Appropriation As a Rhetorical Strategy

Rape Culture, as I have discussed in previous blogs, is a social activism series that I created combining images and texts.  Including in the series were appropriations of an advertisement, a rape joke, and a porn still.  Appropriative reproach is a useful way to persuade an audience to see beyond the original "work" into a more thorough understanding of the social implications that it makes.

I decided quite some years ago that my expression of communication via images and text are mostly social activism, as I have a passion to spreading awareness and enlightening issues that are repressive towards individuals: rape, violence, child abuse, etc.  I feel that this is my outlet and way to help bring people together by finding avenues to breaking down dichotomies and systems that divide each other.

Bansky: Activist or Not?!

Bansky is an England-based graffiti artist and political activist.  But there are some people who question the validity of whether or not is a an activist.  Can a Graffiti artist be an activist?  I say....Why Not??!


There are two versions of the definition of activism that I want to point out in relation to whether or not Bansky can be considered an activist. 

The first definition is found in the Webster Dictionary says that activism is: a doctrine or practice that emphasizes direct vigorous action especially in support of or opposition to one side of a controversial issue.  Sure, according to this definition what constitutes direct vigorous action, so can art consitute as activism?

Well according to this definition on wikipedia, a social platform:

Activism consists of efforts to promote, impede, or direct social, political, economic, or environmental change, or stasis with the desire to make improvements in society and to change society. Forms of activism range from writing letters to newspapers or to politicians, political campaigning, economic activism such as boycotts or preferentially patronizing businesses, rallies, street marches, strikes, sit-ins, and hunger strikes. One can also express activism through different forms of art (Artivism).BUT DOES GRAFFITI COUNT AS ART?! Is the common question and debate I hear, some consider it vandalism, however, in my eyes, what's different for "hanging a piece of art" or painting murals on walls, versus graffiti.  So Yes, Bansky is an activist, and in my 'eyes' a successful political artist/activist.  Here are a couple of my favorite images.

I would say that if the art makes a political/social statement, as these two images certainly do, it has the viewers thinking which is all any activist can aim for to persuade the audience.

Emoticons: Are They Worthless, Disgraceful, or Actually Helpful?!

If you ever get a text from me, most likely you will also get the emoticon of a facial expression or heart or something that I feel adds to what the words cannot.  I have often wondered, is this childish?! Is this helpful, silly, unecessary, and I have come to this conclusion: When we talk to people in person there is a nonverbal body language that each experiences, that one does not get through text messages or IMs in general.  I find that these emoticons can really help out, if say a message is sarcastic and you don't want it to be taken seriously, loving but could be confused as otherwise, ets.

So when I read this comment on the opposition of using emoticons, "Attacks are often centered on the ambiguity of the emoticon" in the article titled, Conventional Faces: Emoticons in Instant Messaging Discourse,  I personally disagreed.  These emoticons I find narrow down the ambiguity of words that could be taken out of context.

In my experience, I use emoticons strictly for text and some emails and social media posts, I have never used them otherwise.  In that same article the opposition states, "Emoticons, specifically, have been scrutinized by language scholars from fields as diverse as psychology, neuroscience, and sociolinguistics as “an unnecessary and unwelcome intrusion into a well-crafted text”"

I would say that is a big leap, to suggest that they are an "unnecessary and unwelcome intrusion into a well-crafted text".  I would say that it depends on the text, and often times texts are on limited time, and people don't have the ability to craft with words the lengthy text it may take to fully express the idea and could use an emoticon instead.  I know personally, since I write very long texts usually, that a friend of mine says "I always know when I get a text from you because my phone goes off multiple times"....meaning multiple texts.  They come out of order and are confusing for her, and so I try to shorten them now.

The Power of Video

I browsed Youtube to check out some video essay's on Rape Culture for research on my multimodal project.  I came across this interview on the #SRShow in which the interviewed person talks against the acceptance of rape culture, denying it's existence and blaming feminists in creating this ideology.  

The ability we have as individuals to create whatever type of video we want and the accessibility of spreading it to the masses makes the knowledge that is shared, persuasive, and possibly effective for naive minds.  

I found the interview to be a man not able to identify with rape and therefore resisting the idea of rape culture.  He has sound arguments and ideas that help to place value on the importance of not denying rape, yet uses language to to create an effective argument against the feminists that have come up with this idea of rape culture.  Rape Culture is the idea that rape is normalized and thus the victim is blamed.  This concept is not able to be denied, the mass media certainly promotes rape culture and therefore, it has entered into everyday life through multiple examples.  What is important is embracing this idea and figuring out what to do about it, not to resist it.  I find that he isn't rhetorically listening to those who believe in the existence of rape culture and why, he is refusing to identify with it and therefore resisting against it.

I had to share this interview, because although I find it repulsive, I agree with some of his comments and I also feel that it exemplifies the power that people have in a social media space and to put question on what that means to have the freedom to create videos that counter very important theories.

Below is an example of a video essay on consent.  I find that the power of this video speaks loudly on the power of multimodal texts.  It is a simple cartoon drawing and a narrator and yet incredibly POWERFUL.   

Abstract: MOAR Digital Activism, Please

In her article titled MOAR Digital Activism, Please, Lauri Goodling discusses the implication of activism in the digital world and whether or not it is an acceptable platform.  She uses data from multiple surveys to show why it is not universally valued, yet counters the opposition with sound reasoning being as objective as possible from both sides of the debate.  The main argument is whether the addition of online social media avenues are acceptable forms of activism in the rhetorical world and she concludes with the fact that discourse extends beyond words on the page, although there is resistance against this digital rhetorical world there have been examples even in the 60s when imagery began to influence activism and this is extending into these social media platforms as well. She sums it up with the fact that any way to get our voices heard is what matters, therefore suggesting that activism in the digital world is most definitely acceptable.

Multimodal Revision: Language Matters

In Rape Culture, a research paper that I wrote a year ago, there's a section that I talk about the commonly offensive language used in our everyday language that are sexualizing and perverted, phrases like: "suck my dick", "fuck yourself", "hit on someone", "throw like a girl", "you're a pussy", "you know she wanted it".  There are implications of these phrases that I want to take the time to point out, because words shape perceptions and I want to expose what exactly that means.

 I am considering that it would be nice to implement videos that exemplify this.  Just short clips of examples of each of these phrases and some more that put these phrases into action showing how normalizing it is within our language and then have a description about the effects of using such language and the implications that rape culture suggests, by using these phrases we are normalizing the ideas and creating a trivialization of what the words are actually saying.

Here is an example on youtube: https://youtu.be/wuk1qLOw17g

I'm pondering on the idea of using a TedTalk interview of Language and Rape Culture given by Kayce Singletary & Alexis Stratton. https://youtu.be/tss23dx9KrY
In this video, these two women do a great job of explaining language and the link between rape culture.

"Rape culture is the culture that condones and surrounds us that expects sexual violence and gender base violence to happen and it happens through the language that we use."Kayce Singletary

This is just one example of rape culture and how language sets up power differences that provides a platform that women become more passive towards men. Words have power and they have meaning, this point of the visual series I created is to exemplify this.  To show what happens when we create a language that normalizes rape.

My Multimodal Project

Rape Culture is a research paper that I wrote for a class that I created a visual series representing what exactly rape culture "looks" like.  Since the class was my senior capstone for my degree in Photography the images were not combined with the research that I put into my paper, as it was meant to succeed as a visual representation without needing a description.

By creating a web page with these images and descriptions found within the research paper and other sources I can fully express what each image represents to narrow down the "visual" element with the textual evidence/elements.

I will also be able to include clips of a song that is considered a contributing factor (as many out there exist) of a normalizing of "rape".

The internet will be the accessibility for this project as it is a platform to reach many people in order to enlighten on what exactly "rape culture" is and how we can work to create an anti-rape culture.  By creating a web-page I can upload it to multiple blogs as well as my own and other websites geared towards spreading this awareness.

Here is one of the images that I will be working with, among many others.  This girl is just a model that was used in the making of the project to project text that is commonly said towards rape victims.  "She didn't say No" has been used many times in the defense of men that basically says, if you don't say no the body is a right of passage to do with what one pleases.

The idea is that by juxtaposing these words that represent rape culture onto images that it better expresses to what it actually means when words like this are said.

I will be able to explain each created image along with the statistics about rape and information on rape that I put into my research paper, in hopes to further exemplify this world called rape culture.