- Do visual arguments need captions? Messaris argues that “the lack of an explicit propositional syntax may actually be one of the distinguishing strengths of images when they are used as means of persuasion…Because of perceptual habits cultivated by the dominant role of movies and other visual narratives in our visual culture, all viewers are primed to see sequences of images as bits of stories, even when those image[s] are also connected in more symbolic or conceptual ways” (213) Images, because they have personal narratives assigned to them by viewers, can be more memorable. “Consequently, the fact that views may bring a narrative bias to images can be seen as an enhancement of – rather than an impediment to- the potential use of images in propositional constructions. One lay of meaning makes the argument; the other layer of meaning makes the argument memorable” (214). Also, “visual communication has an element of deniability that is absent from words” (215). Viewers can see if a claim is true.
- Are pictures more emotional than words? Cognitive scientists have discovered that images do elicit emotions in ways that words cannot. Therefore, “while it remains true that any form of artistic communication can excite the emotions if used skillfully, it also seems true that representational images possess certain means of eliciting emotion that are not available to verbal language” (216). “In other words, in adapting this aspect of emotional response for pictorial purposes, the creators of images are using a rhetorical strategy who efficacy is, in a sense, ‘guaranteed’” (217).
- Are words more informative than pictures? “While it incontestably true that certain kinds of visual abstraction cannot be interpreted without specialized knowledge, it by no means follows that such abstractions adhere to a totally arbitrary code, as in the case of language” (218). This is the closest Messaris comes to answering the question.
Key Term
- Rhetorical: “constructing a social reality (210)