viz.

I recently incorporated the Garry Winogrand photo below into an in-class writing exercise. The exercise is essentially the same as one that I came up with when helping Brooks Landon teach his Prose Style course at the University of Iowa a few years ago. Keep reading to learn more about the writing exercise.

I bring a photo in to class, usually one that depicts something weird, something that probably has a story behind it but that doesn't make that story explicit. I project the photo and don't tell the students a word about it, not when it was taken, by whom, nothing. Then the students have to write about the photo. It's a creative assignment and in this case I was trying to get them to think about form. Specifically, after a workshop on the subject in the prior class, I was asking them to write "cumulative" sentences. Cumulative sentences, for those of you who aren't prose style junkies, are described in Francis Christensen's essay "A Generative Rhetoric of the Sentence." So, the photo was just a prompt to get the students writing in a new mode that we had been working on. The exercise went very well and my students generated some whacky, but stylistically adventurous, prose. If I get their permission, I will post some of their writings in the comments soon.

Since fall of '06 I have been giving a PowerPoint visual rhetoric presentation in UT's RHE 306 and RHE 309K classes. The presentations have been pretty successful and seem well received by students and instructors alike. I have had some requests to distribute the presentation but have been holding off for a couple of reasons: 1) the presentation is composed almost entirely of coprighted material and unlimited distribution would almost certainly violate the fair use terms under which I am currently using the materials; 2) the images I included are often controversial, for a variety of reasons, and I am hesitant to distribute the presentation to instructors without backgrounds in visual rhetoric or who might not be attuned to some of the delicate classroom issues some of the images present.

For a light-hearted example of someone who does some amazing "rhetorical analyses" of visual texts, check out the Comics Curmudgeon blog at http://joshreads.com.

Josh routinely uses visual cues in the crappy comics, the ones you read but aren't sure why and never make you laugh, to transform the comics into much more entertaining texts than their original authors were capable of achieving.

Notes for the Instructor: This is a unit-long assignment, which asks the students to write first a short paper (300–500 words), in which they compare two images/objects/spaces and their respective messages, and then produce a long essay (4–5 pages), in which they incorporate the text they have already produced in the short paper, but make an argument about the rhetorical effectiveness of the two images/objects. In other words, in the short paper they discuss message alone; in the long paper they discuss both the message and its reception. The assignment involves doing extensive research into the respective culture/ideology, which produced the images/objects. Both the short and the long essay should contain a rhetorically crafted, comparative description of the images/objects, which should serve to set up the main argument, i.e., to make the reader more receptive to it.

Here are two sample arguments (quoted with the students’ permission):

Short Paper: “Two of the most well-known statues of King David were erected by Renaissance painters Michelangelo and Donatello. Both artists’ sculptures differ from previous representations of heroic figures in that their versions of David are depicted in the nude. However, these two artists’ figures differ in their characteristic representation of David’s victory: Donatello emphasizes its spiritual side, while Michelangelo expresses its power.”

Long Paper: “Designed twenty years apart, house X and house Y both claim to blend artificial, human creation with the natural landscape, in an attempt to appeal to homebuyers’ rising ecological awareness. However, while X spurred an entire trend in residential architecture, Y remains a lonely monument to its author’s efforts. Y’s rigid, museum-like aesthetic has proven unattractive compared to X’s accommodating, livable beauty.”

Assignment Description: Write a short comparison, which leads to the creation of a rhetorical analysis.

Category: Individual Project.

Goals: This assignment has several goals: a) to give the students the opportunity to realize that successful arguments about rhetorical effect can be quite complex and require much research, b) to give them a chance to revise and incorporate some of their own writing into longer pieces of text with different goals, c) to help them realize that no description or comparison is “neutral;” all descriptions/comparisons have a particular rhetorical goal and audience, and their language and selection of elements is important.

Short Essay

Choose two closely related images/objects, which are at least fifty years old and write a short essay (300–500 words), in which you make a comparative claim about their respective messages. In order to make a sustainable claim, you will need to research the historical and cultural context in which the images/objects first appeared.

Before you begin, consider again the following questions:

• What is the context in which the images/objects first appeared?
• What audiences were they meant for?
• How were they meant to be used/viewed/displayed?
• What is their message? Their goal?
• How do they strike you as a viewer?

Requirements:

• Your paper must have an arguable, strong comparative claim.
• The historical/cultural context of the two images must be expounded briefly – in no more than one paragraph for each image/object. Only choose to include that information which will help your argument.
• Your may have a “block” comparison or a “running” comparison – choose the strategy most appropriate for your argument. Your comparison must include a description of the images/objects crafted so as to set up your main argument and to make your reader more receptive to your claims. In other words, concentrate mostly on the elements which will help your argument.
• Your paper must contain sufficient visual analysis to support your claim.

Grading Criteria:

• Clarity, focus, and value of your central claim/argument
• Appropriateness of selected visual elements, their ordering, comparison, and interpretation in relation to main argument
• Use of visual terms and vocabulary
• Clarity and precision of language
• Correct syntax, grammar, and punctuation

Long Essay

Building on your short paper, write a long argumentative essay (4-5 pages), in which you make a comparative argument about the rhetorical effectiveness of two closely related images/objects. Your images/objects must be at least fifty years old. In order to make a sustainable claim, you will need to research the historical and cultural context in which the images/objects first appeared. You claim must involve the ideologies and messages of your images/objects as well as the reception of those messages.

Before you begin, consider again the following questions:

• What is the context in which the images/objects first appeared?
• What audiences were they meant for?
• How were they meant to be used/viewed/displayed?
• What is their message? Their goal?
• How effective were they in their own time and place? If you cannot find direct information on this question, take your best and most educated guess!

Requirements:

• Your paper must have an arguable, strong comparative claim.
• The historical/cultural context of the two images must be expounded briefly – in no more than one paragraph for each image/object. Only choose to include that information which will help your argument.
• Your paper must contain descriptions of the images/objects, appropriate for your argument and for the comparison you are making. The purpose of the description is to set up the subsequent argument and analysis.
• Your may have a “block” comparison or a “running” comparison – choose the strategy most appropriate for your argument.
• Your paper must contain sufficient visual analysis to support your claim.
• You must cite all sources you have used for your paper in a Works Cited sheet. Please use at least three academic or otherwise reputable sources. (Wikipedia will not do.)

Grading Criteria:

• Clarity, focus, and value of your central claim/argument
• Appropriateness of the descriptions and comparison in relation to main argument
• Appropriateness of selected visual elements and their ordering in relation to main argument
• Use of visual terms and vocabulary
• Clarity and precision of language
• Correct syntax, grammar, and punctuation
• Correct use of citation guidelines and formatting

By John Jones

The arguments found in images are related to textual arguments in that each is presented through the selection and arrangement of disparate elements for some purpose. Though those purposes can range from persuasion to aesthetic pleasure, the fact that they are purposive places them in the realm of rhetoric.

Though photographs and realistic painting are arguments by this definition—they are composed, in that the image’s angle is chosen by the painter or cropped by the photographer and the composition and elements present in each are determined by their authors—this argumentative purpose is more apparent in other media, like collage, or double-exposure photographs, for these methods emphasize their own composed structure through the arrangement of the disparate or fantastical elements that they consist of.

Another category of visual argument is that of the "visual confection." In Visual Explanations (1997) Edward Tufte argues that the confection is different from the examples listed above—photos, collage, etc.—in that confections are fantastical visual structures designed to illustrate written arguments. In this description, diagrams, flowcharts, and iconic images that are created to specifically support written arguments can be called visual confections. One example of a confection is the title page from Thomas Hobbes‘ Leviathan. Tufte argues that this image, which is arranged to illustrate the argument of the book, fits the category because it is explicitly connected to the author’s textual arguments.

Notes for the Instructor: This proposal assignment offers visually-oriented alternatives to the traditional essay and gives students the opportunity to create a web site, a short film, or a PowerPoint presentation. Attached are two examples of PowerPoint presentations, a rough draft and a final draft that has been revised for aesthetic and persuasive appeal. To implement this assignment, the instructor will need to specify a more exact prompt and the specific guidelines necessary to complete the project (for example, the length of a short film [recommended: 5–10 minutes] or PowerPoint presentation [recommended: 20 minutes]), the number and type of sources to be used (the assignment currently requires a minimum of five), the grading specifications, and the due dates.

Assignment Description: Creating a proposal argument

Category: Individual project

Goals: This project is designed give students practice in producing visual proposal arguments; to lead them to demonstrate facility with the tools of visual rhetoric; and to think critically and carefully about the relationship between aesthetics and arguments, or between visual rhetoric and persuasion. Students will research a specific proposal and create a web site, a PowerPoint Presentation, or a short film as the medium for presenting their proposal argument. The objective is to present a well thought-out proposal that offers a viable solution to an issue that interests you, and that identifies a specific plan of action for your reader.

Tasks:

• Choose a controversial or debatable issue that is related to the material and topics of the course and that is as narrowly and clearly defined as possible.
• Identify a target audience that is affected by this problem and plan to structure your argument to reach this audience.
• Design a web site, create a short film, or design and present a PowerPoint presentation that posits a strong argument for your proposal.
• Student progress on this project will be measured in three stages: with a topic proposal, a rough draft, and a final draft.

Guidelines:

• Your project should consist of two primary components:
• A description of the situation, and what makes it a problem.
• A detailed discussion of your proposed solution to this problem. This should act as a “call to action” for your audience. You should discuss not only the reasons for your proposal, but also how it would be put into action, including both the costs (financial and/or personal) and benefits of implementing your proposal. Discuss what (if anything) has already been done about this issue, and why these solutions have been less than satisfactory.
• Your project should show that you’ve taken the time to do careful and thorough research, and investigated all relevant aspects of this issue. Some topics will require more research than others, depending on what is available and how concretely your problem can be measured, but all papers and projects should have a minimum of five sources.
• For web sites: In addition to having text in the web site itself, please cut and paste the text of your site and paste it into a word document that you also submit with your rough draft and final project; this textual component should be roughly 4-5 pages long, double-spaced (not counting the bibliography).

Topic Proposals: Your topic proposal should include the following:

• Your topic
• Some discussion of why the reader should care about this issue
• Your proposed “solution”
• Some examples of what else has been done about this problem
• Costs and benefits of your solution
• A brief description of the format your final project will take (web site, short film, or PowerPoint presentation).

Rough Draft: Your web site or short film should be fairly well fleshed out, and although they may not have all of the content you plan to incorporate into the final product, they should be close to the completed stage. If you elect to do a PowerPoint presentation, you should have all of your slides set up (even if you plan to revise them), and you should also have a Word document summarizing what you plan to say about each slide.

Grading: These projects will be graded for their visual as well as textual content; the visual component and presentation will account for 25% of your assignment grade, and the textual component will account for the remaining 75%. Be sure to include a bibliography (yes, even for short films).