Visual Rhetorical Analysis Practice of the Villager Website

Thesis:

The Villager is, in general, a user-friendly site that allows the user to find content they are looking for easily and effectively. However, there are some modes that the site is lacking in which can make it hard for some users to find and appreciate the content.

Visual – The overall visual content of the website is simple, but effective. All of the pictures within the articles have captions that explain the photo. Overall, there is not a lot of color with the website. It is mostly black and white with the main title of the website green, which is the color associated with Stevenson University. This lack of color conveys a professional tone seen with a lot of other major news sites. The pictures themselves are in color, which helps the reader hold interest. If the main page of the site was all black and white, the reader could become bored or uninterested with the site. The headlines and category names are all the same font while the font of the bodies of the articles are consistent. The category titles are bold and large so that they stand out and are easy to see. The headlines are also bold and larger than the bodies of the articles. This makes their content easy to navigate and find for users.

Linguistic – The overall word choices and delivery of the text is professional. The articles are what you would find in any major news site. The tone is intentional because the site is mimicking what an actual news site would look and read like so that they have professional experience in journalism. The only time the voice of the students writing the articles really come through are in the op/eds, which is exactly what journalism is supposed to be like. There are also subtitles on the sports videos, which helps the communication of the site with users who may have hearing impairments.

Aural – This is one mode that the site is lacking. The only sound seems to be the videos that they post that are sports related. There is no way for a blind person to navigate this site easily. There is no option for the article to be read aloud.

Spatial – The organization of the website is easy for the user to follow, as the articles are organized into categories. There is a convenient sidebar where the categories of articles are listed and a list of the most recent posts for easy navigation. By organizing the website this way, users are easily able to find the content that they are looking for. Across the top of the website are tabs that are split into categories. Some of the categories are “Sports,” “Reviews,” and “Features.” The home page of the site is split into the same categories with the most recent articles available to view. By doing this, the user is able to find the most recent news in the category they are looking for, but can also find older news if they wish to do so.

Gestural – This is another mode that is a bit lacking. The only gestures within the site are in videos, which only are sports related, and if the user has a touch computer screen or are on their phones scrolling through the content. This makes the website less interactive in the physical sense. If there were more videos to go with articles, this would improve the site’s level of interactive.

Conclusion:

For the majority of users, the modes of the site and their affordances are able to communicate effectively. However, there are some users that would find it difficult to enjoy the content of the site because of the lack of modes used. For example, there are very little aural elements. It would be helpful to have the ability to listen to the article as opposed to only being able to read it to get the content. More videos linked with articles would also make the site more interactive for users. Overall, the majority of the audience would find this site easy to navigate and would appreciate the content The Villager publishes.