Anne R. Richards

4 articles
  1. Gaming/Writing and Evolving Forms of Rhetorical Awareness
    Abstract

    This article on digital writing identifies a range of genres that are employed by gamers, many of which evince dialogic rhetoric. Such discourse offers potential to decenter group power relations and thus suggests an opportunity to promote a democratic classroom.

    doi:10.1215/15314200-1625262
  2. Music, Transtextuality, and the World Wide Web
    Abstract

    This article sketches the significance of aurality in hypermedia, notes that the field of English studies is constructing the World Wide Web as a verbal and visual medium, and proposes a transtextual framework to aid technical communicators in designing musical hypermedia. Because the study of music on the World Wide Web is nascent, this article includes references to art and film music, whose theories and practices are substantially developed.

    doi:10.1080/10572250802708337
  3. Decorative Color as a Rhetorical Enhancement on the World Wide Web
    Abstract

    Professional communication scholars have defined the decorative narrowly and subordinated it to informational text. Yet, current psychological research indicates that decorative elements elicit emotion-laden reactions that may precede cognitive awareness and influence interpretation of images. We conceive the decorative in design, and specifically color, as a complex rhetorical phenomenon. Applying decorative and color theory and analyzing design examples illustrating aesthetic, ethical, and logical appeals, we present a range of potential uses for color in electronic media.

    doi:10.1207/s15427625tcq1401_4
  4. Argument and Authority in the Visual Representations of Science
    Abstract

    Abstract The focus of workplace communication research on visual rhetoric has tended to be the efficient and unproblematically "effective" functioning of visual texts. By suggesting ways in which the visual representations of science are construed by expert readers, this article responds to a call within our discipline for more critically focused contributions to the study of visual literacy. A former editor-in-chief of the American Journal of Botany was asked to explain his interpretation of visuals appearing over an 80-year period in that journal; his responses illustrate how visual explanations testify to their creators' authority and how, once established, such authority actuates the rational arguments of science. Rhetorical appeals within and arrangement of visual texts are considered, as is the persuasive power of legends and captions.

    doi:10.1207/s15427625tcq1202_3