Journal 3

For Project 1, I chose the topic of audience with my three artifacts being a news podcast (specifically CNN), a book and social media (twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, etc.). These 3 artifacts are platforms that assist an audience to easily receive rhetoric, but all influence the receiver differently due to the variety of technology. Besides speeches, these artifacts are probably some of the most common places an audience could retrieve or be impacted by rhetoric. I don’t find a common thread or trend amongst them, besides the podcast and social media requiring strictly digital access by the audience. Most of these artifacts are constantly being updated and modified, and allow for instant gratification of information. Edbauer’s article helps us to conclude that the role circulation is essentially eternal and is influenced by outside factors that can allow devices or texts to reappear at a later date. Gladwell explained without dissing the digital age entirely, “Paper facilitates a highly specialized cognitive and social process.” This ties in with one of my artifacts, the book, because I want to see how an audience receives the rhetoric when they are physically holding the transportable source and can enjoy the touch and the feel of their material that make them feel more involved and aware. Wysocki believes that design is founded on the fact that all screens and pages posses visual elements and arrangements that are strategic and persuasive. I find this to tie in with my social media artifact (as well as the book) because it proves the presentation of our media (and regular texts) psychology affects how we receive it and how it influences our attitudes, therefore affecting how an audience would accept or reject rhetoric.