Visual Rhetoric of the Villager

The Villager is a student digital publication that is updated on a weekly basis. The Villager covers topics such as campus news, reviews, events, sports, etc. It is designed for the Stevenson community to become more informed of what is happening on the campus around them. I will be doing a rhetorical analysis on the Villager website to evaluate if it is effective in reaching and appealing to its audience.

Modes:

Linguistic- Because this is a publication there is a lot of the linguistic mode used here. The language used is clear, concise, and helpful/informative. Every article is set up relatively the same considering they have to follow the AP style of writing. Even though stories are written by different students, meaning different writing voices, there is still a coherent style and method here. This is probably the most used mode on the Villager website, however it cannot work alone, as nothing but words would be rather uninteresting.

Visual- I feel the layout and style is very simple and clean. To me this makes the cite easy to use and find what you’re looking for. The layout is also similar on every page even when you click the different headers on the navigation bar. Each page has photos or an article on the left and a side bar on the right that leads the audience to other stories and articles. Because of the photos it frames the viewers eyes directly to that area. This brings the audience’s attention to the articles and depending on the picture it can intrigue them before they even read a word. The layout even looks like that of a real newspaper or other digital publications I have seen.

Aural- There is not much use of the aural mode on the website besides a few videos that are attached to some articles.

Spatial- I think the spatial use here is very well done. It is not cluttered so the information is not overwhelming. There is a lot of information that can be found on this website and the way it is spaced out and organized is very well done and effective. There are different categories of articles so that students can focus on finding articles with topics they are interested in. The arrangement of information is the same throughout, again making it easy to use and navigate.

Gestural- Most of the gestural mode here comes from the visuals of the pictures. In some pictures we see students having fun whether participating in a school event, in a workout class, studying abroad, etc. In others we see clear interacting between students. Some students working together to orchestrate events, others playing a sport with their team members. By seeing their facial expressions, body language, and interaction with others we get a sense that students enjoy their time at Stevenson and that is a community based school. This is beneficial consider the audience are people who go to Stevenson. It could encourage them to do more with the school, or just have a sense of pride for where they go.

Affordances:

I would say the strongest affordances are linguistic, visual, and spatial. These three modes really have to work together in order to produce a cohesive and effective publication. The visuals enhance the words and meanings of the linguistics, while the spatial makes the whole process easy and user friendly. Gestural is also effective here, but because it is mostly scene in the photos posted I feel visual still has a stronger use. Aural is probably the weakest affordance, and could actually use some improvement. It might be nice if they had an audio reading of the articles so that people with visual constraints can also enjoy the articles, making the publication more inclusive to their audience. Besides that I don’t see much use for aural here. The videos are a nice touch, and gives the audience a break from just pictures and texts, but because it is a publication, photos and words are what is most expected.

Color:

The colors of the publication are a white background with mostly black text besides the green text for the Villager logo. Having a white background and black texts creates a great contrast. It makes the words pop and brings the viewer’s eyes to the information at hand. It also helps create a clean and sophisticated look. This shows its audience that although this publication is ran by students they take their jobs as journalist seriously. And finally, the Villager logo being the only hint of green is very effective. It is always in the left hand corner in big bold letters using the “Stevenson Green” we see all over campus, the website, clothing, etc. By using this green it is still connecting to the Stevenson community it is a part of, making it very cohesive and identifiable to its audience.

Font:

The font reminds me of something I would see in an actual newspaper or magazine. The use of all caps in the headers are very effective, everything looks even, clean, and brings the viewers’ eyes to those all capped words. It also helps differentiate between topics and actual stories. And the having the logo in big thick letters clearly brings attention to it, and again is very similar and cohesive with other Stevenson logos.

Layout:

The layout is very effective here. It is easy to navigate and is visually appealing. The layout is probably one of my favorite things about this publication. It makes it easy for the audience to read the mass amount of information and makes it more enjoyable for them.

Overall, I think the students who run this publication have done a good job of making this website user friendly for their audience. Whether a faculty member, student, parent, or alumni is reading this I think they will all clearly see the connection to their school and find useful information that they can use here at their time in Stevenson and in the future. It was designed so that any of these audience members can look at it, easily navigate it, and enjoy whichever article they choose. And on top of that, the information provided on their website is strictly devoted to their desired/actual audience members as well.