Page 338 - Gabrijela Kišiček and Igor Ž. Žagar (eds.), What do we know about the world? Rhetorical and argumentative perspectives, Digital Library, Educational Research Institute, Ljubljana 2013
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What Do We Know about the World?
inal contribution (1969) was determinative. Cognitive scientists agreed
that seeing was creative; it was selective; spatial; and contextual. Cre-
ative means that seeing is a subjective way of reconstruction affected by
personal beliefs and cultural contexts. Seeing is more of a production
governed by aesthetic factors of images (e.g. light; form; texture) than
consumption. Seeing is selective because of the zooming application of
our glances; gazes; and looks. Therefore, we select image-parts and filter
out others depending on inner needs and outer factors. Whilst linguis-
tic signs are temporal, visual signs are arranged spatially; this allows the
viewer to perceive several images simultaneously in a single place. Then,
seeing is spatial and visual logic occupies space. Finally, seeing is context-
ual since it is connected to the cultural, historical context of observation
entailing values and ideologies of the concrete situation. We add that
seeing is, also, figurative since it is the resource and the reinforcement
of conceptual metaphors and the regulator of the rhetorical figures and
their envisioning. As a procedure, visual rhetoric provides rhetoric with
the literacy of seeing and concurrent cognition: this is what the produc-
tion or presumption of media-messages calls for.
6. Spatial Rhetoric
In the shadows of the visual or iconic turn, a spatial turn occurs, also.
This turn marks the fruitful weaving together of the concept of space,
place, location, and milieu. Spaces, as produced interactively, places as
lived inter-relatedly, and newly opened cultural spaces and places, are
amongst those key ideas which determine scientific thinking about
space practices and representations of space. These are the ones which
reveal the communicative and rhetorical horizon of space and place.
Nevertheless, in rhetorical discussions, space emerges still as a partly
enigmatic and often vague notion with malleable definitions. Although
spatial rhetoric is an accepted term to name compositional practices
which represent place-experiences, by using two basic presumptions,
the present apprehension, of spatial rhetoric, introduces a broader in-
terpretation. The first is that rhetoric is the creator of cultural space; the
second is that rhetorical speeches are built on visual and spatial imagery.
Following the idea of third space (Bhabha, 1994; Soja, 2009), namely, a
place where culture is displaced from the interactions and, therefore, a
hybrid, common identity is created to enter a dialogue and share place
and space, the researcher proposes that rhetorical communication opens
a psycho-geographical location for the interactions and offers a discur-
sive place in the context of a spatial experience. Rhetoric forms the “con-
inal contribution (1969) was determinative. Cognitive scientists agreed
that seeing was creative; it was selective; spatial; and contextual. Cre-
ative means that seeing is a subjective way of reconstruction affected by
personal beliefs and cultural contexts. Seeing is more of a production
governed by aesthetic factors of images (e.g. light; form; texture) than
consumption. Seeing is selective because of the zooming application of
our glances; gazes; and looks. Therefore, we select image-parts and filter
out others depending on inner needs and outer factors. Whilst linguis-
tic signs are temporal, visual signs are arranged spatially; this allows the
viewer to perceive several images simultaneously in a single place. Then,
seeing is spatial and visual logic occupies space. Finally, seeing is context-
ual since it is connected to the cultural, historical context of observation
entailing values and ideologies of the concrete situation. We add that
seeing is, also, figurative since it is the resource and the reinforcement
of conceptual metaphors and the regulator of the rhetorical figures and
their envisioning. As a procedure, visual rhetoric provides rhetoric with
the literacy of seeing and concurrent cognition: this is what the produc-
tion or presumption of media-messages calls for.
6. Spatial Rhetoric
In the shadows of the visual or iconic turn, a spatial turn occurs, also.
This turn marks the fruitful weaving together of the concept of space,
place, location, and milieu. Spaces, as produced interactively, places as
lived inter-relatedly, and newly opened cultural spaces and places, are
amongst those key ideas which determine scientific thinking about
space practices and representations of space. These are the ones which
reveal the communicative and rhetorical horizon of space and place.
Nevertheless, in rhetorical discussions, space emerges still as a partly
enigmatic and often vague notion with malleable definitions. Although
spatial rhetoric is an accepted term to name compositional practices
which represent place-experiences, by using two basic presumptions,
the present apprehension, of spatial rhetoric, introduces a broader in-
terpretation. The first is that rhetoric is the creator of cultural space; the
second is that rhetorical speeches are built on visual and spatial imagery.
Following the idea of third space (Bhabha, 1994; Soja, 2009), namely, a
place where culture is displaced from the interactions and, therefore, a
hybrid, common identity is created to enter a dialogue and share place
and space, the researcher proposes that rhetorical communication opens
a psycho-geographical location for the interactions and offers a discur-
sive place in the context of a spatial experience. Rhetoric forms the “con-
