Altering Realities

"...a work of rhetoric is pragmatic; it comes into existence for the sake of something beyond itself; it functions ultimately to produce action or change in the world; it performs some task.  In short, not by the direct application of energy to objects, but by the creation of discourse which changes reality through the mediation of thought and action." - Bitzer, pg. 3

Through (visual) rhetoric, we can/do change the world.That is a big thing to say. As an academic advisor who works with undergraduates, I frequently hear about major and career choices, which are the "real world" packaging for people's dreams. Underneath everything else, underneath the talk of paychecks and prestige, passions and proficiencies, professions and purpose, what is usually uncovered is a desire to change the world. (They won't usually say it in those words, exactly, but if you throw "helping people" and "making a difference" and "doing something meaningful" in a pot, what it boils down to is changing the world.)  And yet being able to change the world seems like this mystical realm to them, just out of their grasp. I have tons of other blog posts I could go in to about the messages we, as a society, and we, as higher education especially, send to students about the merits of wanting to change the world and how I feel about whether or not those messages are "good" or "bad", but that is not really the point here.

The point here is why and how this quote is provocative for me, and again, I say that to assert that we can, and we do, change the world through rhetoric is a big thing to say. And I agree with it.  I think that what we say, and how we say it, creates and changes reality.  Borman, in his Symbolic Convergence Theory and accompanying Fantasy Theme Analysis, says that we construct reality when we buy in to fantasies (stories) and share them with others and they in turn also buy in to those stories.  Symbolic convergence is defined by Bormann as "the communicative processes by which human beings converge their individual fantasies, dreams, and meanings into shared symbol systems." (Bormann, 1980) Burke says something similar in his Dramatism and cluster analysis; the terms that we choose to use to describe and label events, circumstances, and objects reflect our judgments, feelings, and values placed on those events, circumstances, and objects. As others come to use these same descriptions and labels, they share in the values and judgments associated with the labels and come to see the objects or events in the same way as the one who originated the label. And voila- reality is created. Or changed.  

In short, what we say, and how we say it, and, according to Bitzer, when we say it, matters.  It means something.  It means something to the point that we can change the world.  That is big.  And provocative.  How does it apply to the visual?  Can the same effects be had?  If the visual can be rhetorical, and "rhetoric is a mode of altering reality", then the answer would have to be yes.  But, in a more tangible way, what does that look like? (pun intended!)  For example, studies have been done about hurricane Katrina and what terms were used to describe New Orleans in the aftermath.  The term "third world" was used frequently and became associated in people's minds about how New Orleans was before the hurricane, and so their reactions and responses after the hurricane were shaped based on the ideas about "third world" places.  It separated New Orleans from the rest of the U.S., which is thought of as an extremely developed, first world place.  It took some of the fault off of the government, the responders, etc.- a "third world" place obviously doesn't have the infrastructure in place, the knowledge, the resources, to respond to something as devastating as Katrina, so how could the response have been any better?  Perhaps the U.S. was actually a considerably kind and generous country for helping those poor people as much as they did... oh wait, New Orleans is a part of the U.S....  So, following this example, could the visuals be thought of the same way?  Do they have the same kind of influence on reality, specifically the construction of it and changing it, that the words do?  






The first image is from Katrina, the 2nd and 3rd are from the earthquake in Haiti, and the 4th is from hurricane Ida in El Salvadore.  We have discussed in class and on the blog numerous times already the issue of context, authenticity, truth, etc. in regards to photographs, and surely those issues arise in this situation.  But in regards to Bitzer's quote, how does visual rhetoric differ in its ability to alter reality?  Does it differ?  How about in regards to the ideas of a socially constructed reality, especially the ideas from Burke and Bormann that our shared stories and the terms we choose to label and describe something create reality?  The similarity of the images chosen to represent these events, to "label and describe" them,  is similar to these concepts to me- the certain images chosen as representations (terms, perhaps) and the narratives told and shared through these images- create a certain reality of disasters that is repeated and shared across countries and cultures.