Friday, November 07, 2008

Session 3: Four Videos and a Paper

The very talented and creative students in my graduate course, "War and Peace in the Global Village: Rhetorical Acts Post 9/11," showed off their excellent work.

Jenn Roos started with the paper, a very interesting "tri-modal" essay in which she juxtaposes Baudrillard (body text), McLuhan (marginal text), and images (including font experimentation) in a way that does not negate some of Baudriallard's bold claims about terrorism and globalization, but it does undercut them with McLuhan's more optimistic statements and images that also resist Baudrillard's reading of the globe.

Bob Becker explored Kenneth Burke's concept of "the negative" to show what GWB and others' rhetoric said about "us" and implied about "them" post 9/11.

Aaron Quanbeck set passages of McLuhan's WPGV to video clips from the 30s, 40s, and 50s in a film he calls "Vintage Modern Problems. "

Landon Kakfa produced a series of 4 spoof advertisements for "Freedom and Democracy," two of America's finest products.

Niles Haich assembled footage from popular movies and concepts from B., M, and others in what is a traditional "wandering" essay--but in video format. Wandering in the best sense, of wondering.

Good Q&A followed; very positive reception for these 5, four of whom were making their conference debuts.

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