Expressive Power of Comics in Rhetorical Arguments Essay

McCloud summarises the scenes of the previous chapters. It explores the expressive power of comics as a useful tool for making rhetorical arguments. In chapter 9, McCloud uses several concepts of comics to express make arguments. It underscores the importance of comics in relating the visuals in texts and the texts. The chapter, therefore, establishes a relationship between comic and the comprehension of texts. It would, therefore, be essential to have insight into some of the comic elements that the article uses to make compelling arguments in the chapter. The paper, therefore, aims at establishing the expressive power of comics ineffective rhetorical argument (McCloud, 1994).

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Exploring that aspect requires a broad understanding of the power of comics and its relevance in presenting arguments in certain cases before one narrows down to the chapter in context. First, comics are an effective medium for attracting a wide readership. In most cases, the young generation struggle to improve their reading skills. Children, therefore, find it difficult to concentrate on reading plaintexts. However, the introduction of comics improves children's reading skills. That is through the visuals, which help in focusing on the plots in novels and stories. Additionally, comics are essential since they help children to comprehend some texts that are complex to understand. That means that comics help people to develop a different process of processing information. Lastly, comics can encourage one to read texts that rather seem boring and unattractive. Furthermore, comics help in realigning the thoughts of individuals. Comics help readers to create different meanings from multiple modalities. That implies comics in books require the readers to process and interpret the several aspects of visuals, spatial and texts to understand the meaning of the written texts fully.

Reading influences one's brain. Reading helps people gain several ideas from different disciplines, and that helps in improving one's knowledge. Similarly, comics have an impact on the functioning of the brain. Comics in texts require one to relate certain ideas with the visual representations in place. Through such, readers are able to widen their scope of thinking. They are, therefore, a medium for enhancing the performance of the brain. Comics is also a source of entertainment. The graphics are usually in place to represent certain phenomena in the real world. However, as their names suggest, comics have a purpose to influence the audience through emotional appeal. Most comics represent the realities of life through humor. Such elements enhance entertainment among children hence an easy comprehension of a text and attraction towards texts.

The chapter, therefore, applies comics to achieve the mentioned advantages. The scholar posits that comics are a medium of non-verbal communication. That is due to the inability of human beings to communicate in thoughts. The scholar furthers that argument by asserting that the inability of human beings to communicate through minds has led to most problems human beings experience today. Words come from thoughts. The media comes into context in such a situation by converting an individual's thoughts into forms that can change the physical world.

Moreover, the media should also have the ability to re-transform the physical forms back into thoughts. In comics, the conversion of ideas into tangible forms follows a path that starts from the mind to the hand and the paper. From the article, the information is transmitted to the mind and then to mind. The message from the artist passes through the long path without changing the original meaning of the message of the artist. Through such, the chapter presents comics as an effective way of presenting a rhetorical argument. It means that comics are able to relay the intended information from a visual representation without changing the meaning of the intended message.

In addition, the chapter presents comics as a capable platform for an effective rhetorical argument by analyzing the different elements that it brings into perspective. The chapter focuses on central aspects that set it apart from other mediums. For example, the chapter highlights the importance of comics through gutter and dichotomy between image and texts. That means that readers of the book are able to understand the messages that the author intend to relay through an analysis of the comics. Consequently, readers would be able to read the entire book with ease.

The chapter also exposes the role of comics ineffective rhetorical arguments by using a series of images that help in improving visual literacy. The chapter summarises the other chapters and alludes to the early works of graphic narratives as part of the antecedent to comics. It summarizes the effects of the comic by using cartoons and panel borders and a combination of words and pictures. It uses such elements to portray aspects of the literary technique. The use of comic as a literary technique is, therefore, seen as an effective platform for enhancing the rhetorical presentation. The visual technique improves the understanding of the literary information presented by the comics. The comics provide an avenue to interpreting the images and relating the same to the texts.

The chapter also highlights some concepts related to iconic and realistic figures. It indicates that such elements are components of comics and serve a different function in relaying the intended message to the audience. Standard cartoons are examples of iconic figures. The realistic figures, on the other hand, concentrate on details, which influence the quality of a piece of work. The chapter further identifies that human beings have a culture that keeps them attracted to iconic images. Iconic images are simple, and that helps them draw and convey the intended message with ease. The use of realistic figures also captivates the audience by presenting practical ideals of ideas through visuals. Comic through iconic and realistic figures, therefore, help in masking, introducing dramatic convention and visual style, which improves understanding. Furthermore, they help in emotional appeals since they attract readers through the humor that they present.

Conclusion

Lastly, comics offer a useful platform for an effective rhetorical argument since they trigger readers' thoughts. Comics influence subject readers to try unraveling some aspects of the texts and the images provided. For example, the visual aspects would trigger the readers to establish the relationship between the texts and the visual representations. Readers would, therefore, make insights into the visuals presented by the texts. By doing so, they would be triggered to explore different thoughts, which can enhance their understanding of the texts. The chapter, therefore, suggests that comics are responsible for invoking thoughts hence a useful tool for critical thinking. Different people have different thoughts, and the use of comics in such situations trigger a conversation about different interpretations that people have regarding different visuals.

Reference

McCloud, S. (1994). Understanding comics: [the invisible art]. New York: HarperPerennial.