Graffiti and the Unpopular or Intolerant Sentiment

Gonos, George, Virginia Mulkern, and Nicholas Poushinsky.  “Anonymous Expression:  A Structuralist View of Graffiti.”  The Journal of American Folklore 89.351 (1976):  40-48.  Print.  

This article presents research into the content of bathroom graffiti in a variety of contexts.  The authors collected graffiti examples from universities, high schools and public locations.  They specifically examined the occurrence of these stall scrawls that contained racist or homophobic language.  Their findings suggest that this anonymous form “serves a special expressive need for some of its users” (47). 

They demonstrate that graffiti on these specific topics is more commonly present in contexts wherein the social norm is intolerant of public displays of these offensive types of language.  They explain that during times when racism and homophobia were considered accepted by the majority, there was no need to express these sentiments in an anonymous medium.  

The authors acknowledge that their research provides only a glimpse into the complexity of the issue of these special expressive occasions and only examines the occurrences in select contexts.  They suggest that to create better understanding of this issue they would need to continue this type of study as society values and acceptance continue to evolve.

This article gives a unique look into the exigence of graffiti.  It clearly demonstrates that at least one motive for graffiti writing is to give individuals an avenue to express the unpopular or unheard opinion.  Unfortunately, this article, like many others, focuses on graffiti used for unflattering purposes.  Since one of my interests is in re-imagining how we talk about graffiti work, I chafe at this article’s emphasis upon these graffiti writers with negative messages.  However, it does make me ask an important question:  what types of graffiti occur during times of uniform tolerance of a oppressive concept?  are positive graffiti instances always a sign that something negative is occurring in society at large?  Overall, I think this article gives me a firm starting place from which I can continue to explore the exigences that motivate graffiti writing.  

Recently in one women’s bathroom stall at the college where I teach numerous graffiti scrawlings have appeared over a short period of time.   Their appearance has been the subject of a number of office discussions about graffiti and the need to control it.  What interests me about these discussions (which I have yet not participated in) is that I have not heard anyone address the fact that the expressions are largely of a positive nature, including quotes by Eleanor Roosevelt, for example. I wonder what the exigence for this positive expression might be, but more so, I wonder what is implied in the desire to censor positive messages.  It seems that McLuhan is right in these contexts:  the medium is the message.  The content is overlooked as a result of the form.  

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Texts in the City--a clever title. See what she did there?

Carrington, Victoria. “I write, Therefore I am: Texts in the City.” Visual Communication 8.4 (2009): 409-425.

The piece explores the means in which graffiti texts are linked to key issues in contemporary urban life as well as how these texts create narratives about communities and places where they reside. To make her argument, Carrington first briefly overviews the history of graffiti. She acknowledges the fact that while graffiti is often seen as a sign of “urban decay and a youth culture spiraling out of control” (411) this form of expression actually dates back to a least the Roman Empire (which is why I think I will order the disks of Rome from Netflix, watch them and call it “research”—thanks, Kevin! ☺). Her point in addressing the roots of graffiti is to indicate the way texts have always been used as an urban message system.

Next, she addresses the multiple genres that fall under the umbrella term. She then explores different types of “tags” (calligraphic vs. “throw ups”) and the more all-encompassing term of “street art,” which includes expressions that are stencil or sticker-based, or include street furniture or other types of urban fixtures.

Drawing on comments from graffiti artists and scholars, she paints a picture of how graffiti operates within the city. Carrington demonstrates how graffiti is unwelcome and contested and how those qualities are what make it useful to study. Through examining graffiti we can raise important questions about private/public space and identity. For example, she quotes an interview with graffiti artist Swoon who addresses the complexity of public versus private space when she says “I want to be a part of the town center that I live in” (417). While she belongs to the space, the space does not belong to her. How can this be? Swoon also points to her work as a response to commercial expressions in the city. She hopes to create something that, unlike advertising, does not ask for something in return (417).

The way in which Carrington constructs graffiti paints it not as urban decay, but rather an artifact “of a DIY narrative” (420). This construction is, in part, a result of the way in which she uses the phrase “I write, therefore I am” to explain how graffitists write themselves into existence.

Thus, her argument demonstrates the cultural value of graffiti—in helping urban citizens to construct identity and navigate the contested spaces they inhabit. One particularly valuable piece of her argument is in the way she constructs graffiti in a positive light. Commentaries that continue to focus on the illegal quality of graffiti are short-sighted in their ability to fully address graffiti as a text. I think it’s important to understanding the role of graffiti in studies of composition and rhetoric to understand graffiti as a text that happens to be illegal, rather than an illegal text that resembles text. When we look at graffiti in the later sense, it seems that it is more difficult to access it as a rhetorical practice.

The Rhetoric of Graffiti...hypothetically.

Banksy's "Brinngg"

D’Angelo, Frank. “Sacred Cows Make Great Hamburgers:  The Rhetoric of Graffiti.”  College Composition and Communication 25.5 (1974):  173-180.  Print.

Like “Oscar Mayer Ads Are Pure Baloney:  The Graffitist as Critic of Advertising,” an article that D’Angelo published a year after this one (see my previous blog entry), this article addresses the means in which the aims of graffiti parallel those aims of other forms of communication.  While his subsequent article compared graffiti to the work of critics of advertising, this piece puts graffiti in comparison with proverb writing. 

D’Angelo explains that both proverbs and graffiti, at least propositional graffiti, are  “concise, direct, pithy, and incisive” (173).  While the two types of writing have similar traits, graffiti is said to make its point through “ridicule” rather than “folk wit” (173).  The author argues that because graffiti’s approach is entertaining, it can be an effective vehicle for teaching students style.

He suggests that while rhetoricians of the Middle Ages used proverbs to teach style, our contemporary cultural equivalent for teaching stylistic matters might be found in works of graffiti.  As a result, his article first comments upon multiple rhetorical strategies used by graffiti artists, and then discusses how those techniques operate as instruments of satire.  Specifically, he examines following techniques (which he calls “figures of style”): allusions, puns, irony, alliteration, rhyme, antithesis, parallelism, apposition, and parody.

In the end of his article, D’Angelo begins to explore the means in which these observations might be applied to the teaching of writing.  While the promise of this application was of most interest to me in selecting to read this article, it is the portion that is least developed.  This discussion of application accounts for one paragraph of the article—the concluding paragraph.  In this paragraph, D’Angelo states that the analysis of graffiti can be useful in linguistic and social criticism, and that it can help students understand stylistic choices.  He suggests that we help students understand their rhetorical choices more thoroughly through the analysis of these choices and by urging them to make their own such choices “conscious and meaningful.”   

Much in the way that I felt after reading his piece on the graffitist as critic of advertising, I am once again underwhelmed by the evidence D’Angelo provides to convince his reader.  The article contains multiple “graffitos,” an apparent blending of the word motto and graffiti, which provide examples of how a graffitist might write a proverbial statement with a satirical undertone.  However, there is, once again,  no proof that any actual graffiti has taken place in this manner.  In this article, like his other, the graffitist still seems theoretical.  In addition to the lack of evidence, that graffiti operates in this manner, the piece begs for further elaboration into why graffiti is an effective tool for introducing linguistic and social criticism and how it can be of used to help students understand rhetoric choices in a practical manner.  The practitioner in me wants examples, lesson plans or at least a detailed praxis oriented discussion.

The Graffitist as Critic of Advertising...at Least Theoretically

Banksy's "Because I'm Worthless"

D’Angelo, Frank. “Oscar Mayer Ads Are Pure Baloney: The Graffitist as Critic of Advertising.”  College Composition and Communication 26.3 (1975):  263-268.  Print.
 
In this piece, Frank D’Angelo makes the argument that graffiti artists sometimes operate as critics of advertising.  He explains that they reveal the subliminal messages made by the
advertising industry.  Of course, these artists construct their critiques through edgy parodies of the ads, rather than using genres that other critics of advertising might select.

D’Angelo’s article walks through various types of appeals that are made through advertisements and explains how graffiti artists might critique those appeals.  The author examines, for example, appeals to sex, adventure, and, fears and anxieties.  For each type of appeal, the author provides examples of an ad that uses the type of appeal in question, explains the type of subliminal message at work, and then suggests the type of response a graffitist might have.

For example, D’Angelo discusses the Virginia Slims ads that included a the line “You’ve come a long way, baby—Virginia Slims” and argues that the word choice (come, long and baby in particular) is meant to be sexually suggestive.  He then says that the graffitist wishes to make the audience aware of the subliminal sexual message by creating a parody of the original such as “You’ve come a long way, baby—Vagina Slims.”

This article is useful in depicting the means in which graffiti might accomplish tasks similar to those who select other genres for expression.  However, the article falls short in terms of building credibility for its argument through evidence.  While the author cites specific advertisements to deconstruct, his treatment of the graffiti artist is less specific.  Has an artist ever actually made the above parody of the Virginia Slims ad?  It’s unclear.  He speaks throughout the article of a nameless graffitist and the way in which this individual (presumably male) might treat or parody various ads, but gives no evidence that actual graffiti artists ever have parodied ads.  His argument is disconnected from the practice of graffiti and seems to only imagine a theoretical graffitist. 

Rather than providing evidence of this connection, he ends his article by saying that we ought to “study the appeals and the language that advertisers use to shape public tastes and desires and to look carefully at the graffiti which criticizes these appeals” (268).  His rationale for this recommendation is rooted in his sense of morality and a hope that graffitists can bring about social change by unveiling immoral usage of rhetorical appeals.  While he seems convinced that graffiti can “save” us (--of course I still believe it will be Rock 'n' Roll, not graffiti…), the strength of his article comes from its ability to draw our attention to how graffiti artists respond to exigencies that other communicators also address.  I believe it leaves contemporary readers in a position to seek out examples to serve as evidence for his claims, and to consider what this might mean for the composition classroom.

Graffiti As a Case Study for a Revised Writing Model

Edbauer, Jennifer H.  “(Meta)Physical Graffiti:  ‘Getting Up’ as Affective Writing Model.”  JAC 25.1 (2005):  131-159.  Print.

Jennifer H. Edbauer expands compositionists’ understanding of writing models through her analysis of graffiti and affect. She attempts to use graffiti writing as a case study to argue that traditional models of rhetoric and composition are lacking.  In particular, she aims at demonstrating how the rhetoricity of texts results from an interplay between signification and affect, despite the fact that affect is often neglected in traditional characterizations of what writing does.  She reveals the role of affect in writing through her analysis of “three familiar topoi—context, style, and signification” (134).   This analysis reveals how the concept of affect is inherently tied to what writing does and how it should not only exist in the theoretical discussions of composition, but also in conversations about praxis.

Edbauer explains how context is often examined by considering the circumstances that brought about a particular instance of writing.  Rhetorical scenes, she explains, are the product of conversations within discourse communities.  However, she maintains that we ought to consider that which “calls” one to write in addition to that which “culls” one to write.  She explains that being “culled” means being “involved in the writing, which allows for the ‘call’ to get heard in the first place” (139).  It refers to the way in which viewing graffiti might captivate a viewer and to the bodily sensation, the affect, that causes a rhetorical scene to “strike” an individual.

In discussing style, Edbauer explains that it addresses “certain rhetorical goals by answering the call to write” (142).  Drawing from Strunk and White she indicates that style is a matter of being distinguished.  For the graffiti artist, accomplishing this task is done in opposition to the suggestions of Strunk and White—through overdoing it.  By “getting up” their work in as many places as possible, they create an “aggregate of sensation” (144).  In this way, the style of graffiti artists is seen as experiential. 

To introduce the idea of signification and affect, Edbauer builds upon one answer to the question “what does writing do?”  Graffiti, she explains, has multiple layers of significations.  However, she explains that graffiti does something beyond signification—it creates a visceral effect outside of its meaning. 

Her treatment of these topoi demonstrate “’other processes’ that are present to the writing scene” (153) that our pedagogies have previously ignored.   She proposes that an affective writing model would serve to purposes—exploring the meaning and the impact of sensation that are brought about through rhetorical scenes. 

This article provides an example of how nontraditional rhetorical scenes can inform the composition classroom and deepen understanding of how composition practices take place.  In an age when new genres are quickly evolving and becoming important to public rhetoric (e.g. Twitter), I believe it is important to understand how we might evolve our praxis through consideration of what we might learn from the “strangeness” of genres we do not often invite to our classrooms.  

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