Columbia College Chicago

Key Concepts

in Writing and Rhetoric

Our ten key concepts are interrelated strategies for navigating the world as writers and readers. Learn to recognize these concepts in the work of others and to explain your own rhetorical choices in the texts you compose.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This video was written and produced by Eddie Seitz in Jennifer Ailles Fall 2014 Writing and Rhetoric I class. It provides an introduction to the key concepts and begins to provides a tentative answer to one of the central questions of our course: What does it mean to write in the 21st century?

 

 

Affordanceswhat one thing can do that other things can’t
Alphabetic Textthe letters and words we use to communicate
Arrangementthe deliberate placement of pieces of a project in time or space
Circulationwhat happens to a text once it is produced
Ethoswho other people think we are based on what and how we write and speak
Fielda group of people, the texts they write and the things they do in order to generate and circulate knowledge related to a particular idea or question
Genrea category or classification of something
Imagea visual representation of something or someone
Kairosa qualitative sense of time, a sense of opportunity
Remixthe manipulation and rearrangement of “original” materials modes, genres, and stories into something new