Confirmation Progymnasmata
Jenae Cohn’s piece “Understanding Visual Rhetoric” is a great writing about using imagery to your advantage in writing and to show how something as simple as an image can change opinions drastically. Cohn does a fantastic job of describing rhetorical imagery in a way that most can relate to.
The piece is started by giving an example of going out to get food with your friends. Since you are trying to decide where you want to go out you research various places and see the imagery that is present to determine where you go. You end up finding a burger place online that has some pictures that are simply making you salivate. However, the next picture that you stumble upon is significantly worse than the ones you just viewed. All of a sudden, the burgers look cheap, greasy, and unappetizing. Your liking of this restaurant just decreased heavily, and you no longer feel that it is the choice for you and your friends. Cohn then goes on to explain that the use of these images is all visual rhetoric. These images are used to display information in a way that words cannot.
This piece is unquestionably logical as anyone who has wanted to gain info on something is profoundly influenced by the imagery on display. Say you are attempting to purchase a boat. You go online and find a boat that appears to be the one:
Looks to be in great condition and is reasonably in your price range. Upon further investigation you find this image of the boat from a top angle:
All of a sudden that boat is not looking like you thought it would. The visual rhetoric has changed your mind completely and you stop pursuing this boat despite the fact it could just have been not cleaned at the time of that picture.
5 replies on “Confirmation Progymnasmata”
I think this such a great example of confirmation. You stated your case, summarized and concluded with a good point. It also reminds me of interpretation. I like that you thought of and brought in your own examples to help the reader understand your point.
I liked your detailed analysis of the Cohn reading, you brought in multiple of her ideas and examples to provide a good synopsis. You also did a really good job in incorporating your images into the confirmation progym, as they really help to confirm Cohn’s point. They show exactly what you are describing to be her argument, with does the job of confirmation really well.
You did a great job at balancing Cohn’s main points with examples of your own and still keeping it short and concise. It’s a great idea to include other pictures as examples, as you did with the boat images. The images you chose definitely help understand Cohn’s claims about how visual rhetoric impacts the reader.
I really like what you did here with your progym. I like how instead of using the progym within the reading itself you used a different progym to explain and even take the arguement further with your own example. I never thought about positing my progyms this way and I will definitely try it out from now on. I like how you added more examples than were present in the reading and it shows you know what you’re talking about and truly understood what was being stated in our reading. I look forward to reading more of your blog posts.
You did a great job of providing details and real-life examples that display the effects of Visual Rhetoric. This was definitely a creative way of writing and responding to the exercise, and was to the point. Keep it up!!
Edit: I don’t have any suggestions for revision/fixing, but just to add more of the creativity in more posts.