Author's Note:
When beginning this assignment, it was of the utmost importance to me to find a comic that I could relate to and write about effectively. Being a college student who grew up in the information age and is now deeply entrenched in the social networking movement, this comic was a natural choice. I have always thought that our culture has become too concerned with social networking despite the fact that I myself am an avid Facebook and Twitter user. That was what really drew me to this particular comic. I was able to feel a connection with it and at the same time see the humor and irony in the argument it makes.
The first rough draft of my essay was very basic. I wanted to convey how important social networking has become to our society, and indeed I feel that I accomplished that goal, possibly a little too well. While I was able to effectively show how pervasive Twitter has become in our society by pointing some of the basic supporting facts like how Twitter is one of the 50 most popular websites worldwide, that it is the third most used social networking sites, and that there are over 55 million Twitter visitors monthly. I worked very hard in my first draft to illustrate the importance of the historical and social contexts to make my comic relevant to today’s society.
However, for my second rough draft I was shown by my teacher and peers that I needed to add more and show how the comic’s argument was rhetorically developed through the physical elements of the comic. More specifically I was told that I needed, “to address the comics argument through a rhetorical framework by analyzing the strategies, techniques, and appeals the comic employs so as to achieve its desired effect.” This became the basis for my second draft. To address these issues I added information about how logos and pathos were present in the comic and how they worked to strengthen the comic’s argument. For example, I began one paragraph, “But it is not only the knowledge of the historical and cultural contexts that lend themselves to help the audience understand the comic’s argument. There is an appeal to pathos that plays a large role in providing insight into the argument as well.” I attempted to show that while the historical contexts were important to understanding the comic’s argument, there were other rhetorical elements essential to understanding it as well.
For my final draft, I really added onto the ideas that I began to touch on in my second rough draft. My final work is a compilation of my first two drafts, incorporating the significance of the historical contexts, while also addressing the central importance of the rhetorical elements at play as well. I incorporated more about how pathos functions by stating, “Another important appeal to pathos is found in the text found in the thought bubbles above the character’s head.” In this final draft I also thought it might be well to add something about how we view comics in general and break down some of the basic structural elements in the comic. I state, “Before the comic’s audience can understand the argument the comic attempts to make, it is necessary to understand some basics about the reading comics as a whole.” This introduction leads into a brief discussion of the basic elements of the comic, which gives the reader a context in which to situate the comic in general. I felt that this short bit of information would be helpful for the audience by providing background information even outside of the historical and social contexts.
The final draft of my essay is not only the culmination of our pre-writing exercises, various peer reviews, and my two previous drafts, but it is also the product of my observations and personal experiences with a society that has become all too wrapped up in social networking.
Final Draft:
The above comic comes from the comic strip "Geek And Poke,” and depicts as well as pokes fun at our extreme dependence on social networks, particularly Twitter. The comic, entitled, “The Genesis Of A Tweet,” features a man sitting at his computer deciding what he is going to “tweet” next. Through classic comic style humor, the comic is able to ironically comment on the integration of Twitter into our popular culture, our dependence on social networking and makes the argument that social networking has become so central to daily life; it is now superior to other more critically important things. To understand this comic and the argument it attempts to make it is critical to understand the basic structure of the comic medium, the historical and social contexts, as well as the importance of the relevance of ethos, pathos, and logos as rhetorical appeals.
Before the comic’s audience can understand the argument the comic attempts to make, it is necessary to understand some basics about the reading comics as a whole. This comic consists of three panels and within these panels, the comic is developed both graphically and textually. According to “Compose, Design, Advocate”(CDA) “our attentions are almost always first directed to the illustrations,” (CDA, 301). Thus, we first notice the drawing to the cartoon figure sitting at a computer, and then our attention shifts to the words in the thought bubbles situated above the character’s head. This arrangement forms the overall construction of the comic and strengthens the logos and pathos of the comic, which are essential elements in beginning to understand the argument made by the comic.
Central to comprehending this comic and its arguments is gaining an understanding of the growing significance of social networking to today’s popular culture. The comic focuses particularly on the web site Twitter. Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging site that enables its users to send messages in 140 characters or less. These messages have become known as “tweets,” and the act of sending tweets, is called “tweeting.” These tweets are sent out to the author’s subscribers who are known as “followers.” Twitter users are also able to send out pictures using an application called “Twitpic,” and send out short videos by creating what is called a “bubble tweet.” Since its creation in 2006, Twitter has become one of the 50 most popular websites worldwide and is now ranked the third most used social network. Although the exact number of active accounts is not known, Twitter receives over 55 million visitors monthly, (Twitter, Wikipedia).
It is hard to go a day without hearing a Twitter reference. News programs, TV shows, and radio programs are consistently making reference to something that someone has tweeted. And the lingo has become common knowledge. There are very few people who don’t know what a “tweet” is or and what is meant when someone says that they are “twittering.” It is this integration into popular culture and the obsession with tweeting the right thing that brought about the comic I have chosen. If Twitter were not such a huge part of our culture and every day reality, the comic would not have been created.
But it is not only the knowledge of the historical and cultural contexts that lend themselves to help the audience understand the comic’s argument. These appeals are shaped primarily by the basic structure of the comic as well as the comic’s unchanging panels. The basic structure of the comic is an important appeal to logos and critical to the understanding of the comic’s argument. We see a comically drawn cartoon man simply sitting at his computer thinking of what he is going to tweet next. He believes that if he doesn’t come up with something “cool” to tweet soon he will lose followers, something he obviously doesn’t want. He finally tweets, “Sitting at the computer, thinking about my next tweet.” There is an irony and vicious circle associated with this tweet. The man in the comic wants desperately to tweet something cool, so he sits at his computer thinking about what to tweet. However, if he were out in the world doing things and experiencing things, he might have something legitimately “cool” to tweet about. But Twitter has become more centrally important to him than doing other things and being out in the world, so he sits at his computer and tweets about what he is going to tweet.
Another important appeal to logos is found in the comic’s unchanging panels. The comic features three panels, all of which contain the exact same drawing of a man sitting at his computer. The only differences in each panel are the words in the thought bubbles above his head. And while the text in the thought bubbles is clearly very important to our understanding of the comic, it is not the text we notice first. According to Compose, Design, Advocate, "our attentions are almost always first directed to the illustrations--and only then to words" (CDA, 301). The background of each panel is a blank, barren, and also unchanging white. It is this bleak setting that our tweeter is attempting to find inspiration, and judging by what he finally decides to tweet, we can see that he was really not inspired at all. These monotonous panels and blank background are not nearly as fascinating as what lies in the outside world, which is full of color, movement, and other people. Alone at his computer, our tweeter has become so preoccupied with Twitter and finds it so much more important than activities in the outside world that he is comfortable isolating himself in such bleak, desolate surroundings as long as he can tweet.
There are also strong appeals to pathos that enhance the audience’s understanding of the argument the comic attempts to make. The viewers of the comic are able to make an emotional connection with the character depicted sitting at his computer. This abstractly drawn character is representative of the millions of Twitter users sitting on their computers thinking about what they are going to tweet next. The simple looking character allows millions of people to be able to put themselves in the character’s shoes and feel the way he is feeling, and relate to what he is thinking. It is this emotional connection and that allows us to see how Twitter has been able to become so important and so integrated to our society.
Another important appeal to pathos is found in the text found in the thought bubbles above the character’s head. The character found in the comic is thinking about his next tweet, but we see in the second panel that his primary concern is thinking of something “cool” to tweet so that he doesn’t lose followers. This is a concern that all people can relate to on one level or another. Regardless of whether or not a particular audience twitters, that audience can relate to wanting to feel accepted and the desire to belong. It is this basic connection that allows the audience to relate to the character on a basic human level. The connection allows the audience to see that no matter how ridiculous the character’s tweet may seem, he does it because acceptance in the social networking world of Twitter is so critically important that he would give up other experiences to devote time to it.
Twitter has recently become a critically important part of our popular culture and daily lives. It is hard to go a day without hearing someone talk about what they tweeted or an experience that they are going to tweet about. But tweeting has now become so imperative to some that they are willing to give up important life experiences in order to do it. We have become so obsessed with social networking that following them have become more significant than going out into the world and having new experiences. It is now more important to sit alone at your computer thinking about what you are going to tweet than having meaningful experiences. This Geek and Poke comic, “Genesis of a Tweet,” illustrates that point exactly and addresses the issue with clever irony and humor.
Works Cited
"Microbloggin." Wikipedia. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Nov. 2009.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microblogging.
"Panel (comics)." Wikipedia. N.p., 19 Oct. 2009. Web. 10 Nov. 2009.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panel_(comics).
"Popular Culture." Wikipedia. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Nov. 2009.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popular_culture.
"Twitter." Wikipedia. N.p., 28 Oct. 2009. Web. 29 Oct. 2009. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter.
"What Is Social Networking?" Social Networking. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Nov 2009. http://www.whatissocialnetworking.com/.
Widder, Oliver. Geek and Poke. N.p., 9 Nov. 2009. Web. 10 Nov 2009.http://geekandpoke.typepad.com/.
Wysocki, Anne Frances, and Dennis A. Lynch. Compose, Design, Advocate: a rhetoric for integrating written, visual, and oral communication. New York: Person Longman, 2007. Page 301.
