The Rhetoric of Design

In reading this section, I found myself making notes and connections based on prior class discussions, especially Thursday night's humdinger of a conversation. So here is a sampling of those notes.

The Rules of Typography According to Experts

• Keedy begins with a discussion of "the rules" of typography. I instantly thought about our discussion of writing's rules vs. genre expectations vs. throwing out all the rules. Keedy states that all typographers know the rules. They also know that rules are to be broken. Lastly, breaking the rules is one of the rules. I can't help thinking how this is true for all writing. When a writer breaks the rules for a rhetorical purpose, then we all find that perfectly acceptable (as comp teachers). But if a student breaks the rule out of ignorance, without knowledge of its rhetorical effect, then most of us can agreee that this would be "bad writing."
• The fear of new technology is that it will signal the end of "traditional typographic standards" (274). Instead, Keedy argues that the new technology will "reaffirm what works and modify what is outdated" (274). Again, this is true of all writing. In class discussions the "fear" can be palpable--if we aren't teaching "writing," then what are we teaching? But new media will not make "writing" obsolete. Instead, it will reaffirm what works and modify what is outdated.
• Zwart states that "the more uninteresting the letter, the more useful it is to the typographer" (274). Keedy interprets this to mean that Zwart was "for expression in composition" (274). What we write will always be of more importance than how we write it. Fancy technology cannot be a substitute for meaningful content, but it can enhance what a writer is attempting to communicate.
• Keedy writes, "Rejection or ignorance of the rich and varied history and traditions of typography are inexcusable; however, adherence to traditional concepts without regard to contemporary context is intellectually lazy and a threat to typography today" (275). Again, I will tie this to Thursday's discussion. Gina wants "writing" to mean the act of putting pen to paper; the generation of ideas in some type of "essay form." I agreed that there is a difference between writing and composing. While we need to respect this type of writing and its history, we also cannot ignore that the composition landscape is changing. If we don't recognize new media as a form of composition, composition itself is in jeopardy. I think this is the middle road that many of us were pushing for during the discussion.

The Power of Punctuation

If punctuation is used to clarify meaning, then we must pay attention to not only the mark itelf, but also the way it looks in a particular font. Solomon examines, for example, how the period looks different (and signifies a difference) when in different fonts. I think about this every time I type our emoticon. There are some fonts that do not translate the image properly.

• :l>2 This is Arial. I like this version because the mouth is straight and the hand is "unfancy."
• :I>2 This is Courier. There is no good representation of the mouth in this font.
• :l>2 This is Georgia. The lower case l or the upper case I both change the look of the mouth. The other symbols are also too low in relation to the mouth.

Solomon also discourages the use of punctuation for "the sake of design." This reminded me of Frances's rant against the prolific use of the exclamation point. When the punctuation is overused, it loses its meaning.

Repetition and the Rhetoric of Visual Design

I found Porter and Sullivan's discussion of the use of repetition in design very interesting (especially for a topic that I myself never think of). I wonder how many of us read the box on p. 293 before reading the page before it, and if so, why. I did read the box as soon as I turned to page 292. It was the first element that looked different, so it caught my eye. The *WARNING!* also begs to be noticed.

Rhetoric, Humanism, and Design

And just to highlight how connections are made in our brains, I have had "Bella Lugosi's Dead" stuck in my head for days now due to the mere mention of Bauhaus (the school of design, not the band) in this article.

The Visual Representation of My Literacy

As I'm struggling to complete the visual essay by Tuesday's class, I am reminded of what Rhodes said on Tuesday--our discomfort with this essay mirrors how many of our students feel in our composition classrooms with the traditional essay.

Why is this project so difficult for me? I think it's because I am having both a "composition" issue and a "technology" issue.

Even if we were allowed to write a traditional essay regarding our literacy, I would still be having trouble. In fact, I had the choice to write to a very similar prompt for another class a few weeks ago and immediately chose to write to the other prompt (about our individual writing processes). If I think about this like a box (kind of like the box logic), my literacy is in a HUGE box--but the lid is closed. I'm trying to find ways into the box and instead, I just keep knocking the box over. So the topic itself is a struggle for me.

That difficulty has been compounded by my realization that I know nothing about computers--at least not enough to do what I want to do. When a theme comes to me that would unify my visual essay in a much cooler way than it is now, I quickly see that I don't have the software to do what I want, or I've never used the software that I end up using so the learning curve seems insurmountable. And these two aspects of the essay (the composition and the technology) exacerbate each other--they both cause writer's block for the other component. The technology is of no use if I don't know what to write; the writing doesn't make it onto a page because I don't know how to use the technology.

The "Feeling" of Literacy

Okay, I've decided to be brave and post my freewrite from last night's class. My hope is that someone will offer suggestions for incorporating these thoughts into my visual essay project:

I think of my grandmother. She's in her chair with newspapers, magazines, Maeve Binchy, Truman Capote, Steinbeck fluttered all around her. Light streams in from the window to alight her in a glow.
I think of the public library, the rush and excitement of the wonder: What world will I get to enter into today?
I smell the new book and feel the first bend in the spine. These books were mine-not the library's.
I remember books and stories that made me laugh, cry, think, and ponder.
I feel protective of my mom as I read Gone with the Wind to her at night. She'd fall asleep, but I'd continue reading.
I remember the exhilaration of knowing all the words to something: the movie Grease or "Take Me Home Country Roads."
I feel connection with my mom and friends (Luanne/ Joy) as we discuss our favorite or current books. The gift of allowing someone else into that book's world..."Did you get to the part where...?"
Writing a paper I feel proud of and being willing to share those words with others. Books/reading/writing is the one area of my life in which I feel smart.
Books comfort me when I'm sick, send me to sleep at night through my iPod, and challenge the way I think (on a good day).
I remember the circle--reading to my grandmother as she died. I read the Bible to her (to calm her) and Circle of Friends (to remind her of home). Although I talked with her often in those days, books allowed me to say some of the things I couldn't. I know exactly what line I was reading as she died. The last voice she heard was mine, reading from her favorite book.

"The Vocabulary of Comics"

Scott McCloud's essay intrigued me, but I'm not sure I totally buy into it. I followed him until the very end. He uses icon "to mean any image used to represent a person, place, thing or idea" (198). He discusses the various types of icons:

• symbols that represent "concepts, ideas and philosphies" (198)
• practical symbols (such as math, shapes, typing symbols, etc)
• and pictures that "resemble their subjects" (198).

McCloud then addresses the various types of pictures, from realistic to cartoon. He claims that comics allow for "amplification through simplification" (201).

However, in the last section, he explains how we are able to see a face just based on the presence of a circle, two dots, and a line: "We humans are a self-centered race" (203). How self-centered? With a realistic picture we see another human, but with a cartoon, we are able to see oursevles (207). Essentially, McCloud claims, we are able to see a little part of ourselves in every cartoon--that explains their effect on our culture and our fascination with them.

But I wonder :l>2

Why does seeing a face where none really exists make us self-centered? Can we really jump to McCloud's conclusion that we are seeing ourselves in these comic characters? I really thought about this, and, no, I did not view the "man" in this comic as me. But I did view him as another human, just as I always viewed both Calvin and Hobbes as human from the comic above. I don't think it's that we are able to see ourselves; it's that we are able to see someone like ourselves. Humans have a tendency to anthropomorphize and to personify non-living objects--it's our way of understanding the world around us. But I don't think that makes us self-centered; it makes us human-centered.