedagogical project in which we invited management students to produce films on scalar issues related to global environmental change. Our analytical lens and our empirical findings (examined through a template analysis and a multimodal video transcription) help us make three contributions. First, we synthesize a new ontological and epistemological foundational "positioning" that portrays the nature of learning processes as revolving on meaning-making activities (a positioning that we have termed a performative, design-oriented multimodality). Second, we provide a framework that advances understanding of the "inner workings" of student film-making as resting on a triple engagement (cognitive-affective, behavioral, and relational), anchored on underpinning multimodal composing activities. These conceptual moves and empirical work allow us to distill several implications, or "provocations": film-making fosters radical openness in management learning curricula, gives new momentum to the instructor's role change ("from sage on the stage to guide on the side") and expands existing cultures of recognition around what gets valued and can be assessed as (signs of) learning. Third, we offer a pedagogical prototype containing practical teaching guidelines.