Theorizing Digital Rhetoric takes up the intersection of rhetorical theory and digital technology to explore the ways in which rhetoric is challenged by new technologies and how rhetorical theory can illuminate discursive expression in digital contexts. The volume combines complex rhetorical theory with personal anecdotes about the use of technologies to create a larger philosophical and rhetorical account of how theorists approach the examinations of new and future digital technologies. This collection of essays emphasizes the ways that digital technology intrudes upon rhetorical theory and how readers can be everyday rhetorical critics within an era of ever-increasing use of digital technology.
Each chapter effectively blends theorizing between rhetoric and digital technology, informing readers of the potentiality between the two ideas. The theoretical perspectives informed by digital media studies, rhetorical theory, and personal/professional use provide a robust accounting of digital rhetoric that is timely, personable, and useful.
Editors’ Preface
Aaron Hess, Arizona State University
Amber Davisson, Keene State College
1: The Speaking Machine: Surveying the Field of Digital Rhetoric
Aaron Hess, Arizona State University
Section 1: Building Identity Online
2: Fluidity in a Digital World
Ashley Hink, Xavier University
3: Gazing and Swiping Together: Identification in Visually Driven Social Media
Hillary Jones, University of California Fresno
4: Reviving identity politics: "Asian American" strategic essentialism in the digital age
Vincent N. Pham, California State University-San Marcos
5: I am what I play and I play what I am: Feminine Identity Construction and the Casual Games Market
Shira Chess, The University of Georgia
6: Schema, Stigma, and Selfies: Navigating Digital Rhetorics of Analog Gender
Angela Leone, Northwestern University
Amber Davisson, Keene State College
Section 2: Automated and In-Human Rhetorics
7: Digital Information and Binary Rhetoric
David J. Gunkel, Northern Illinois University (USA)
8: Discursive, Material, and Digital Entanglements in the Internet of Things
James P. Zappen, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
9: The Rhetorical Agency of Algorithms
Jessica Reyman, University of Northern Illinois
10: The New Data: Argumentation from, with, and of Data
Candice Lanius, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Gaines Hubbell, University of Alabama-Huntsville
11: Where is the Body in Digital Rhetoric?
Brett Lunceford, Independent Scholar
Section 3: Digital Systems and Networks
12: Assemblage, the Minor, and the Clickable World
J. Macgregor Wise, Arizona State University
13: The Terms of Technoliberalism
Damien Pfister, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
14: Rhetoricity and Textuality
Jeremy David Johnson, Penn State University
15: Sharing/Shaping Community: Virality’s Constitutive Rhetoric
Jessica Sheffield, University of Alabama
16: Recommendational Rhetoric
Chris Ingraham, North Carolina State University
17: Rhetorical Agency and Education in the Digital Age
Cindy Koenig Richards, Willamette University
Biography
Aaron Hess is an Assistant Professor of Rhetoric and Communication at Arizona State University. He is the co-author of Participatory Critical Rhetoric: Theoretical and Methodological Foundations for Studying Rhetoric In Situ (Lexington, 2015). His research follows two primary avenues: the participatory elements of rhetorical advocacy and digital rhetorical expression. His work can be found in a variety of scholarly journals, including the International Journal of Communication, Critical Studies in Media Communication, New Media and Society, and Media, Culture and Society.
Amber Davisson is an Assistant Professor of Communication at Keene State College. She is the author of Lady Gaga and the Remaking of Celebrity Culture (McFarland, 2013) and the co-editor of Controversies in Digital Ethics (Bloomsbury, 2016). Her interdisciplinary scholarship on identity, politics, and digital technology has appeared in journals such as Rhetoric and Public Affairs, Transformative Works and Culture, Journal of Media and Digital Literacy, Journal of Visual Literacy, and American Communication Journal.
