Monday, January 9, 2012

Rhetoric

This image is representative of the trend of simplification.  Whenever there’s an important speech or debate, commentators try to simplify it and decide who won and who lost.  This image is indicative of that trend because it takes simplification to its logical conclusion:  a single image and single sentence which summarize most of what was said about Obama’s speech announcing that Osama Bin Laden had been killed.  News anchors spent a lot of time saying that this was a major win for Obama at a time when he really needed one, but this image does it succinctly.

In the context of the internet, this is an image macro, which is a very common type of meme.  LolCats, which I mentioned in class, are images of cute cats with text superimposed on top.  Just like LolCats (often) elicit an "aww", this image could also elicit a strong, visceral reaction:  an Obama supporter would feel triumphant and a detractor would feel disgusted.  The succinct text-and-image combination is key to drawing out this response.

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