Coca Cola – America the Beautiful

Rhetorical Analysis of a Visual Text

The visual text chosen to analyze is the
Coca Cola ad “America the Beautiful”

First, choose a visual text to analyze. Your text may be one of the following or something else: a music video, advertisement, excerpt from a film or TV show, TED talk, painting, Instagram post, video game, sports game, or other image/video (if you think of something else, just okay it with me first).

You have (at least) two options for essay structure: 1) you may summarize the text in the first paragraph and then proceed to your analysis in one or more paragraphs, or 2) you may summarize a part of the text in each body paragraph before analyzing that part (in which case your first paragraph may provide general information and context about the text, e.g., it’s a music video by an American rock band that first aired on MTV in 1999, or it’s an advertisement for perfume in the December 1975 issue of Vogue). Option 1 might work better for essays that focus on a more general strategy employed by or approach taken by the visual text as a whole, whereas Option 2 might work better for analysis that looks at several different parts or moments of the text. Your summary should explain what’s happening in the visual text to an audience that may not be familiar with it in as much relevant detail as possible (in other words, your reader shouldn’t have to Google your visual text to understand what it is or what you’re saying about it).

So the way you summarize the text might depend on the way you analyze the text. Chapter 1 of Pop Perspectives offers a great Checklist for Previewing on p. 11 that you used in Pop Culture Journal 1 to help you analyze the author, audience, purpose, etc. Chapter 1 of Writing Analytically also discussed strategies for analysis on pp. 6-7 and 9. You could also employ any of the analytical methods from Chapter 2 of Writing Analytically. No one method yields the right answer or the perfect essay – rather, you need to find a method that works for you and helps you better understand or interpret your particular visual text.

Since analysis usually involves breaking things up into parts, writing an essay from that mess of parts can often be challenging. I encourage you to look for patterns or trends in your own observations and writing about the text (in the Pop Culture Journals, using The Method, etc). Those patterns or trends that you notice can end up being the focus of an essay. Less is usually more – focus on one or two significant aspects of your text and get as much meaning out of them as you can. If you’re stuck, I’ve included a list of questions below, any one of which could lead you to an answer that could be a thesis.

Imagine your audience as UH students who are so used to visual texts that they have stopped noticing how those texts affect them. Pretend your essay will appear in a UH magazine designed to create a more aware and informed citizenry.

Your essay will be graded on the following criteria, weighted equally:

Organization
• introduction identifies important information about the type of visual text and a specific thesis
• thesis presents a claim or interpretive statement (not a “true fact”) about a visual text and how it persuades its audience, who its audience is, why it was made, etc.
• each paragraph has a topic sentence that both supports the thesis and expresses the main idea of the paragraph (M in MEAL)
• each paragraph has a sentence at the end reinforcing the paragraph’s connection to the thesis or transitioning to the next paragraph’s points (L in MEAL)
• conclusion recaps your essay without being redundant and explains its significance without getting preachy or too general

Evidence
• each main point is supported with evidence (E in MEAL) from the text itself (e.g., description, specific details, references to moments or parts) or an outside source (quoted or paraphrased)
• all sources used are cited by name in the text of the essay (whether quoted or paraphrased), including Wikipedia and all visual texts
• sources are cited according to MLA style (see PurdueOWL for more information)
• uses a combination of paraphrase and quotation when integrating other sources

Analysis
• evidence is not just presented but also explained in analysis (A in MEAL) answering the questions: How does the evidence illustrate your point? Why do you have the interpretations you do? What might the evidence mean? What else might it mean?
• the writer’s original thinking is shown on the page: how has your thinking and writing led you to make the claims you are making?
• the writer “makes the implicit explicit” by articulating what is unspoken or unstated in the visual text but implied or suggested

Language and Format
• original and interesting title that is not just the title of the visual text
• double-spaced, one-inch margins, page numbers, professional font
• Works Cited page including visual text and any other sources used and/or cited
• meets 750-1000 word requirement
• has few to no language errors, including punctuation, grammar, and spelling

Revision
• the global structure or content of the essay is substantially different than in the rough draft
• the main points, thesis, analysis, introduction, and/or conclusion have become more specific and refined than they were in the rough draft
• irrelevant or lengthy passages have been cut down or deleted
• the essay has been proofread or edited for sentence-level errors
• the writer took into account comments from peers and instructor

A Succeeds in all elements of the assignment, excels in at least one element, contains clear
and elegant prose

B Succeeds in most or all elements of the assignment, contains mostly clear prose

C Attempts to accomplish all elements of the assignment, contains mostly sensible prose
(though some effort might be required to decipher meaning)

D Fails in one or more elements of the assignment, contains nonsensical prose

F Fails in all elements of the assignment (including possibly length), contains large sections of nonsensical prose

Questions to Help You With Rhetorical Analysis

Author/Artist/Character
– What is the background of the author(s) and/or makers of the visual text? How is/are he/she/they positioned within society? How do you know?
– How does the author or character in the text present him-/herself? How do clothes, hair, accessories, etc., contribute to this presentation? How do other characters/details in the text contribute to this presentation?
– What values does the author/creator seem to identify with? How do you know?
– How does the author/creator convey his/her perspective? What might influence that perspective?
– How would you assess the trustworthiness, credibility, and good will (or “ethos”) of the author/creator? What details contribute to your assessment?

Context
– When and where was the text made? By whom? What other people or parties are involved, if any? What might be the significance of these details?
– What possible limitations or constraints were present in the making of the text? How might these limitations have shaped the text itself?

Composition
– What images are represented and how are they arranged? What patterns, colors, symmetry, proportion, movement, contrast, etc., do you notice?
– How does written text function? How does sound function?
– How do camera positioning, movement, and editing impact this text?

Genre
– How does the genre of the text (or general category, e.g. music video, mobile ad, cooking website) seem to influence its message?
– What conventions of the form does it use? Does it use conventions from multiple forms?

Cultural Narratives
– What cultural narratives and conventions are operating in this visual text?
– How are various social groups represented, and what do the representations reveal about American culture’s fears, desires, values, and anxieties?

Intertextuality
– What other sources or cultural references does this text draw upon? How do you know? What names, ideas, and concepts are present in the text? How do these references lend credibility to the text or detract from it?

Audience
– Who seems to be the audience for this text? How do you know?
– What assumptions are made about the viewer/reader? What values does the text assume the audience shares with the maker(s) of the text?
– Is human interaction encouraged by the text? If so, how does the rhetoric of the text accomplish this?

Appeals
– What language choices, examples, and images are used in the text to stir the audience’s emotions? What emotions do they elicit and how?
– How does the text utilize logic, evidence, or experts to create an argument?

Purpose
– What seems to be the purpose of the text? What could be another purpose? What ideas does it seem to be selling? What does it seem to be trying to persuade its audience of?