Media products such as documentaries, news and advertisement has stir consumer away into agreement that support their propositional interest. As a consumer, I have been compelled by the power of persuasion that has attracted me into believing what they have presented. I think documentaries has a great ability to possess its viewers, when watching documentaries, I always believe in every word they say without having any knowledge that the truth might be manipulated. The purpose of writing this journal is to argue that visual rhetoric is more powerful than verbal form of rhetoric. I also want to highlight that Aristotle presented a theory that allow the arguer to gain power in public. I wonder with such power that one are able to create mass persuasion, Will there any truth left in the argument and are we as viewers being fooled or being lied to by such power created by Rhetoric.the persuasive power of rhetoric are able to shape people's perception and are we as consumer really see the whole truth?
H.C Lawson-Tancred in his book titled Aristotle the art of rhetoric stated that "Rhetoric is considered to be capable of intuition of the persuasiveness of, so to speak the given. The powerful tool of this theory lies in its enthymeme. Enthymeme is an incomplete syllogism that gives such orator and intelligence to the speaker". (Lawson-Tancred, 1991). Thus, an enthymeme works by leaving an unstated premise allowing the participation of interpreters by making them think, at the same time arguer gain such power knowing that interpreters will ultimately agree upon his or her proposition.
This video is a controversial documentary by Michael Moore called Capitalism a love story. Some might argue that there is no visual rhetoric but documentary like this one opted to give viewers visual images that can stir emotions away, a series of visual evidence are presented to support the proposition. In Capitalism the love story, Michael Moore creates a proposition about the suffering of American citizen. Images showing the dark side of capitalism give the impression of negativity are presented in order to lure people’s mind into this argument. Moore presented audience with series of premises that act to support his proposition. His premises includes the exploitation of the civilian where he ask "where is our money" referring to $700 billion bailout money. An enthymeme in this documentary will be capitalism is bad; it is a bias form of government system. This premise is not stated by Michael Moore but rather purposely leave it to audience to judge and knowing that with visual images he presented as evidences surely can persuade audience to support his proposition even though the evidences might not have truth nature in it. Pragmatics would allow the same subject to be transfer to a different context, if capitalism the love story is transfer into a verbal form for example a book. Surely, verbal form is indeed rhetoric but which one will give a powerful persuasion?
In book, readers are able to have a description about the proposition and arguer are able to shape emotions but will this emotion create a powerful impact as a visual images would have? I think in a verbal form of Capitalism a love story; readers might not have such great impact on persuasion because a visual form of rhetoric has given premises with images that surely make a huge emotional impact when images of suffrage, economic crisis and discrimination are being portrayed than a verbal form of the same element.The identification of those elements of dark side of capitalism is even clearer with the use of visual images that can enhance one's emotions and people can relate to. Do people feel a lot of emotion reading than seeing the visual form of it? Like watching a twilight movie and reading the book, which one persuades us more? I think visual form absolutely influence me more. Visual rhetoric does exist and serve more powerful than traditional verbal form especially in documentary.
This is an advertisement for Dior perfume called the midnight poison. This advertisement uses actress Eva Green as their model, her image depicts the representation of a rare beauty. Her image connotes exotic, mysterious and curiosity. The body language shows that she is emerging from water which signified the uniqueness of her beauty as the new Cinderella which is link to the text “the new Cinderella is born”. Dior intended to say that this is the modern look of a new Cinderella. Unlike a traditional Cinderella that has a generic looks of a blonde beauty. Dior might also intend to use this advertisement to act like a battleship to knock down their enemy. Business rivals include other perfume brand that offer a generic beauty. Dior explicitly want to say that “other brands doesn’t make you unique like we do and only we are able to offer you uniqueness”.
No doubt that this advertisement uses rhetoric to persuade people to buy the perfume, the representation of beauty here persuades people to buy the product by giving an inductive reasoning. Bruce N Walter in his book titled critical thinking consider the verdict (3rd edition) stated that" an inductive reasoning is a type of reasoning where one premise is enough to generalize the whole conclusion". (Walter,1998).
This is the inductive reasoning of this advert:
This is the inductive reasoning of this advert:
Eva Green is beautiful and exotic by wearing this perfume.
Therefore, everyone who wears this perfume will feel beautiful and exotic.
Dior and its advertiser inserted an enthymeme, where there is unstated premise for viewers to think about., knowing that the viewers will agree upon the proposition. The enthymeme here is that buy their perfume and the users will feel sexy, beautiful, exotic, unique and mysterious. Viewers might also think that this perfume is good and other brands are not. However, with all visual rhetoric has persuaded viewers to agree upon their proposition. How far truth are they giving to the consumers? Is it even true that this perfume is really good and other perfume brands are not. Do users really feel beautiful and exotic by wearing it. People do anything for a profitable purposes and honesty might not exist in the world we know as business. The art of persuasion lead to the question of will the truth be prevail? Are viewers being fooled all this time by visual rhetoric? In my opinion, Such persuasive power that one possess give arguer the great ability to hinder truth.
References:
Lawson-Tancred, H.C.(1991) Aristotle The Art Of Rhetoric. Penguin Classics. London.
Waller, Bruce N. (1998). Critical Thinking Consider the verdict 3rd edition. Simon & Schuster. New Jersey.
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