Journal of Business and Technical Communication Jul 2012

Reimagining NASA

Miriam F. Williams Texas State University

Abstract

In 2010, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) commemorated its 50th anniversary by launching an anniversary Web site, which includes links to a photographic timeline, videos, and documents that the agency views as important in telling its history. This article uses concepts from narrative theory and visual rhetoric to analyze the images used in the NASA History Timeline, paying special attention to why certain images were selected as historical markers over other photographs that are more widely published and televised. Specifically, the author uses arguments from Sontag’s On Photography and Barbatsis’s “Narrative Theory” to explain how NASA’s photographic narrative provides a story with a plot that spans from triumphs and tragedies in space exploration to pioneering efforts in racial, ethnic, and gender diversity.

Journal
Journal of Business and Technical Communication
Published
2012-07-01
DOI
10.1177/1050651912439698
Open Access
Closed
Topics
writing across the curriculum multimodality multilingual writers

Citation Context

Cited by in this index (8)

  1. Edwards et al. (2022)
    Black Women Imagining and Realizing Liberated Futures
    Technical Communication Quarterly
  2. Olman (2022)
    Decolonizing the Color-Line: A Topological Analysis of W.E.B. Du Bois's Infogra…
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  3. Winkle (2022)
    Above All Made by Themselves: The Visual Rhetoric of W. E. B. Du Bois’s Data Vi…
    Technical Communication Quarterly
  4. Cox (2019)
    Working Closets: Mapping Queer Professional Discourses and Why Professional Com…
    Journal of Business and Technical Communication
  5. Phillips (2019)
    Teaching Public, Scientific Controversy: Genetically Modified Mosquitoes in the…
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Show all 8 →
  1. Weber (2018)
    Seeing like a Rover: How Robots, Teams, and Images Craft Knowledge of Mars
    Technical Communication Quarterly
  2. Small (2017)
    (Re)Kindle
    Journal of Technical Writing and Communication
  3. Weber (2016)
    Stasis in Space! Viewing Definitional Conflicts Surrounding the James Webb Spac…
    Technical Communication Quarterly

Cites in this index (4)

  1. Dombrowski (2006)
    The Two Shuttle Accident Reports: Context and Culture in Technical Communication
    Journal of Technical Writing and Communication
  2. Dombrowski (1992)
    <i>Challenger</i>and the social contingency of meaning: Two lessons for the tec…
    Technical Communication Quarterly
  3. Winsor (1990)
    The Construction of Knowledge in Organizations: Asking the Right Questions abou…
    Journal of Business and Technical Communication
  4. Pace (1988)
    Technical Communication, Group Differentiation, and the Decision to Launch the …
    Journal of Technical Writing and Communication
Also cites 3 works outside this index ↓
  1. 10.1109/47.108666
     ↗
  2. 10.1109/TPC.2007.908729
     ↗
  3. 10.1109/47.7814
     ↗
CrossRef global citation count: 9 View in citation network →

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