From telos to amplification and back again: making everything a cause

Don Knotts, by Adam J

Here we have a Don Knotts mii icon. Although I don't have a wii (and so cannot tune in to the mii channel), I can be grateful for miiware, which let's me create iconic avatars for free. Because, hey, sometimes shareriff is in a deputy sort of mood. Can a Barney Fife icon, deployed as an "avatar," alter the balance and eq (the "tone") of a communication effort? It would seem that the particular nature of any such Barney Fifean iconography could only be known by it's use--symbols get made, resemblances are grown, and the standard "icons" of technical communication ($%+=?!) emerge in communities of practice. I realize that, on the one hand, I'm being sort of literal about McCloud's typology of icons, but, on the other hand, for me, McCloud's Understanding Comics text does the most work when I when I think McCloud's rap in terms of the wider multimedia contexts of the web, where amplification through simplification happens all the time. Sarah wrote that "when we abstract ideas, we are not just eliminating details," but in fact are also selecting a specific set of details and calling for readers/listeners to pay careful attention to them. Her well-stated claim instantly made me think about the many ways we compress information in many media. It's a "commons"place of multimedia composition! At the same time, no, I don't think life is one big comic strip. Even if it was, we would still need more than one tool in our toolbox, more than one scale in our repertoire, to find a compositional rhythm. And, yes, I do notice the wayit has become a lot easier to make claims than to articulate the reasons (and reasoning) supporting them. So, I think "amplification via simplification" is rhetorically important, but it's equally important to know when to "require greater levels of perception," of ourselves and our readers (Understanding Comics 49). The web is pretty loud, wouldn't you say?

Blog

1. As we blog about "because" claims--and immerse in the art and science of causal rhetoric--let's try to "amp up" our blog "volume" by "simplifying" our game. When we go to the wiki, let's both a) make causal claims (or find and post them) and b) find and write up the reasons and reasoning supporting those claims. And if you find an icon--reflect on the effects it's intending to be causing, yo!

2. Revise a portion of another student's blog or unit assignment. Introduce at least one new counter argument.

present:

tino

josh

dontae

drew

sara

ian

emilyyy

ksaun

Something you should know about Because Lyrics

Title: The Beatles - Because lyrics

Artist: The Beatles

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Because the world is round it turns me on

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Because the wind is high it blows my mind

Because the wind is high......aaaaaaaahhhh

Love is all, love is new

Love is all, love is you

Because the sky is blue, it makes me cry

Because the sky is blue.......aaaaaaaahhhh

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