New Media & Visual Rhetoric
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New Media Visual Rhetoric Alan J. Reid, Ph.D. Coastal Carolina University &
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Transcript of New Media & Visual Rhetoric
New Media Visual Rhetoric
Alan J. Reid, Ph.D.Coastal Carolina University
&
Today’s Objectives
• Understand and explain the terms new media and visual rhetoric.
• Conduct a rhetorical analysis of a digital interface.
To be able to:
New Media
Includes science, humanities, computing, and
visual arts, specifically, in relation to digital text.
The Medium is the MessageThe medium of communication is as valuable as the message itself (McLuhan, 1964).
New Media & Composition
Just as good writing involves more than putting words on a page, good design involves more than using words and pictures to convey information
(Handa, 2004, p.4).
Media dictates rhetoric, ethos, and attention.
“
New(s) Media
Answer Poll Question #1: Where do you get your news?
News and Social Media
• 64% U.S. adults use Facebook• 3 in 10 users get news from Facebook • 78% of users receive news incidentally
We Are All Producers
Twitter, along with all social media, has made everyone producers of content, not just consumers.
Producers of content carry varying levels of authority and credibility (ethos).
New Media
Advantages
• Immediacy
• Accessibility
• Networking
• Interactivity
Disadvantages
• Immediacy
• Limited Perceptual Span
• Split-attention
• Encourages task-switching
New Media
Using images and symbols to construct argument, consciously or not.
The composer as the “maker of meaning”
(Trimbur, 2002)
The visual design of writing factors into the rhetorical posture. The page itself is a “unit of discourse
(Trimbur, 2002)
Visual Rhetoric
Visual Rhetoric & BYOD
iPad
iMac Pocket Reader
Visual Rhetoric & Barcodes
Now, they are ubiquitous, functional, and they have connotations of “technology, identity, and identification”
(Morrison & Arnall, 2011, p.229).
Barcodes, invented in 1948, used to signify “Big Brother.”
Visual Rhetoric & Quick Response (QR)
Answer Poll Question #2: Have you ever used a QR?
Visual Rhetoric of the Interface
Interface is the...
“place of interaction for the technological, human, social, and cultural aspects which make up computer-mediated communication and, more specifically, new media”
(Carnegie, 2009, p.165)
Simply put, interface is a meeting-point or intersection. A print text and its type, pages, book jacket
A computer and its monitor, mouse, or keyboard
A website and its graphical design
TheFacebook, 2005.
Facebook, 2014.
Visual Rhetoric & Interactivity
New Media implements visual rhetoric.
Visual rhetoric engages the user in its Interface.
Interfaces determine the level of interactivity.
Modes of Interactivity*
Multi-directionality
Manipulability
Presence
* Carnegie, 2009
Multi-directionality
Hyperlinks to outside content.
The role of the network user: sender, receiver, both
Low High
Sending a message unrelated to a previous message or not expecting a return message.
Real-time interaction, ability to send and receive.
Manipulability
Low High
Digitization of objects such as sounds, text, animation, video, and photos into units of data.
Customization.
Moodle BlackBoard WordPress
Presence
Users’ perceptions of immediacy, movements, and connection to others.
Low High
Asynchronous, online courses
Face-to-FaceWeb-enhanced, telepresence
Answer Poll Question #3: In which mode of interactivity is Facebook’s interface the strongest?
‘Leave a Reply’
• Name a way in which online technologies have influenced or persuaded a decision.
• How has social media turned everyone into a
producer as well as a consumer of new media?
• Is the medium truly as valuable as the message itself?
*Please utilize language from today’s presentation.
References
Carnegie, T. (2009). Interface as exordium: The rhetoric of interactivity. Computers and Composition, 26, 164-173. doi: 10.1016/j.compcom.2009.05.005
Facebook. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.facebook.com
Handa, C. (2004). Visual rhetoric in a digital world: A critical sourcebook. Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin’s.
Morrison, A. Arnall, T. (2011). Visualizations of digital interaction in daily life. Computers and Composition, 28(3), 224-234.
