Zappen, James P. “Digital Rhetoric: Toward an Integrated Theory.” Technical Communication Quarterly 14 3 (2005): 319-25.

Article Abstract:

This article surveys the literature on digital rhetoric, which encompasses a wide range of issues, including novel strategies of self-expression and collaboration, the characteristics, affordances, and constraints of the new digital media, and the formation of identities and communities in digital spaces. It notes the current disparate nature of the field and calls for an integrated theory of digital rhetoric that charts new directions for rhetorical studies in general and the rhetoric of science and technology in particular.

It is somewhat difficult to write up/review this article for key points, since it is an extremely brief and concise account of the key topic in digital rhetoric and the key scholars writing on these topics: a sort of literature review. However, it is valuable to me to look to what topics emerge as most relevant/important in digital rhetoric, what affordances and constraints it brings, etc.

Strategies of Self-Expression and Collaboration
Of the points addressed in the article, I am most interested in considering how individuals express themselves and form both individual identities and collaborative communities. Of course, given my study, I am almost exclusively interested in how these issues manifest in video form, particularly in asynchronous, group video settings similar to those I am examining. For example, “[B.J.] Fogg shows how the computer itself (and its associated software) functions as … a social actor through a variety of physical, psychological, linguistic, and social cues” (23–120). The computer is not without a certain presence when used as a communication device. The interface, display, and software provide a specific conduit to a conversation that shapes how statements are made and perceived.

Kathleen E. Welch likewise observes the potential of digital media to transform traditional notions of persuasion when she observes characteristics of both oral and print media in the new “electric rhetoric,” which she claims can be both additive and subordinate, aggregative and analytic, redundant and copious, agonistic and collaborative or participatory, situational and abstract (106, 108, 184–86).

When we consider argumentation and persuasion, it is essential to know the mode(s) and method(s) being used. Whether one is speaking publically or privately, to a mass or to an individual, over the phone, textually, online, etc. matters greatly. But what about when the message is delivered through video? Zappen actually addresses this point in Rebirth of a Dialogue in which he argue that persuasion can take place in any medium, since it is not specific or dependent on any one medium, but is “a testing of one’s own ideas, a contesting of others’ ideas, and a collaborative creating of ideas.

Characteristics, Affordances, Constraints
In Cyberliteracy (which I discussed in May 2010< https://timewrites.com/tag/cyberliteracy>), Laura Gurak identifies the basic characteristics of communication in digital spaces as speed, reach, anonymity, and interactivity (Zappen 321):

Speed – Encourages an oral and casual style, but it also encourages redundant and repetitive postings (30–33).
Reach – Permits communication among multiple participants in an array of media and thus the development of communities of interest on a global scale; how- ever, it does not include the benefits of gatekeeping (33–37).
Anonymity – Encourages experiments in self and gender identities, but it also problematizes notions of authorship and ownership and encourages “flaming”—the hostile expression of strong emotions (38–43).
Interactivity – Permits closer access to other people with increased opportunities for discussion and feedback, but it also permits increased opportunities for intrusions upon personal privacy (44–46).

Formation of Identities and Communities
As individuals participate in digital spaces, they establish individual identities based on the persona that they emit and that others perceived. Often such a space consists of an established community, such as a game room, chat room, or class. However, the participants can also form communities, such as in the case of a listserv or a forum on a blog or other site in which one visitor might post a question or post to which others respond. This action can create a thread of conversation in which the participants begin to form some tie and relationship (even if it is a dissenting one) that can carry over to other conversations within that space. In this way, the participants begin to both establish an identity and gain some form of understanding of others’ identities.

Sherry Turkle explains the processes of identity formation as interactions among multiple versions of our online selves and between these and our real selves: “As players participate [in Multiple-User Domains, or MUDs], they become authors not only of text, but of themselves, constructing new selves through social interaction. (11-12). (Quoted in Zappen pg 322).

While the OVC is not a MUD, in which there are players that form actual alter identities for a game, the explanation is fitting in that students-through their semester-long participation–become authors of the class and the content of the site, but also of their own identities. Since they are posting video responses, the other participants get to see the physical persona, including mannerisms and gestures, as well as the background and surroundings. Additionally, through what the student says, including the actual voice, the opinions, attitudes, tangents, tone, etc., he or she establishes an identity in the eyes of the others.

Zappen points out that the process of identity formation through social interaction is reminiscent of the traditional rhetorical concept of ethos.

Carolyn R. Miller observes, identity formation as the creation of human character is closely associated with Aristotle’s understanding of ethos as “more than our knowledge of someone’s prior reputation but…also, importantly, a product of the ongoing performance itself, made on the fly, in the course of interaction” (269).

One may gain some initial perception of an individual, but it is the semester-long interactions that produce a fuller understanding of an individuals identity, since it has been shaped and perhaps even fine-tuned throughout the semester.
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  • Fogg, B. J. Persuasive Technology: Using Computers to Change What We Think and Do. Morgan Kaufmann Series in Interactive Technologies. San Francisco: Morgan, 2003.
  • Miller, Carolyn R. “Writing in a Culture of Simulation: Ethos Online.” The Semiotics of Writing: Transdisciplinary Perspectives on the Technology of Writing. Ed. Patrick Coppock. Semiotic and Cognitive Studies. Turnhout, Belg.: Brepols, 2001. 253–79.
  • Turkle, Sherry. Life on the Screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet. New York: Simon, 1995.
  • Welch, Kathleen E. Electric Rhetoric: Classical Rhetoric, Oralism, and a New Literacy. Digital Communication. Cambridge: MIT P, 1999.
  • Zappen, James P. The Rebirth of Dialogue: Bakhtin, Socrates, and the Rhetorical Tradition. Albany: State U of New York P, 2004.