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Tracking The Language Of Time And Space, 1945-2008, Roderick P. Hart, Elvin T. Lim

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This article explores how contemporary historians can avail themselves of quantitative approaches to examine how elusive concepts like ‘time’ and ‘space’ have been used in the public domain. By making use of specifically designed programs, historians can use digital tools to harness an unprecedented mass of information. This is a particularly important methodological innovation at a time of rapidly expanding data: news, speeches, and commentary are available first electronically, and they are available on countless sites in an unprecedented array of formats. Mastering these sources digitally is not only imperative for the contemporary historian; it also provides essential source material …

Framing Health Care Across The Pond: A Comparative Content Analysis Of Elite Newspapers In The Us And Uk During The 2009 American Health Policy Debate, Jackson Bales Foote

Theses

This study analyzes content from eight leading newspapers in the United States and United Kingdom during ten months of the 2009 American health care policy debate, identifying emergent issue-specific health care frames that manifest themselves in key framing devices, like metaphors, exemplars, catchphrases, and depictions. This exploratory, quantitive frame analysis is conducted in a cross-cultural context to facilitate generalizable comparisons about how the news media in different countries frame social welfare policy through symbolic and rhetorical elements. A principal component analysis is used to reduce the health care-specific variables into four frames: access, choice, rising costs, and market competition. The …

When Bieber Fever Strikes: Using Twitter As A New Medium For Attack And Defense Communication, Samuel Hardman Taylor, Matthew Barton

Iowa Journal of Communication

Rhetorical analyses of image restoration and attack have characteristically centered on public figures because their images are the focal point of news conversation for traditional mass media outlets following events of public shame. Through the development of Web 2.0 technologies and microblogging sites like Twitter, publishing power has shifted the conversation about public figures and their image creation, management and restoration into the hands of the general public. The shift creates new opportunities for research in the field of public discourse, specifically attack and defense rhetoric. This study uses the tweets surrounding Justin Bieber's loss at the 2011 Grammy Awards …

Liminal Practice In A Maturing Writing Department, Louise Wetherbee Phelps

English Faculty Publications

[First Paragraph]

In Spring 2011 I was awarded a Fulbright Specialist Grant to "consult, collaborate, and inform" on the future of the Department of Rhetoric, Writing, and Communications at the University of Winnipeg, located in the city of Winnipeg in Manitoba, Canada. The Department of Rhetoric, Writing, and Communications department (hereafter, RWC) was a pioneer in writing instruction in Canada, where it became the first unit to establish itself independently as a department with a full-‐time faculty committed to both teaching and scholarship in writing and rhetoric. It remains a rare phenomenon on the Canadian higher education scene, where studies …

Rhetorical Outcomes: A Genre Analysis Of Student Service-Learning Writing, Thomas Brady Trimble

Wayne State University Dissertations

Service-learning continues to be a popular pedagogical approach within composition studies. Despite a number of studies that document a range of positive impacts on students, faculty, institutions, and community members, the relationship between service-learning and student writing outcomes is not well understood. This study presents the results of a genre analysis of student-authored ethnographies composed in four distinct sections of a service-learning--based intermediate writing course at a Midwestern urban research university. Results of the analysis are then used to develop a contextualized writing assessment framework to evaluate student writing outcomes and to consider the implications of using contemporary genre theory …

Rhetorical Problems And Cinematic Solutions: The Visual Arguments Of The 'Obama Infomercial', Bryan Ricke

All Theses

Most Americans remember the outcome of the presidential election on November 2nd, 2008, and the intense media coverage of the entire campaign. Just three nights before Election Day, the Barack Obama campaign purchased primetime air slots on seven major broadcast and cable stations across the country to air a 30-minute 'infomercial' entitled
American Stories: American Solutions. This thesis looks at this television program with a specific focus not on the verbal message of American Stories: American Solutions, but on how this message is framed through cinematography. The thesis first explores research in the fields of rhetoric, film, politics, and race, …

Designing For Cultural Diversity: Participatory Design, Immigrant Women And Shared Creativity, Naureen Mumtaz

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Immigration and multiculturalism are realities of the globalized world that has given rise to subcultures, which possess specialized knowledge. This increasing interaction among people from diverse cultures has produced a complex ethno-cultural mosaic that presents formidable challenges for visual communication designers’ as well as for other designers. Cultural diversity of designers and audience of messages in a design scenario brings complexity in the design research process. This research study explores an effective visual communication language, through the medium of the poster, for culturally diverse audience of immigrant women in Edmonton, Canada. The decision was informed by triangulated results from a …

Through A Glass Darkly: Using Brain Science And Visual Rhetoric To Gain A Professional Perspective On Visual Advocacy, Lucille A. Jewel

Scholarly Works

American legal culture, tracking the trend within the media culture as a whole, has become inherently more visual. Visual competency is now required for effective persuasion in the courtroom and in a variety of other advocacy settings. The central thesis of this Article is that visual advocacy is here to stay, but that there is a large knowledge gap that prevents advocates from being able to evaluate the professionalism of their own visual arguments and properly respond to the visual arguments submitted by their opposing counsel.

Accordingly, this Article offers a detailed outline of the knowledge bases that attorneys need …

Remapping Evil: Locating, Spatializing, And Depicting Evil, Christie Lynn Daniels

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation expands upon critical studies of difference by exploring one particular ideological construct and how its use propagates, maintains, and exacerbates ubiquitously existent social inequalities. The concept of evil has been employed in a way that marginalizes and villainizes individuals, groups, and even entire communities. Moreover, when they are deployed in a visual medium, the ideas and concepts conveyed are often not interrogated as closely as a written work would be. As a result, the guiding question of inquiry for this project is: How have western notions of good and evil been deployed and employed as a mechanism of …

Review Of The Rhetoric Of Intellectual Property: Copyright Law And The Regulation Of Digital Culture, By Jessica Reyman, Jessica Silbey

Faculty Scholarship

A short book review of Jessica Reyman’s, The Rhetoric of Intellectual Property: Copyright Law and the Regulation of Digital Culture.

Using The 2008 Presidential Election To Think About “Playing The Race Card”, Ronald Lee, Aysel Morin

Department of Communication Studies: Faculty Publications

Bill Clinton and Geraldine Ferraro were accused of “playing the race card” during the 2008 contest for the Democratic presidential nomination. This essay explores the different forms race cards may assume and the dangers each poses to the public dialogue. Moving away from the traditional focus on persuasive effects, the Clinton and Ferraro utterances are analyzed as argumentative discourses. Then, critical standards are promulgated for evaluating their reasonableness.

Visual Argument Reconsidered: 'Objective' Theory And A Classical Rhetorical Approach, Daniel Richards

All Theses

Visual argument is a relatively new discipline within the field of visual rhetorics. Consequently, visual rhetoricians have presented new theories of visual argumentation without fully considering the possibilities of existing textual methodologies as explanatory tools—especially classical rhetorical devices. This thesis presents a methodology for examining and creating visual arguments based on the concepts of topoi and figures of speech. I contend that these classical rhetorical devises embody an “objective” understanding of visual communication that shows one way of bridging the empiricism/rationalism debate in epistemology. By demonstrating that knowledge comes from the necessary interplay of perception and conception, I attempt to …

Ritual Rhetoric In Ancient Near Eastern Texts, James W. Watts

Religion - All Scholarship

Many ancient Near Eastern texts reflect a concern for ritual accuracy. They depict ancient kings justifying their ritual practices on the basis of supposedly invariable tradition and, frequently, on the basis of old ritual texts. They also invoke ritual acts and omissions to explain the course of past history and to promise future punishments and rewards. In fact, very many texts assert that ritual performance is the most determinative factor in the success or failure of rulers and nations. The rhetoric of ritual therefore pervaded royal propaganda as well as temple texts. It also provided the principal rationale for criticizing …

Invisible Hands: Recognizing Archivists’ Work To Make Records Accessible, Sammie L. Morris, Shirley K. Rose

Libraries Research Publications

Two faculty members, one an archivist and the other a rhetoric and composition scholar/professor collaborated in processing the papers of a rhetoric and composition scholar. This project allowed the archivist to gain a better understanding of archival researchers' needs, while allowing the researcher to better understand the thought process and activities inherent in archival processing-- the activities of organizing, describing, and preserving primary source materials in the archives. Through this article the authors seek to demystify and increase transparency of archival processing, while enhancing researchers' abilities to interpret the archival collections with which they work.

Formalism And Realism In Ruins (Mapping The Logics Of Collapse), Pierre Schlag

Publications

After laying out a conventional account of the formalism vs. realism debates, this Article argues that formalism and realism are at once impossible and entrenched. To say they are impossible is to say that they are not as represented--that they cannot deliver their promised goods. To say that they are entrenched is to say that these forms of thought are sedimented as thought and practice throughout law's empire. We live thus amidst the ruins of formalism and realism. The disputes between these two great determinations of American law continue today, but usually in more localized or circumscribed forms. We see …

Scripting The Unscripted: Gender And Sexual Orientation In Strategy-Genre Reality Television, L Elizabeth Zollner

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Since 2000, there has been an explosion of "reality," or unscripted, television shows in a variety of formats. The series in which new societies are created in isolation appeared almost immediately to be influenced by certain identity constructs, particularly gender and sexual orientation. Audiences came to these shows with definite expectations already in place. I intend in this study to determine why this is so and what those expectations are.

Survivor, the germinal presentation of this genre, has as its motto "Outwit, Outplay, Outlast." However, as the show has developed through many iterations, the ability to literally survive in …

Sp 501 Communication As Christian Rhetoric , Stacy R. Minger

Syllabi

Holy Bible. (Please choose a translation to work from rather than a paraphrase). Schmit, Clayton. The Public Reading of Scripture. Nashville: Abingdon, 2002. ISBN:06-870-45-371 SP 501 Communication as Christian Rhetoric Syllabus Page 2 Schultze, Q. J. An Essential Guide to Public Speaking: Serving Your Audience with Faith, Skill, and Virtue. Grand Rapids: Baker, 2006. ISBN 08-010-31-516 Volf, Miroslav. Free of Charge: Giving and Forgiving in a Culture Stripped of Grace. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2005. ISBN 0-310-26574-6 1 VHS Tape or a DVD-R for recording your speeches. If you record to a DVD you will need to stay after class to …

Sp 501 Communication As Christian Rhetoric, Carolyn Smith

Syllabi

“Communication as Christian Rhetoric provides a context for instruction and practice that introduces the art of written and spoken communication within a clearly articulated Wesleyan theological framework for the purpose of Christian ministry. As a core course within the theological curriculum, its purpose does not simply replicate undergraduate speech and communication studies. Students will be provided with appropriate means for cultivating necessary habits of Christian life and speech in light of the Christian rhetorical tradition, classical rhetoric, and contemporary communication studies in preparation for Christian ministry in a multicultural society. This course is designed to integrate theological and scriptural knowledge, …

From Textbooks To Safety Briefings: Helping Technical Writers Negotiate Complex Rhetorical Situations, Brian Blackburne

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, I analyze the organizational and political constraints that technical writers encounter when dealing with complex rhetorical situations, particularly within risk-management discourse. I ground my research in case studies of safety briefings that airlines provide to their passengers because these important documents have long been regarded as ineffective, yet they ve gone largely unchanged in the last 20 years. Airlines are required to produce these safety briefings, which must satisfy multiple audiences, such as corporate executives, federal safety inspectors, flight attendants, and passengers. Because space and time are limited when presenting safety information to passengers, the technical writers …

The Rhetorical Myth Of The Athlete As A Moral Hero: The Implications Of Steroids In Sport And The Threatened Myth, Karen L. Hartman

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

This research analyzes changes in the rhetoric of a sustaining myth in order to better assess what happens when a myth is threatened. By examining American sport and its current struggle to withstand the widespread use of steroids, the author investigates how public discourse about the scandal turns athletes from mythical heroes to cheaters. The author begins by explicating the rhetorical construction of the athlete as a moral hero in America and how this myth is perpetuated today. The author then examines how steroids threaten the myth of the moral athlete and uses Major League Baseball as a case study …

Sp 501 Communication As Christian Rhetoric, Carolyn Smith

Syllabi

“Communication as Christian Rhetoric provides a context for instruction and practice that introduces the art of written and spoken communication within a clearly articulated Wesleyan theological framework for the purpose of Christian ministry. As a core course within the theological curriculum, its purpose does not simply replicate undergraduate speech and communication studies. Students will be provided with appropriate means for cultivating necessary habits of Christian life and speech in light of the Christian rhetorical tradition, classical rhetoric, and contemporary communication studies in preparation for Christian ministry in a multicultural society. This course is designed to integrate theological and scriptural knowledge, …

Moving Thumos: Emotion, Image, And The Enthymeme, Eric D. Mason

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation connects classical theories regarding the enthymeme and thumos (a Greek word commonly translated as "heart," "mind," or one's "capacity for emotion") to modern theories of images and emotion in order to reconsider the central role of visual discourse in persuasion, ideology, and subject formation. Since "enthymeme" comes from en and thymos, meaning "in heart," etymologically the enthymeme is an argument that is realized in an individual's thumos.

This dissertation thus attempts to establish the notion of thumos in rhetorical studies by developing a theory of visual enthymemes.The understanding of the enthymeme used within this dissertation works less from …

Threatening Bodies Resisting Containment: Enemy Combatants, War Protestors And Same-Sex Couples, Mary K. Bloodsworth-Lugo, Carmen R. Lugo-Lugo

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

The U.S.-launched "War on Terror" has been a major driving force in political discourses during the last few years, including presidential discourse. Since September 11, 2001, presidential rhetoric has systematically entangled international efforts, such as "the War on Terror" and the War in Iraq, with domestic issues, such as same-sex marriages and civil unions. In so doing, international and domestic threats have been effectively merged into one, and in the process, specific bodies have been constructed as "terrorist" agents in need of strict containment (for example, enemy combatant bodies, war protestor bodies, and the bodies of same-sex couples). This paper …

Postmodern Feminism, Hypertext, And The Rhetoric Of Cooking Websites, Heather Eaton Mcgrane

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study explores the ways cookbooks and their rhetorical dimensions have been re-imagined using hypertext and Web technology. Using the tenets of postmodern feminist rhetoric and Web design theory, the study considers how commercial cooking hypertexts construct users' identities. Although hypertext is a potentially empowering technology, democratizing rhetoric and knowledge making practices, commercial hypertext often circumscribes agency formation and prohibits participation. Participatory, constructive hypertexts are difficult to design and costly to maintain. Of the three sites studied, Epicurious.com, BettyCrocker.com, and FoodNetwork.com, only Epicurious.com encourages meaningful communication between users and between users and designers. In many ways, Epicurious.com conceives of its …

Powerful Submission: Popular Texts And The Subjectivity Of Christian Right Women, Ellen L. Flournoy

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Christian Right exerts considerable influence over female identity, especially through its members who have emerged as one of the most powerful voting blocks in the nation---the Christian Right woman. American Christian women, especially those considered to be on the political fringes, are virtually ignored in academic endeavors. Given their power, which defies their categorization as a "fringe" group, this academic silence is a gross oversight, especially in light of the rise of the Christian Right, which has successfully recruited millions of women to its service. This dissertation analyzes texts of Christian popular culture that contribute to the construction of …

Reconstructing Writer Identities, Student Identities, Teacher Identities, And Gender Identities: Chinese Graduate Students In America, Peiling Zhao

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The increasing presence of Chinese international graduate students in American higher education has mandated a closer examination of their multifaceted lives against stereotypes that hinder their efforts to find, transform, or assert their identities in the dominant discourses of American academia and culture.

Cross cultural studies of Chinese international students tend to reinforce stereotypes of their writer identities, learner identities, and teacher identities. Examining these various identities discloses dichotomies that read Chinese students’ traits and behaviors as handicaps and thus characterize them as “abnormal” in relation to the “normal” traits and behaviors of Chinese students’ Western counterparts. Whereas Western student …

The Rhetoric Of Newspaper Rivalry In The Face Of Image Restoration And Transformation, Andrea Ludlow Christensen

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is a study of the rhetoric of newspaper rivalry, particularly under the pressures of image restoration and transformation. I use methods of critical discourse analysis to look at newspaper articles in Utah's two dominant newspapers, the Salt Lake Tribune and the Deseret Morning News. I compare a sample of news articles from each paper in 2002 to a sample in 2003, when the Tribune was working to restore its image after a scandal involving two of its reporters, and the News was working to transform its image as it transitioned from an afternoon newspaper to a morning newspaper. …

Investigating Affective Dimensions Of Whiteness In The Cultural Studies Writing Classroom: Toward A Critical, Feminist, Anti-Racist Pedagogy, Allison Brimmer

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation seeks to help teachers understand the ways that affect is tied to the dominant ideology of white supremacy in contemporary U.S. society. It argues that affect—the complex confluence of feeling and judgment—is bound intricately to racism, sexism, classism, heterosexism, etc. In this work I attempt to deconstruct the social construction of affect that fuels dominant white ideology— what some scholars call whiteness—in the context of white teachers and students in the cultural studies writing classroom. With the lofty yet ultimately empowering goal of effecting anti-racist change in the classroom and in the profession, I trace affective dimensions of …

Loving Loving? Problematizing Pedagogies Of Care And Chéla Sandoval’S Love As A Hermeneutic, Allison Brimmer

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

My thesis project is an argument for and an investigation into the complex dynamics of what I term a critical, feminist, anti-racist pedagogy. Drawing from scholarly work in the fields of feminist theory, cultural studies, whiteness studies, and rhetoric and composition, in what follows I argue for a “blurring” of the traditional reason-emotion split that, I believe, continues to stifle learners in today’s U.S. educational system. I then offer a pedagogical theory that rejects or “blurs” this split, acknowledges and examines the affective realm, and is fueled by the more holistic notion and theory of “love as a hermeneutic” put …

Paradoxical Views Of "Librarian" In The Rhetoric Of Library Science Literature: A Fantasy Theme Analysis, Richard A. Stoddart, Adrienne R. Lee

Library Faculty Publications and Presentations

No abstract provided.