Visual rhetoric is the study of how document design (including the use of illustrations, charts and graphs, typography and layout) communicate, as opposed to aural or verbal messages. Visual rhetoric examines also the relationship between images and writing.
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Visual Rhetoric (and Other Visual) Resources 
Links to a variety of resources about visual rhetoric.
Wysocki, Anne Frances. Michigan Tech University (2003). Design>Graphic Design>Visual Rhetoric
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Visual Rhetoric in a Technological Age
This course participates in constructing visual rhetoric for composition studies and computers and composition studies. There are few models for the graduate study of visual rhetoric, and certainly there are not canonical issues or figures in this area. Instead there is the growing realizing that written discourse increasingly involves visual dimensions that are influenced (and sometime controlled) by the composer(s). Nowhere is this understanding more concretely rendered than in areas that depend on technology. In a real sense, technology has pushed us to see visual dimensions of meaning as falling under our influence. Of course, that influence can only be exercised via know-how.
Sullivan, Patricia. Purdue University. Academic>Courses>Rhetoric>Visual Rhetoric
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A collection of online resources for visual rhetoric, based at York College of Pennsylvania.
Propen, Amy. York College of Pennsylvania. Resources>Directories>Visual Rhetoric
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This interactive tutorial is designed to supplement your use of TCTC, and provides new information and activities that will enhance your understanding of visual rhetoric. This tutorial has five main sections, Visual Rhetoric, Use of Visuals, Types of Visuals, Color, and Design. With only a few variations, each section is divided into smaller three- to five-page chapters, all arranged using three basic types of pages.
Dobrin, Sidney I., Christopher J. Keller and Christian R. Weisser. TCTC. Academic>Course Materials>Visual Rhetoric
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This page serves as a gateway for an exploration of visual rhetoric. It includes links to course materials, student projects, supplementary resources, exempla, and other web-based material.
Blakesley, David. Purdue University (2000). Resources>Directories>Rhetoric>Visual Rhetoric
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Visual Rhetoric: Literacy by Design 
The keynote speech presented at the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies of Writing 1998 Conference, 'Technology and Literacy in a Wired Academy.'
Faigley, Lester. University of Minnesota (1998). Presentations>Rhetoric>Visual Rhetoric
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Visual Social Semiotics: Understanding How Still Images Make Meaning 
Presents a framework for analyzing imagery in multi-modal print documents and Web sites. Demonstrates how images and text work together to make meaning for readers/users. Provides analytical tools and tips to help choose still images to enhance textual messages.
Harrison, Claire. Technical Communication Online (2003). Articles>Rhetoric>Visual>Visual Rhetoric
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Visual Texts and Technologies: Situating the Visual in Technoculture
In Western culture, we now understand that visual representations influence our thinking, but we don’t always fully comprehend the extent of that influence, nor do we understand precisely how that influence is exercised. In this course, we will gain a fuller understanding of the influence of the visual on meaning, by thinking with, about, and through the visual.
Kitalong, Karla Saari. University of Central Florida. Academic>Courses>Visual Rhetoric
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Visual Texts: Format and the Evolution of English Accounting Texts, 1100-1700
Emphasis on page design, as an aid to visual accessibility, did not receive attention in modern technical writing until the 1970s. However, accounting documents and instructional texts utilized format and document design strategies as early as the twelfth century to enhance the organization of quantitative data and linear bookkeeping entries. Format in text was used to reflect the arrangement used in oral accounting practices and to produce uniform documents. Thus, format was integral to the rise of pragmatic literacy of the commercial reader. During the Renaissance, these early format strategies received impetus from Ramist method. The result was design strategies that attempted to capture the rigid principles of organization fundamental to commercial accounting. These early accounting documents also illustrate the plain style that would become the focus of the later decades of the seventeenth century. Clarity in language paralleled clarity in page design for the sole purpose of eliminating ambiguity on the page and on the sentence level. Plain style was thus nurtured by financial forces long before the advent of natural science.
Tebeaux, Elizabeth. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2000). Articles>Document Design>Visual Rhetoric>History
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The role of the technical writer is expanding, partly in response to technological and societal changes; it is encompassing a broader variety of communication tasks and media. One individual, the technical communicator, often plays the roles of designer, writer, editor, and producer. As these rolesconverge, visual thinking and visual communication are becoming critical skills for many technical writers.
Brumberger, Eva R. CPTSC Proceedings (2001). Articles>Education>Instructional Design>Visual Rhetoric
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El siglo XX ha visto muchos avances en campos diversos. La Visualización no ha sido una excepción a esos cambios, que prepararon el camino para su transformación en 'Visualización de Información' durante las dos décadas que precedieron al nuevo milenio.
Dursteler, Juan Carlos. InfoVis (2003). Articles>History>Visual Rhetoric
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Visualizar la Interacción Social
La interacción social nos proporciona patrones visuales que nos ayudan a situarnos en nuestro entorno. En Internet, sin embargo, esto no es tan inmediato. Están empezando a aparecer visualizaciones que intentan paliar el problema.
Dursteler, Juan Carlos. InfoVis (2003). Articles>Collaboration>Visual Rhetoric
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Visualization Strategies for Team-Oriented Problem Solving, Analysis, and Project Planning
This article describes visualization methods used by many international organizations in the design of development projects. In this context, development projects means projects that are designed to improve the quality of life for people living in a developing country. During the project design workshop essential elements of a discussion and subsequent analysis are visualized as the discussion takes place and displayed to the participants. This visual record is kept in view through the whole period of the discussion. The visual methods of identifying, analyzing and structuring a problem dramatically improves the efficiency and effectiveness of the problem solving process and the quality of the final solution. The techniques enable a large amount of knowledge available within the group of participants to be collected quickly and allows complex problems to be taken through several steps of analysis.
Lewis, Paul. Technical Communication Online (1998). Articles>Collaboration>Project Management>Rhetoric
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Visualizations for Data Exploration and Analysis: A Critical Review of Usability Research
Data visualization has the potential to change the questions that people are able to pose to their data and transform their analytical methods and decision-making processes. It may, in fact, be the next generation of data reporting tools. This article argues that the prevailing computer science orientation to data visualizations is severely limited for addressing many of the usability concerns associated with supporting users in three critical problem areas: sophisticated visual literacy, complex data analysis, and new paradigms of visual inquiry. I first describe what visualization technology is and what is uncharted about the three usability areas of perceptually rich, interactive displays; complex problem-solving; and visual querying. Then I explain what it means to take a computing -- specifically an object-oriented -- perspective on the usability of visualizations, emphasizing the limitations of this point of view when it comes to supporting users in complex activities and reasoning.
Mirel, Barbara E. Technical Communication Online (1998). Articles>Usability>Visual>Visual Rhetoric
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Visualizing Information: An Overview of This Special Issue
The guest editors offer a brief history of visualization, discuss the present state of the art, and explore the possibilities and challenges that lie ahead. They then discuss the contents of this special issue in terms of the trends in visualization theory and research. They conclude by observing that technical communicators must respond to the challenges presented in the content of this issue, both by using the methods presented and by performing the further research the authors call for. Additionally, researchers must incorporate the results of inquiry in the related fields.
Gribbons, William M. and Arthur G. Elser. Technical Communication Online (1998). Articles>Graphic Design>Visual Rhetoric>Technical Illustration
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Visually Speaking: Adult-Only Publications
Corporate photography was once the realm of adults only. Just a few years ago, it was surprising to see a picture of anybody under 40 years old in an annual report or capabilities brochure, much less someone under the age of 12. But nowadays, photos of children are showing up more and more often in all kinds of corporate publications, and as you might suspect, photographing children requires a totally different approach than shooting the CEO.
Salvo, Suzanne. Communication World Bulletin (2008). Design>Graphic Design>Photography>Visual Rhetoric
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Visually Teaching Technical Communication—Despite Technology
Enticed by sophisticated software, students of technical communication often lose perspective of visual effect. Inclusion of design principles into syllabi for technicalcommunication courses can conflict with those elements, such as substance content and audience analysis, that already occupy primary emphases. Principles of visual design can, however, be taught within group projects on professional presentations or similar topics. Cognitive dissonance introduced through rudimentary techniques of not computerized—but manual—design shifts student focus from keyboard and mouse to visual coherence of the final product. This simple technique offers benefits to students and researchers of technical communication.
Bonk, Robert J. STC Proceedings (1999). Articles>Education>Visual Rhetoric
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Visuals and Specialization Present Possibilities for Handling the Information Overload Crisis
Professional communicators and attorneys have long stood side by side as both fought to win in court—one in the court of law, the other in the court of public opinion. These two sometimes wary compatriots, however, are now beginning to partner more frequently to garner the best results for the executive suite.
Larkin, T.J. and Sandar Larkin. Communication World Bulletin (2005). Articles>Document Design>Visual Rhetoric>Charts and Graphs
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Based on an interpretive study, this article focuses on visual composition within the workforce as perceived by individuals who use visuals to instruct, persuade, or inform while speaking to an intended audience. Tabulated and evaluated responses to survey statements relate the presenter's perception of a visual's function, the presenter's sensitivity to and the use of the audience perspective in visual composition, and training received in researching an audience. Data also provides a comparative analysis among respective organizations categorized by career interests: administrative or managerial positions within product-oriented business, people-oriented business, and educational institutions. Survey statements reflect the frames of reference that regulate visual design: the color spectrum, gender, cultural sensitivity, structural organization, semantics, and adherence to ethics when applying technological enhancements.
Caricato, Josephine A. Technical Communication Online (2000). Design>Information Design>Visual>Visual Rhetoric
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Visuals When You Have No Visuals
You have just been asked to to give a 30-45 minute speech at a conference and there is absolutely no time to put visuals together for it. You're panicked at the thought of boring these people to death. What can you do? Use Word pictures.
Miller, Anne. Presenters University (2003). Articles>Presentations>Rhetoric>Microsoft PowerPoint
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The goal of this site is to explore the ways in which rhetoric, visual culture, and pedagogy interact with and inform each other. In keeping with this mission, the viz. blog is a forum for exploring the visual through identifying the connections between theory, rhetorical practice, popular culture, and the classroom.
University of Texas. Resources>Graphic Design>Visual Rhetoric>Blogs
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Want to Talk About...: A Rhetorical Analysis of the Introductions of 40 Speeches About Engineering
This article investigates the introductions of 40 professional speeches from a rhetorical perspective to address the problems audiences seem to have with presentations about engineering. The authors use an exordial model that they derived from classical manuals on rhetoric. This model enumerates and groups rhetorical exordial techniques into 3 main functions: attentum, benevolum, and docilem . The study shows that rhetorically complete introductions are rare. Most of the speakers seemed to prefer a content-oriented, direct approach (docilem) in their introductions and seldom used techniques to garner the audience's attention (attentum) or sympathy (benevolum). The article concludes with an evaluation of the exordial model and a discussion of the study's pedagogical implications.
Van De Mieroop, Dorien, Jaap de Jong and Bas Andeweg. Journal of Business and Technical Communication (2008). Articles>Education>Rhetoric>Engineering
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Web Design: Assuring Credibility
In recent years, we have seen an explosion of medical and health-related information on the internet, and many patients cite the internet as their preferred source for information on their health and that of their families. However, there are concerns, voiced by healthcare professionals and patients alike, that this information is not uniformly accurate, complete, or up-to-date.
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Web Design: Define the Purpose
What's the 'mission' of your site? This is the first and, perhaps, most important question to answer before you embark on developing your site.
Tech-Writer (2001). Design>Web Design>Planning>Rhetoric
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Web Site Redesign: From Stagnation to Rejuvenation
When surfing the web these days, you often come across web sites that suffer from stagnation—they look old, obsolete or appear to have been designed by an amateur. Your web site needs continuous improvement to capture and engage your visitor’s attention. If not, he or she can easily click away to your competitor’s site. Here are twelve steps to help prevent stagnation.
Drost, Herman. Communication World Bulletin (2004). Design>Web Design>Redesign>Rhetoric
