Journal #3

At first, I had difficulty approaching this project because I couldn’t quite understand the end goal or the purpose. After explanations, examples, and open-ended answers, I realized that we’re just showcasing what we see as rhetoric and how they (our artifacts) connect with each other and alone through the chosen key term. Like someone previously mentioned, Shipka would appreciate this project because it goes beyond what I’m used to and we engage in creative thinking like never before, at least for me. My artifacts circulates around the notion of circulation. I will be using the Instagram, Snapchat, and the newly launched app of Brittany Renner (social media star/fitness guru) as my artifacts. I’ve been following Brittany for a couple of years now, and I witnessed how she uses each of these platforms to circulate herself and her work to the audience. On Instagram, she promotes self-encouragement of the body where she uploads before and after pictures of her weight loss. On snapchat, she has this “segment” called Diamond Discussions where she offers advice and self-love antidotes. On her new app, titled B. Renner Fitness, she gives us the best of both worlds where we get her workout regimen, merchandise, diamond discussions, special appearances, dietary schedules etc. Through each of these mediums, rhetoric is displayed in a different form that reaches a whole new aspect. My artifacts teaches the idea that rhetoric can change due to its medium, but the circulation of it is constant and in my opinion, recycled. We take used and old pieces to form new content, but essentially, we’re still using the old product. Considering the fact that most of the artifacts are digital, no one really chose the term circulation. Circulation is such a broad term that you can mold it to fit your understanding. Without circulation, there is no rhetoric. For Wysocki, we can conclude that the design not only interacts with the text but influences the text itself and how the audience perceives it. Like previously stated, Rice would conclude that without circulation, there is no rhetoric. In terms of Gladwell, to my understanding, technology doesn’t always achieve the same thing as tangibility no matter how identical it is.