Affect, as a term of rhetoric, is the responsive, emotional feeling (affect) that precedes cognition.Brunner, E., & Deluca, K. (2016). The argumentative force of image networks: Greenpeace's panmediated global detox campaign. Argumentation and Advocacy, 52(4), 281. Affect differs from pathos as described by Aristotle as one of the modes of proofAristotle (2001). Pathos. In Bizzell, P. & Herzberg, B. (Eds.). The rhetorical tradition: Readings from classical times to the present. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's. and pathos as described by Jasinski as an emotional appealJasinski, J. (2001). Pathos. Sourcebook on rhetoric: Key concepts in contemporary rhetorical studies. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications. because it is “the response we have to things before we label that response with feelings or emotions.”Harold, Christine. (2009). On target: Aura, affect, and the rhetoric of "design democracy". Public Culture, 21(3), 599.
In further exploring this term, scholars recognized affect’s rhetorical role in literature,Rogers, M. (2012). The people, rhetoric, and affect: On the political force of du bois's the souls of black folk. American Political Science Review, 106(1), 188-203. photography,Brunner, E., & Deluca, K. (2016). The argumentative force of image networks: Greenpeace's panmediated global detox campaign. Argumentation and Advocacy, 52(4), 281.Murray, J. (2009). Nondiscursive rhetoric: Image and affect in multimodal composition. Ithaca, NY, USA: State University of New York Press. marketingHarold, Christine. (2009). On target: Aura, affect, and the rhetoric of "design democracy". Public Culture, 21(3), 599. and memory.Pruchnic, J., & Lacey, K. (2011). The future of forgetting: Rhetoric, memory, affect. Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 41(5), 472-494. In 2012, Rogers described how author W. E. B. Du Bois used the structure of his work, The Souls of Black Folk, to affect his audience into feeling shame.Rogers, M. (2012). The people, rhetoric, and affect: On the political force of du bois's the souls of black folk. American Political Science Review, 106(1), 188-203. In 2016, Brunner and Deluca proposed the term affective winds to describe “the force of images that moves people to engage and interact by exploring the affective potency of visual arguments.”Brunner, E., & Deluca, K. (2016). The argumentative force of image networks: Greenpeace's panmediated global detox campaign. Argumentation and Advocacy, 52(4), 281. Affective winds were part of the rhetorical persuasiveness of images shared through social media. In a different sense, Harold described how the Target Corporation’s advertising used aura and affect to democratize the appearance of some products.Harold, Christine. (2009). On target: Aura, affect, and the rhetoric of "design democracy". Public Culture, 21(3), 599. Affect has also been identified as a conduit through which rhetorical memories can be internalized.Pruchnic, J., & Lacey, K. (2011). The future of forgetting: Rhetoric, memory, affect. Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 41(5), 472-494.
Drawing from philosophy, someRickert, Thomas. (2013). Ambient Rhetoric: The Attunements of Rhetorical Being. U of Pittsburgh Press.Gross, Daniel. (2006). The secret history of emotion: From Aristotle's Rhetoric to modern brain science. Berkeley: U of California Press. rhetorical studies of affect have followed Martin Heidegger's articulation of Dasein which posits "affect" as the ground of reason. OthersPruchnic, Jeff and Kim Lacey. "The Future of Forgetting: Rhetoric, Memory, Affect. "Rhetoric Society Quarterly" 41.4 (2011), 1-23. follow post-structuralist and post-Heideggerian insights to follow affect's influence on rhetorical canons and digital rhetoric.
References