Rhetoric and RTV

http://youtu.be/t9Su8NVPuF0

Confession: I’m obsessed with “reality” television. I think this is because it does such weird things to the genres of drama and comedy: take seven individuals, put them in a confined space, and, to quote Bravo, watch what happens. It is both written and unscripted, planned and un-rehearsed. Check out the first clip I’ve provided here to see a little bit of what I’m talking about: each cast member comes to the reunion with an agenda, something she thinks she must say or perform. Yet, it’s all one continuous take, making what I’m sure is a planned argument seem “real.”

To discuss how I might be able to connect RTV with rhetoric, first, I must outline the framework I utilize to understand what the term rhetoric actually means. From Bitzer and Bizzell and Herzberg’s text, we can see that language plays some role in shaping the reality of an individual or a community. This is done through persuasion or epistemology. Communities are formed through a shared set of ideals and (I would argue) key terms, both of which are shaped by and rooted in language. For example, without the language with which we can form consensus and texts to make and contain knowledge, we would not have Rhetoric and Composition. Thus, I think of rhetoric as the study of language and the ways in which it shapes our understanding of the world around us.

RTV does this. It constructs real people as heroes and villains through complex storytelling, storytelling that is both visual and verbal. Visually, editors choose which shots and scenes to include to make a narrative happen. Verbally, the cast members are interviewed (both individually and collectively), shaping their own narratives, identities, and realities. As an audience, those constructions solicit a response from us.

http://youtu.be/9uHObBvKeqA

Consider, if you will, the example that I’ve provided here: a link to a clip from the Real Housewives of Atlanta Season 4 Reunion Special. To provide some context, the main argument in this clip is between Nene Leakes and Sheree Whitfield. The two had quarreled in the opening episode of the season over a misunderstanding about booking an appearance at an event. The rest of the season documented the points of tension between the two. At the reunion special, there was a comment made about the home Sheree was building and Nene called it “Neverland.” Check out the clip.

I definitely think that the producers affected the way the audience perceives Sheree. In this particular example, while Sheree is explaining why her house has yet to be finished, the camera shows us reaction shots of the women listening to her story. The way the scene has been edited lends more authority to their reactions than to her voice. Thus, the audience is invited to accept their argument about Sheree (and her overall ethos). This is a visual kind of language: motion picture has a grammar, rhetoric, and poetics to it just like spoken or written language does. Bizzell and Herzberg suggest in their introduction “Our learning comes from interpretation, our disciplines grow by argument, our communities cohere through discourse, our ideologies are structures of persuasion. Reality itself is a function of the way we use language” (15). Rhetoric is at work in this example, both in the argument between the Sheree and Nene and in the editing of the scene, shaping how we see both women.