Arguments Based on Emotion: Pathos (ch. 2)

Arguments Based on Emotion: Pathos (Ch. 2)

The Sculpture of Love and Anguis

Emotional appeals to any audience are powerful methods for influencing what people think and  believe. It is one of the most popular forms visual arguments use. We all make decisions that are based on our feelings.Writers, speakers, and artists find images to evoke certain emotions in people, so that their audience can connect to those feelings and even act on them. Take for example the sculpture pictured to the right. It is of a hand reaching up to the sky in a desperate attempt to grasp for help. The hand is tattooed with a number from Aushwitz and is the figure of a dying persons last attempt at help. The figure might leave the onlooker with despair, hope, or even a feeling of emptiness. The creator of this sculpture wanted to create these feeling so that the people who gaze upon this large piece remember the Holocaust and the immense grief and hardship human beings faced during this terrible period of time.

A Series of Vignettes

Sensing Both Love and Fear

The photographs to the left are of the figures that cover the hand pictured above. A Series of Vignettes shows a truly emotional image of an elderly man pleading for the young child's life, and the one to the right of it is a mother who is trying to comfort her child before their unavoidably death to come. These visual arguments do not need words to convey intended argument to its audience. It is the emotion one feels when they look upon these figures that stirs the wanted action. This is the purpose of pathos 

in visual arguments.

Chapter 14 Visual Arguments

CHAPTER 14

Visual Arguments have been around for centuries. They have lined the banks of the Nile in the form of statues, leaders have stamped them on monetary coins, and early cave dwellers carved them on cave walls. Visual arguments can range from the simplest of images to television ads. These images make arguments of their own, since each person analyzes the meaning differently. Human vision is selective. People have a tendency to shape what they have seen and learned to see things according to their meanings within their culture. Images can bring meaning to life because they appeal to emotion, or a significant point in history. Any image can be portrayed as a visual argument. Take for example, the picture on the top left. It is a visual image of characters from The Adventures of Alice in Wonderland in the setting of a modern day subway. Anyone who is familiar with the short story or Disney's film Alice in Wonderland, knows the famous line from the white rabbit, "I'm late, I'm late!" The title of the subway has the word "circus" which portrays how hectic people are on their way to work or on the way home in a subway. And in the long run how ridiculous it can be. Overall, analyzing the visual elements of arguments can be tricky, especially because images can hold more than one meaning. But it can also be the reason why visual arguments are so effective.             

So as a synopsis, the chapter in this book was primarily on visual arguments as a whole. It emphasized the power of visual arguments, and the effectiveness of shaping the messages behind visual arguments. If you refer back to the chapter in Everything's an Argument, the chapter will give you tips on how to analyze different visual arguments and how to determine the meaning behind the images.

It also provides a section on using visuals in your own arguments.

                    IDEAS FOR ADVOCACY AD          
 images from Shepard Fairey             

                                         

          

                    

Introduction

Hey everyone! I'm Daniella. I am a freshman at ASU majoring in Biomedical Engineering. I came from Queen Creek, AZ. Queen Creek is a small town right in between Florence and Chandler. Its a quiet area, but recent construction has brought an influx of people from the surrounding areas and now what was once dairy farms and fields, is now occupied by Walmarts and Targets. I have always wanted to be a Sun Devil since a small child, and that goal is the reason why I choose to attend Arizona State University. I live on Campus in PV Main. I have a couple of interesting hobbies and facts about myself:

Picture of my Home Town :)

• I am a NBA fan, the Suns being one of my favorite teams
• I also played basketball all through high school
• My favorite color is black
• I am the oldest of two children in my family, as I have a younger sister
• I love Supernatural, in my opinion one of the best shows on television to this date
• I like all types of music except for alternative
• I am the queen of sarcasm
• I love the movie Bridesmaids
• I want to work in the medical industry
• I have never been the one to like writing, or the one to write in journals
• The only sport I cannot watch on television or in person is soccer
• I am Hispanic, even though I may seem like the whitest person in the world
• I am not afraid to try new things
• I am also a video game nerd, as sad as that seems