Writing About Ekphrasis 7

The Falling Child Debacle

           It is difficult to convey a point with just a photograph. Without text or sounds to accompany it, even
art with seemingly clear motives can spark conflicting interpretations. In This is Our World, the author saw an ad in a magazine that “showed a small child high in the air dropping toward the upraised arms of a waiting figure below” (Allison 13). The author interpreted this ad as an innocent child in danger, and her friend viewed it as a safe child. Their conflicting opinions demonstrate that art can evoke contrasting interpretations. The contradicting opinions of the author of This is Our World and her friend are why I think that multimodal writing creates a better argument. If the ad was accompanied by happy music and positive text, then the author's interpretation might be completely different. 

Stereotypes

            Images can aid in persuasion, but should there be a set of criteria to determine the persuasiveness of the image? Criteria can be dangerous. The author of Everything’s an Argument says, “Criteria can also reveal biases we hardly notice.” , and he then gives an example of the news’ strong tendency to report European deaths over African, Asian, And Pacific peoples deaths (Lunsford). Criteria could be just as dangerous when it comes to the criteria of persuasive images. Creating criteria for what makes an advertisement convincing can result in reliance on stereotypes. For example, the stereotype of someone in Information Technology (IT) is a man with glasses. Although an image of this caricature that society has created might be more persuasive to people wanting an IT service, an ad moving away from the stereotype can help chip away at our stereotype of someone working in IT.

An Ideal World

I think that when creating images for advertisements, advertisers should follow what Allison, author of This is Our World says, “Art is not meant to be polite, secret, coded, or timid. Art is the sphere in which that impulse to hide and lie is the most dangerous” (Allison 17). Advertisers need to take risks as an artist would. When crafting images, their message shouldn’t be as open-ended and generic/safe as the ad of the child or a typical IT guy. To create better arguments, I think it is necessary for advertisers to stray away from stereotypical and biased criteria and to make their arguments clear with sound, text, and images that do not shy away from being bold. In my argumentative writing around/with pictures I want to make sure that my photos are bold and more persuasive than the image of the ad of the falling child.

Want More? Here is an article about the banning of gender stereotypes in advertisements.

Works Cited

Lunsford, Andre, and John Ruszkiewicz. Everything’s an Argument. Eight Edition, ebook, Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2019.

Allison, Dorothy, This Is Our World.