Definition: The means through which a text reaches its audience.
Examples:
Photograph
Website
Song
B. Affordances
Definition: Features unique to a selected medium that a creator can use.
Examples:
Website: Hyperlinks and visual images paired with linguistic text.
Video: Time, movement, editing, and audio.
C. Genre and Genre Conventions
Definition: Additional divisions of media based on anticipated audiences.
Examples:
Film media includes genres such as:
Romantic comedy
Animated shorts
Each genre includes a set of conventions:
Newspaper comic strip: Often has three frames with a punchline in the final frame.
Graphic novel: Shares features of a comic strip but tells a longer narrative through a series of frames that vary in number from page to page.
III. RHETORICAL SITUATION
Definition: Set of expectations resulting from the specific time, location, and audience for which a multimodal work is created.
Considerations:
Author
Genre
Audience
Context (or implied author)
IV. AUTHOR AND IMPLIED AUTHOR
Author:
The creator of multimodal works (e.g., film director, author and illustrator of a children's book).
Implied Author:
When the author is unknown, the implied author is the entity responsible for the work.
Examples:
Advertisements: Created by a team of designers, videographers, and writers, but the implied author may be the company (e.g., McDonald’s or Snickers).
Anonymous articles on websites: The implied author could be the platform (e.g., WebMD).