Ridolfo & Rife: Everything is Still a Remix

            With regards to Ridolfo and Rife’s article their terminology consisting of words such as rhetorical velocity, delivery, appropriation, and recomposition are all directly related because they tie back to the greater subject of remix and remediation and therefore the re-appropriation of a given work. They are not all the same thing, but they make up facets of a much bigger subject, and all bleed into one another at a given point, although their contexts and their intended ultimate use may differ.

            To begin, when talking about rhetorical velocity this term directly relates to a given work, and the rhetoric of a given work we have to look at the rhetorical delivery as it relates to any and all copyright infringements, (Ridolfo & Rife 229). This term directly relates to the methods that are used to get the message of the rhetoric across, rather the delivery method as a whole. Specifically, in the text it is described as a “strategic concept of redelivery in which a rhetor theorizes how certain newspapers, blogs, or television stations may recompose and re-distribute the release both as and in other media,” (Ridolfo & Rife 339).  The sense that it greatly applies to when referencing Maggie Ryan is that a photograph that she was a subject in was remediated and appropriated in an incorrect manner that she felt was not fitting, given the context which the photo was taken in.

            In addition, delivery in this context related to the manner in which the given work was presented as a completely new text. In the case of Maggie Ryan and her photo, the picture itself was remixed and therefore redelivered in three different contexts, all of which did not concern her, and all of which she thought was a highly inappropriate use for a photo that was taken at a protest. The original intention of the photo was just being a piece of media taken at the protest. It was not meant to be used in an advertising campaign for a university’s gain. It was legitimately just a photo taken while an event was going on.

            Next, appropriation in this sense refers to a work or a text being used in a different context aside from the originally intended one. Furthermore a work or a text is shaped differently, and presented in a different manner, and in a way is considered a remix of something that was already pre-existing. It was a previously existing photo of students at an event, and the university just thought the photo was great and decided to use it in their advertising because they felt it portrayed an accurate depiction of student life in Michigan. To an extent, just because the photo was good, does not mean go ahead and use it for advertising purposes. There are so many other photos that are taken at universities, it is always a mystery as to how the choices are made for what to use in their marketing and advertising campaigns.

            Lastly, recomposition ties into the subject of remix and remediation because something is used in a context that was again different than the originally intended one. It is made characteristically different, and redone in a manner that there are traces of the original, but the intended meaning and audience of the text or work that has been recomposed now changes.

            In the end, to tie this all back to Carol Miller’s definition of what genre means I think that rhetorical velocity is the terminology most appropriate when grappling with the subject of genre, and generally trying to define the constraints of genre. Rhetorical velocity refers directly to the concept of delivery, and if we are talking about genre it can be paired directly with the manner in which a text or a work of art. Genre when paired with rhetorical velocity and then applied to a subject like recorded music, can take on the meaning of the type of music that the audience is dealing with; for example, the genre of music is hip-hop/rap, and the method for rhetorical velocity might be the different elements within the music that make it part of that genre or even a subgenre. To give a better example encompassing the two subjects I’ll discuss the genre of R&B. Take an artist like FKA Twigs; the genre that she is recording music in is referred to formally as R&B, but the rhetorical velocity that she chooses her music to take further remediate her music to become affiliated with the neo-R&B and witch-hop elements of more modern pop music.

Overall, the term in the text that surprised me the most in the text was re-appropriation. I feel that, if a text is already being appropriated, this means that its original artistic intention has already been changed. If something is being re-appropriated, it should just be considered a remediation or a remix generally speaking.

-Valeria Vargas