VR Post #3

Keisner, J. (2008). Do you want to watch? A study of the visual rhetoric of the postmodern horror film. Women’s Studies, 37, 411-427.

Keisner examines feardotcom, a 2003 horror movie, through the lens of visual rhetoric. She categorizes feardotcom as a postmodern horror film, for which she presents four principles (borrowed from Isabel Cristina Pinedo):

1.      The presence of a man/monster that disrupts an already violent social order.

2.      An unclear distinction between good and evil.

3.      The understanding that survival depends on adapting to the disrupted surroundings.

4.      A disinclination toward closure (412).

Keisner focuses on the appeal of horror films despite (or due to) their tendency to be masculine texts.

Keisner begins by stressing the importance of the visual in horror films. She writes that horror films tend to have weak character development and dialogue, and that these traits shift the emphasis to the visual even more strongly than in most movies. In keeping with the genre, the film feardotcom relies more on visuals than plot, character, or dialogue to affect the viewer. In brief, the film’s premise is that a sociopathic doctor tortures young women while posting videos of the torture on the Internet; visitors to the in-movie site www.feardotcom.com are asked if they “want to watch.” If they click yes, they see more of the torture, but 48 hours after they enter the site they are literally scared to death themselves by a supernatural force.

Keisner points out that it is primarily through the movie’s use of visual rhetoric that its goal of scaring the audience is realized. She quotes the director as saying that he “use[d] special effects to layer subtle, small elements that are hardly noticeable, but which play upon the audience’s psyche and strengthen the suspense and uneasiness of the experience” (414). Keisner notes some of these elements—dark backdrops, darkness, constant rain—create the feel of a nightmare (414). Citing Anne Marie Seward Barry, Keisner writes that image can inspire emotions before it is understood by the thinking parts of the brain, making it a particularly important device for inspiring horror (415).

As Keisner notes, the visual nature of the movie is paired with its premise. In the fictitious site www.feardotcom.com, viewers choose to see the graphically violent images by responding to the prompt. They are then complicit in the torture and eventual murder of the subject. Keisner alleges that viewers of the movie are similarly complicit (although hopefully not in a real murder): even though our society decries the increasing violence in our media, by watching the movie, we indicate our approval of such violence and our desire for more.

Keisner also examines the misogyny present in feardotcom. She points out that most horror movies objectify and terrorize primarily women, and asserts that “a close study of postmodern slasher films […] implicates the postmodern slasher film as a projection of masculine desire. Audience members who are female identify with the objectified image of a woman while the male viewers identify with the movie’s main protagonist, who, more often than not, is male” (420). Relying on Mulvey, Keisner suggests that the castration anxiety of male viewers is assuaged by the punishment of female characters. She cites studies of horror movies that reveal that torture and death scenes of women tend to be much longer and more graphic than those of men, and points out that male viewers report that “enjoyment is heightened when in the company of a distressed woman” (422), while female viewers report more enjoyment when in the company of men who seem in control of the situation.

Keisner’s piece is valuable in its examination of both explicit and implicit arguments in feardotcom. Explicitly, the argument is that we should be scared, and that through our participation we are complicit in the increasingly graphic violence we see in popular culture. To me, the implicit arguments are more interesting. Keisner asserts that we learn how men and women should act, think, and feel by viewing horror movies; we learn what is valued in each sex. Keisner writes that “while some critics argue that the postmodern horror movie can provide a safe, pleasurable outlet for experiencing terror, an analysis of the social context and gender discrepancies in emotional responses proves that the horror movie creates a man’s world, ultimately empowering men while females, on and off the screen, are encouraged to see themselves as victims” (426).

VR Post #2: Postmodern Visual Rhetoric

Rice, J. (2004, January/April). A critical review of visual rhetoric in a postmodern age: Complementing, extending, and presenting new ideas. Review of Communication, 4(1/2), 63-74.

Rice's essay summarizes and critiques two principle theorists--Sonja Foss and Valerie Peterson--and attempts to extend their theories of visual rhetoric to provide a heuristic for the analysis of visual artifacts. Rice limits his essay to a postmodern context, which he characterizes as one ring of "the large and hard-to-hit bull's eye of visual rhetorical theory" (73). Extending this analogy, he states that "Foss shot wide, Peterson used a smaller gauge, and the approach taken here is more of a rifle approach" (73).

Rice begins the essay by critiquing Foss's schema as too deductive. Foss suggests a critic first "determine the function of a text," secondly "scrutinize the composition of the visual artifact," and third "scrutinize the function of the art, measuring its legitimacy or soundness" (65). Rice briefly summarizes Peterson's critique of Foss and then presents Peterson's schema, which "basically reverses the first two steps, making the sequence more inductive" (65). Rice thinks that both schema are too linear and methodical for postmodern analysis, and suggests that he intends to "fuse a variety of ideas and schemas into a complex, multidimensional perspective" (66).

At this point, Rice introduces "the omniphistic visual schema," which contains "two planes of perception, content and form" (66). Rice states that "omniphistic" means "all in balance" and combines rational and intuitive aspects (73). Rice suggests that an omniphistic approach can integrate rationality, sensation, interpretation, and intuition in a way consistent with postmodern thought. Rice also explores what he calls "abductive thinking" (67), which he compares to connotation and argues "precedes both induction and deduction and exists as an 'origin of knowing,' which begins with visual observation before anything else" (67). A fair summary of this section of the article is that Rice is attempting to elevate subjective and intuitive aspects of visual analysis to counter what he sees as overly rational and methodical approaches.

Rice then discusses "four indicators of a postmodern visual text" (69). These are oppositional elements (internal conflicts); co-constructed elements (interactions between the text and audience); contextual elements (interactions between the text and context); and ideological elements, which "focus on text and all its surrounding elements, which results in a revelation of rhetorical power" (72), the analysis of which must be saved for last.

Despite his claims of being as specific as a rifle shot, Rice's essay is extremely hard to grasp. Part of the reason is probably that he is operating from a postmodern viewpoint that is inherently slippery. In other words, some of the difficulty in this essay is probably by design. Rice borrows an analogy from Foucault--a toolbox--and suggests that rather than attempt to use the methods of visual analysis he lays out wholesale, that it might be better for the reader to pick and choose the tools that are useful in a given situation. Rice writes that "if some small part of the ideas [in the essay] aids in the analysis and understanding of text, so much the better" (73). It is an interesting essay, and it is possible that some of his methodology (which he explicitly resists describing as a methodology) might be useful for visual analysis. I particularly liked his efforts to raise the intuitive as worthy of analysis. However, the essay is also vulnerable to one of the big critiques of postmodern thought: Rice's commitment to avoid proscribing a methodology or schema and his essential throwing-up-of-hands, take-what-you-want ending leave the reader confused of what to make of it. His critiques of other methodologies are good, but he is reluctant to put anything firm in their place.

Sehmel, H. (2002, June). Websites and advocacy campaigns: Decision making, implementation, and audience in an environmental advocacy group's use of websites as part of its communication campaigns. Business Communication Quarterly, 65(2), 100-107.

This article summarizes case-study research she performed in which she examined how a small environmental advocacy group used its website. Sehmel states that she hopes the article will “provide people working in small organizations with information about how they might improve the decision-making processes they use regarding their Websites” (100), especially those groups that “sell ideas, rather than products” (100).

Sehmel critiques existing research as being primarily focused on larger organizations with substantial publication departments. Additionally, Sehmel alleges that existing research inadequately explores how organizations integrate web publications with other communication tactics. For her case study, she conducted interviews of four out of five members of the advocacy group as well as the webmaster, who worked on an hourly rate and was not part of the company. She observed several planning meetings, analyzed planning e-mails, and analyzed the organization’s website. Finally, she surveyed visitors to the organization’s website and participants in the organization’s e-mail list.

Sehmel found that although the group had clear goals for its websites (which the websites seemed to support), the group experienced other challenges. For example, the employees did not have a clear grasp of the alternatives available to them, nor feedback on the choices they made that would “enable them to become more expert rhetoricians on the Web” (104). Several factors Sehmel states are likely to be experienced by other small organizations, such as the following (105):

• ·         Employees have no training in web design.
• ·         The webmaster is perceived as a technical expert rather than a rhetorician.
• ·         The organization has limited knowledge of its web audience and little feedback about their web communications.
• ·         The organization has limited time and money.

In Sehmel’s estimation, these limitations did not result in a failed website, but rather one that did not live up to its potential. Sehmel suggests that “researchers encourage groups to conduct some of their own research and to support them in conducting it, thereby helping them learn more about their audiences and about whether the choices they have made worked for them” (106). While this is an interesting suggestion, it is difficult to see how very many groups could take advantage of the opportunity to partner with a researcher, especially those organizations that are based in areas far from a research university. Indeed, Sehmel’s implication section is the weakest part of an otherwise intriguing essay.

Ironically, what Sehmel recommends is very close to what I propose to do for my class project. As a “researcher,” I propose to work with my college to address many of the same areas Sehmel does by examining my college’s new websites, flyers, and informational mailers targeting veterans. The group in my college that has been tasked with developing the materials shares many characteristics with Sehmel’s environmental advocacy group—limited resources, limited experience in web design, and imperfect feedback processes to gauge the effect of their communications. I will be looking more at the documents themselves rather than the people and design process. Still, I expect Sehmel’s article will give me an idea of things to look for as I perform my own research.