Before moving forward, however, it is necessary to better explain what we mean by “the projects of visual rhetoric” in the first place, or how we might apply an understanding of visual rhetoric as a mode or project of inquiry. To do so, I highlight two such projects stemming from the recent work of Finnegan and Hariman and Lucaites, who focus primarily on the visual genre of photography, arguably one of the genres most readily associated with studies of visual rhetoric.2 I should note that my aim here is not necessarily to provide an extensive review of scholarship in visual rhetoric, nor is it to paint an overly narrow picture of what studies of visual rhetoric ought to resemble. Rather, I am interested in describing for the reader who is perhaps less familiar with the subdiscipline some clear ideas about what approaches to visual rhetoric might entail or what it might mean to understand visual rhetoric as a mode of inquiry. Namely, Finnegan’s study of Abraham Lincoln and what she calls image vernaculars, and Hariman and Lucaites’s work with iconic photographs, engage nicely the components necessary for understanding visual rhetoric as more than a product or mere genre category. Thus, a general understanding of the goals of their work and what visual rhetoric projects can “look” like will help provide a more solid foundation or schema for discussing visual rhetoric, thereby allowing the reader to build on that understanding when, following these initial discussions, I will situate visual rhetoric more specifically in terms of its relationship to studies of space, place, and cartography and describe its more material and embodied components.
Using the tools of rhetoric and informed by understandings of visual culture, Finnegan analyzes the earliest known photograph of Abraham Lincoln, a daguerreotype that dates to the 1840s and was later published in McClure’s magazine in 1895. To carry out her analysis, she says, “requires careful, situated investigation of the social, cultural, and political work that visual communication is meant to do” (“Recognizing Lincoln” 62). She situates the rare photo of an uncharacteristically well-coifed, youthful-looking, head-to-shoulders portrait of Lincoln in what she calls the “image vernaculars of late nineteenth-century visual culture” (“Recognizing” 62). Doing so allows her to fulfill the three main criteria of a visual rhetoric project. First, by understanding image vernaculars as “enthymematic modes of reasoning employed by audiences in the context of specific practices of reading and viewing in visual cultures” (“Recognizing Lincoln” 62–3), she is able to understand the artifacts of visual culture “in light of the questions of rhetorical theory,” while simultaneously situating rhetorical theory relative to analyses of visual artifacts (“Rhetorical History” 198).3 This approach then paves the way for fulfillment of the subsequent criteria of the visual rhetoric project. That is, next, Finnegan’s analytical approach “illuminate[s] the complex dynamics of power and knowledge at play in and around images” (“Rhetorical History” 198) by revealing that readers’ overwhelming responses to the daguerreotype reproduction in McClure’s “tapped into myths about Lincoln circulating in the late nineteenth century” (“Recognizing” 62). Based on their understandings of photography at the time and interpretations of the “‘scientific’ discourses of character such as physiognomy and phrenology,” readers felt comfortable analyzing the physical qualities of the Lincoln they saw in the photo (“Recognizing” 62). They then recognized these traits as evidence of his moral character and used the photo “to elaborate an Anglo-Saxon national ideal at a time when elites were consumed by fin-de-siecle anxieties about the fate of ‘American’ identity” (“Recognizing” 62). Finnegan again invokes the tools of rhetoric when acknowledging that, “in the nineteenth century, portraits were thought to be ekphrastic—that is, they were thought to reveal or bring before the eyes something vital and almost mysterious about their subjects” (“Recognizing” 68). By juxtaposing her analysis of the history of how the image itself came to be reproduced and published in McClure’s with a historically and socially contextualized analysis of readers’ written responses to the photo, Finnegan demonstrates how the complex interplay of image and text can open up new possibilities for the creation of rhetorical histories, one that “illustrat[es] how visual rhetoric constitutes a powerful world-making discourse” and a viable mode of inquiry (“Recognizing Lincoln” 74).
Hariman and Lucaites’s extensive work with iconic photographs provides additional examples of visual rhetorical analysis that speak to Finnegan’s criteria for the visual rhetoric project. Specifically, their analysis of the photo of the flag raising at Iwo Jima and its subsequent reproduction in society, as well as its echoes in the more recent image of the three firefighters raising the American flag after the events of September 11, 2001 not only provides a helpful example of important work in visual rhetoric but also allows us to transition into a discussion of the material and spatial components of visual rhetoric.
Like Finnegan, Hariman and Lucaites are concerned with the ways in which visual artifacts draw upon, communicate, and reproduce social knowledge. More specifically, they are concerned with the connections between iconic photographs and the shaping of public opinion and specific events, not only during the time of a particular photo’s publication but over the course of its subsequent reception within society (11). They define the photojournalistic icon as “those photographic images appearing in print, electronic, or digital media that are widely recognized and remembered, are understood to be representations of historically significant events, activate strong emotional identification or response, and are reproduced across a range of media, genres, or topics” (Hariman and Lucaites 27). While they note on the one hand that “few images meet these criteria” (27) and thus provide detailed rationale for the set of images they choose to analyze in No Caption Needed, all of which they feel have had “distinctive influence on public opinion,” they also acknowledge that “claims regarding influence are notoriously difficult to prove,” and thus leave the door open for further identification and analysis of iconic imagery (7). Their study of the iconic photo of the Iwo Jima flag raising, which they see as “unquestionably the most popular image of World War II,” exemplifies and fulfills the criteria for visual rhetoric projects (Hariman and Lucaites 21).
Hariman and Lucaites understand the Iwo Jima photo, which depicts six U.S. soldiers raising the American flag at the top of Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima, relative to the questions of rhetorical studies when they analyze the photo’s composition, its appropriation over time, and its reproduction within popular media. Similar to Finnegan’s work with the Lincoln photograph, they begin by contextualizing the photo’s original publication on February 25, 1945 on the front page of newspapers nationwide (93). They then go on to describe how the photo’s meaning has shifted over time and across generations (105). In the original photo, they eloquently analyze the significance of the men’s poses and the meaning conveyed through the photo’s visual composition of their coordinated efforts to plant the flag pole in the ground atop Mount Suribachi:
There is a palpable harmony to the bodies as they strain together in the athleticism of physical work. Although the poses shift from being bent close to the ground to bearing a load to lifting upwards, one can draw a horizontal line across their belt lines, their knees all move together as if marching in step, all their physical energy flows along their common line of sight to the single point of impact in the earth. [. . .] We see the sure coordination of bodies with each other and with an instrument dedicated to their task. (Hariman and Lucaites 96)
Through their visual analysis of the image, Hariman and Lucaites are able to attribute its iconic power to “the combination of historical setting, visual transparency, and selfless action” (97). The complexity of the photo’s power, they feel, is rooted in the “three codes of American public culture” conveyed through its composition (97). The anonymous but collective work ethic of the men working together conveys a sense of egalitarianism, while the flag raising conveys a sense of nationalism in its symbolism of “the nation’s sacrifice and victory in World War II” (97). Finally, the