Women Can't Win

2017 ◽  
pp. 244-262
Author(s):  
Michael S. Bruner ◽  
Karissa Valine ◽  
Berenice Ceja
Keyword(s):  
Female Body ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Documentary Film ◽  
Rhetorical Analysis ◽  
Central Focus ◽  
Tv News ◽  
Catch 22 ◽  
The Times ◽  
The Biggest Loser ◽  
Tv Show

This chapter employs irony as a tool to make clearer the workings of one form of the e-politics of food, namely, the structural food oppression linked to the weight and shape of the female body. The authors argue that the e-politics of the weight and shape of the female body is one of the most important incarnations of the e-politics of food and one of the most vigorously contested. This chapter examines many forms of public discourse and e-politics, from Bing to Tumblr, from Huffington Post to the Mirror (UK), from TV news in Lacrosse, Wisconsin to The Times of India, from the documentary film Killing Us Softly to the book You Are What You Eat, and from WebMD to Twitter, in the end, with a central focus on Rachel Frederickson on the TV show, The Biggest Loser. The critical rhetorical analysis finds some support for the Women Can't Win thesis. Women are in a Catch-22 situation, trapped between fat-shaming and skinny-shaming.

Women Can't Win

2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 16-36
Author(s):  
Michael S. Bruner ◽  
Karissa Valine ◽  
Berenice Ceja
Keyword(s):  
Female Body ◽  
Rhetorical Analysis ◽  
Catch 22 ◽  
The Biggest Loser

This essay employs irony as a tool to make clearer the workings of one form of the e-politics of food, namely, the structural food oppression linked to the weight and shape of the female body. Arguing that the e-politics of the weight and shape of the female body is one of the most important incarnations of the e-politics of food and one of the most vigorously contested, this study examines the construction of the assumptions, the ideals, and the rules with which women must contend. The case of Rachel Frederickson, the oft-attacked winner of The Biggest Loser (2014), serves as the focus of the study. The critical rhetorical analysis finds some support for the Women Can't Win thesis. Finally, the authors offers some constructive suggestions for helping to escape the Catch-22 of fat-shaming/skinny shaming.

scholarly journals Rhetoric of the image of architecture

2019 ◽  
Vol 22 (31) ◽  
pp. 29-37
Author(s):  
Hanna Grzeszczuk-Brendel
Keyword(s):  
Documentary Film ◽  
Rhetorical Analysis ◽  
Rhetorical Figures ◽  
Film Image ◽  
The Creation

Based on the example of one of the newsreels of the Polish Film Chronicle of 1965, we have researched the issue of the usability of rhetorical figures for the analysis of the image of architecture recorded in film and its relations with the verbal rhetoric of narration as well as the pictorial rhetoric, which makes up the message of a different nature. By this we have attempted to decode the lifestyle model presented in the film and propagated by its manner of description of architecture with the use of rhetorical figures and also to decode the role and meaning of the architectural forms, which were engaged in the creation of the message of the film image. Combining the rhetorical analysis with an interpretation of the architectural forms has enabled us to identify the persuasive nature of the message of the chronicle material included in the documentary film.

Police officer or social media star? Live PD and microcelebrity

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 237-249 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex McVey
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
New Media ◽  
Police Officers ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Reality Tv ◽  
Self Presentation ◽  
Visual Access ◽  
The Media ◽  
Tv Show ◽  
Fan Engagement

This article examines the rhetorical strategies of microcelebrity in the reality TV show Live PD. Live PD is an important text for understanding how police work with the entertainment industry to create selective strategies of self-presentation in the wake of the media challenges posed by the Black Lives Matter movement. It shows how police draw on new media and social media to shape public discourse about police and promote alternative images of police officers. It also shows how police mobilize the techniques of reality TV, fan engagement and social media to respond to emergent crises of police credibility. This article argues that Live PD’s rhetorics of microcelebrity use intimate visual access and fan engagement to create new modes of cultural attachment to police power while also substituting affective sensations of intimacy for substantive demands of police accountability.

Trajectories of the black female body in Brazil

2015 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 197-216 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joana Plaza Pinto
Keyword(s):  
Female Body ◽  
Blind Spot ◽  
Black Female ◽  
Female Character ◽  
The Political ◽  
History Of ◽  
Situated Perspective ◽  
Tv Show ◽  
Woman's Body

In this paper, I offer a situated perspective on the political and semiotic landscapes of the circulation of racist and antiracist images and texts in and around a dark-skinned female character, Adelaide, in the popular Brazilian TV show Zorra Total. I aim to differ and defer the character as a sign, in order to undermine the character’s hegemonic frame of interpretation. First, I contextualize some resources used in a typical episode, including the character’s performance as a trajectory of racist signs about the black woman’s body. Next, I discuss the contemporary circulation of the character, confronted by the experience of discussing this character in an undergraduate classroom. In conclusion, I argue that by exposing trajectories of the black female body, it is possible to gather together its fragmented signs as a multi-layered and overlapping set, and I identify these trajectories as a blind spot in the history of Brazilian racism.

scholarly journals Scientific journalism in the times of pandemic and conspiracy theories

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 35-49
Author(s):  
Marta Alicja Trzeciak
Keyword(s):  
Public Discourse ◽  
Population Control ◽  
Control Program ◽  
Biological Weapon ◽  
World Health ◽  
Conspiracy Theories ◽  
For Profit ◽  
The Usa ◽  
The Times ◽  
Health Organization

On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization announced the state of the coronavirus outbreak as a pandemic. This has contributed to the deepening of feelings of fear, anger, frustration and dissatis-faction in many people, as well as the emergence of numerous conspiracy theories related to the new coronavirus. These concepts are socially dangerous because, without bringing any positive reactions, they deepen the feeling of fear, panic or even hysteria. Thus, they hinder rational thinking, taking care of one’s own mental health and acting reasonably. This article discusses the most frequently repeated conspiracy theories in public discourse: corona-virus as a Chinese biological weapon, SARS-CoV-2 as an American biological weapon, the coronavirus created by the USA for profit, SARS-CoV-2 created or developed by Jews, the virus as an element of spy action, the pandemic as a population control program, and 5G as the cause of the pandemic.

scholarly journals Spokes in a Wheel: A Linguistic and Rhetorical Analysis of Native American Public Discourse

1979 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 552 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ralph Cooley
Keyword(s):  
Native American ◽  
Annual Meeting ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Rhetorical Analysis

Proceedings of the Fifth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (1979), pp. 552-557

scholarly journals De la producción a la recepción. Una propuesta de observación multi local y sincrónica para el análisis de noticias televisivas

2020 ◽  
pp. 185
Author(s):  
Mercedes Calzado ◽  
Vanesa Lio ◽  
Cristian Manchego Cardenas ◽  
Victoria Irisarri
Keyword(s):  
Family Environment ◽  
Buenos Aires ◽  
Television News ◽  
Political Process ◽  
Public Spaces ◽  
Tv News ◽  
The Media ◽  
Three Space ◽  
Tv Show ◽  
Medios De Comunicacion

Este artículo presenta un ejercicio metodológico realizado en el marco de un proyecto de investigación sobre los nuevos modos de construcción de la noticia policial en televisión. El tópico de la inseguridad se enmarca en un proceso social, cultural y político vinculado al crecimiento de la violencia y el delito en las sociedades contemporáneas, pero también al incremento y transformación de su visibilidad. Partiendo de la hipótesis de que los medios de comunicación son dispositivos centrales en la construcción del espacio de lo público, indagamos en la producción de contenidos sobre “inseguridad” en noticieros de televisión, en los modos de acceso a las fuentes, circulación de la información, estrategias de presentación de las noticias y la forma en que las audiencias las decodifican e interpretan. Para esto, nos propusimos observar, en forma simultánea, tres espacios/situaciones durante la emisión de un noticiero central de un canal de aire de la Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires. Por un lado, en la instancia de producción, la sala de control y el móvil principal del día. Por otro, incorporamos la recepción visualizando en vivo el mismo noticiero en un ámbito familiar. La experiencia implicó la participación de cuatro investigadores en tres locaciones distintas. El objetivo es presentar la potencialidad y dificultades que emergieron de este ejercicio de observación participante grupal y multisituada. This article presents a methodological exercise carried out as part of a research project on the new modes of construction of police news on television in Argentina. The topic of insecurity is part of a social, cultural and political process linked to the growth of violence and crime in contemporary societies, but also to the increase and transformation of its visibility. From the hypothesis that the media are central in the construction of public spaces, we investigate the production of content regarding “insecurity” in television news, focusing on the ways of accessing the sources, circulation of information, news presentation strategies and how audiences decode and interpret them. To reach this objective, we observe simultaneously three space-situations during a central TV news show broadcast by an over-the-air channel in Buenos Aires. On one hand, we analyze the production of news, from the broadcasting room and the main live reporting from the street. On the other hand, we also study news reception by visualizing the same TV show in a family environment. The experience involved the participation of four researchers in three different locations. The paper presents the potentiality and difficulties that emerged from this multi local and synchronic observation exercise.

scholarly journals Activism in Bosnia-Herzegovina: Struggles against Dual Hegemony and the Emergence of “Local First”

2018 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-156
Author(s):  
Randall Puljek-Shank ◽  
Felix Fritsch
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
Service Provision ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Local Scale ◽  
Political Strategies ◽  
Dual Nature ◽  
International Intervention ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Central Focus

The 2014 protests and plenums in Bosnia-Herzegovina were widely noted for their insertion of economic and social justice topics into the stale public discourse of ethnocracy. They also signified a potential to break with an anemic civil society shaped by international intervention, technocratic “project logic” and apolitical service provision. This article argues for treating these struggles in reference to the dual nature of the hegemony created by both local ethnonationalists and international liberal intervenors. It applies a Gramscian perspective to the processes by which hegemony is created and (re)produced via consensus in civil society. The challenge to dual hegemony can be seen in the central focus of contestation on social justice in economic arrangements as well as in the alternative logics of engagement and organizational forms in society. We describe the tensions arising from this dual challenge in terms of the degree to which they contest or reproduce the predominant anti-politics, a stance of distancing from dialogue or even contact with political actors and institutions. We conclude that the events during and since 2014 have strengthened the means to build an alternative third bloc via a “local first” approach, containing heterogeneous forms of local-scale action with explicitly political strategies.

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