Katie Wisniewski
College Writing 2
Rhetorical Analysis
About-face:
Women in Society
Everyday people visit millions upon millions
of websites. When an internet surfer first encounters the about-face website,
many thoughts start running through their heads. Their eye is first caught by
the title of the website, About-face, which is presented on the top of the
webpage. This leads the reader wanting to know more about this organization and
what they do, just by looking at the name.
About-face seems to be a website about women in the media and how they
are portrayed in society. The main point of this website is to show women and
girls how to resist the negative messages of social media in today’s society.
Many
women these days struggle day to day about their self-image. Women are getting
less self-confident, and this is mostly because of the messages being sent to
them through social media. This media is
telling girls and women every day that they need to strive to be better and
look better. But these message aren’t
being sent in a positive way. Instead they’re being sent through criticisms of
these stars we look up to and hate that is being spread through various
means. This makes women stop and think:
if these beautiful people are the ones that are being called ugly and fat, what
does that make me? This website wants women to be empowered by who they are,
and to not change themselves because of what media is spewing in their ears.
The text on this website’s home page is very
limited. Instead, you are presented with multiple options that would redirect
you to more information. Once you click
on one of these options, you are 
taken
to information that better explains that segment of the website. This as an
effective way of displaying text and visual together because finding out more
about certain categories is the reader’s choice. There are endless choices on this website.
Some include signing a petition, looking at certain galleries about “winners”
and “offenders”, getting involved, and lots of information about taking action
and getting more information about the website and women related problems in
society. The author wants you to get involved in the website and explore your
options while finding out about their views.
The audience would be young women who are self-conscious or worried
about their image compared to that of society’s perfect image. They want to change women’s views that they
have about themselves and the people around them.
taken
to information that better explains that segment of the website. This as an
effective way of displaying text and visual together because finding out more
about certain categories is the reader’s choice. There are endless choices on this website.
Some include signing a petition, looking at certain galleries about “winners”
and “offenders”, getting involved, and lots of information about taking action
and getting more information about the website and women related problems in
society. The author wants you to get involved in the website and explore your
options while finding out about their views.
The audience would be young women who are self-conscious or worried
about their image compared to that of society’s perfect image. They want to change women’s views that they
have about themselves and the people around them.
About-face
uses many strategies to tug at the emotions of the reader. With their “Gallery
of Offenders” they strive to make the reader feel upset or mad with the
offenders. This option is presented in an inviting way-they are showing a
famous artist and are asking the reader why he would be an offender, which makes
the reader wonder. After getting redirected, they ask the reader multiple
questions about Robin Thicke and how his video for “Blurred Lines” would be
detrimental to women in society. By making the reader upset, they are
encouraging the reader to take action or get their opinion heard. Showing the
reader a familiar face that they may have once looked up to and telling them
that they have offended women in society has a huge impact on someone.
This
website shows extreme credibility. First of all, the website is directed
towards women in our society. It would
only be appropriate that since it is directed towards women, it is also
published by women. When clicking on an option to find out more “about us”, the
reader is presented with a picture of multiple women. These are the women who
run this organization and this website, so the author isn’t being held behind
closed doors. After this, one could read the story of how the website got
started. Here, they explain where they got the idea for this website, and why
they want you to get involved. Overall, they are very justified in contributing
to this website. The people behind about-face are very relatable to what is
being said on the page.
The
overall layout of the website is very organized and inviting. They use many
colors to help direct the attention of the reader. You first see the title of
the website, and underneath it, is the main issue on this website, which is the
message “Don’t fall for the media circus”. Also, all of the different options
on this website are out in the open, and are not overwhelming, there are only
about twelve different redirections on the page. They also utilize many
different pictures of well-known celebrities, which let the reader know that
they are involved in modern social media.
Overall,
the text and the visuals work together very well. Not only are they both
presented in an open and inviting way, they are all related to one another. The
pictures that are used to back up the text are well related and emphasize what
the text is trying to say. The visuals
are almost placed as invitations to the text, as one needs to click on the
visual before they are presented with the full textual information. If all of the text was just displayed on the
home page, the reader would get overwhelmed with too much information and most
likely not read any of it. Without the text, the visuals would just be a lot of
pictures of different women and celebrities. Without one another, the text and
visuals would not be beneficial to the website.
In
conclusion, there are many aspects that make up a successful webpage. When
someone on the internet comes upon About-face, they can learn many things about
women and society. I believe that this website truly is about empowering women
to ignore the negative strains the media have on society. By utilizing many
rhetorical appeals, this website is very successful in presenting their
information and persuading the reader to take action. Viewers of this webpage are very encouraged
to change not only their outlook on women in society, but someone else’s.
Works Cited
http://www.about-face.org/
