The Modes of Visual Rhetoric: Circulating Memes as Expressions

Abstract

The speed, scale, and shape o f digital circulation pose numerous challenges for rhetorical analysis that seeks to analyze image-texts in context. This paper develops a framework fo r the rhetorical analysis o f Internet memes through the concept o f modes. Analyzing memes requires a shift in focus from the actual (texts and contexts) to the virtual (the capacities fo r affect and affection structuring an encounter). W hat makes such memes recognizable and, hence, circulable is a shared, virtual mode structuring all subsequent actualizations. The examination ofFail/W in demonstrates that the analysis o f modes can be assisted by a number o f rhetorical concepts as long as modes are understood as collective, emergent expressions. It also shows that the Fail/Win mode is better understood not as the representation o f specific rhetors but, instead, as an expression o f control society that advances both a dystopian view o f humans reduced toperforming rote operations and a utopian, ideological gesture promising that success remains possible nevertheless.

Ubiquitous Photography, by Martin Hand. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2012. 220 pp. $22.95 paper. ISBN 9780745647159 (paper).

“…In my own field of Communication Studies, Hand's work aligns with recent efforts to rethink the field's approach to visual rhetoric (Jenkins 2014). Moreover, the ever-growing reach of image-producing and distributing technologies (Snapchat, for example, and the aforementioned live-streaming feature on Facebook) provides new applications for Hand's claims.…”

Colonizing Pepe: Internet Memes as Cyberplaces

“…Jenkins (2014) explains that “image-objects become constantly remade and remixed,” which makes it “difficult to isolate origins and intentions” (p. 445). A spatial methodology, however, allows for a more nuanced understanding of the ideological tensions latent in Internet memes.…”

Internet Memes as Form of Cultural Discourse: A Rhetorical Analysis on Facebook

“…They are a form of public persuasion and serve different purposes with different strategies (Huntington 2013). The creation, circulation, recreation and re-dissemination of memes have been hugely influenced by the network of Internet users (Jenkins 2014). The meme consumers are also influenced by the development of Internet memes, which revealed a new approach to interactions and public participation among people (Shifman 2014).…”