the faces of homelessness campaign
TRANSCRIPT
THE FACES OF HOMELESSNESS CAMPAIGN: A REFLECTIVE ANALYSIS 1
The Faces of Homelessness Campaign: A Reflective Analysis
The rise of homelessness in Florida is astounding. The 2012 Annual Homeless
Assessment Report, issued by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, states
that Florida witnessed a 14.8% increase. However, in that same duration, homelessness declined
5.7% nationally. Florida accounts for 8.7% of all homeless individuals in the United States; this
represents the third biggest population of homeless persons in the nation. Between 2012 and
2013, the figure of homeless people in Orange County rose from 2,281 to 2,937; this positions
Orange County fourth for the highest amount of homeless people in Florida. Additionally,
Orange County accounts for the largest number of homeless students with 4,844. Despite the fact
that there are many positive programs and organizations that aid and assist the homeless, the
recurrent rise of homelessness in Central Florida is bleak. This paper desires to accurately
evaluate the rhetorical strategies and methods employed throughout the Faces of Homelessness
Campaign. Our campaign specifically aims to raise awareness and combat the rise of
homelessness in Orange County, Florida. We strive to do this by changing the misconceptions
and stereotypes that are associated with the homeless. Principally, our desired target audience is
the University of Central Florida student body. The information, photos, and stories contained in
our blog will be examined. Furthermore, the social media platforms utilized to most effectively
reach our audience will be analyzed. These evaluations are provided to see how effectively the
rhetorical ideologies and methods learned throughout this semester were developed through this
campaign.
Several key rhetorical strategies can be detected in our Faces of Homelessness Campaign.
Several pathos and emotional appeals were productively utilized through the depiction and use of
sympathetic characters. Likewise, our campaign is supported and strengthened through the
THE FACES OF HOMELESSNESS CAMPAIGN: A REFLECTIVE ANALYSIS 2
rhetorical appeals made to the visual culture. Lastly, character is established by our use of
practical wisdom, goodwill and virtue. Wholly, The Faces of Homelessness campaign combines
an emotionally and visually compelling blog with a strong presence on social media to create and
unify a successful campaign.
Pathos and emotional appeals consistently remained the focus of our campaign. Thus it
became imperative to firstly consider the emotional state of our audience to successfully make
pathos appeals. However, it became noticeable that our audience was chiefly apathetic in regards
to the homeless. Efforts to make emotional entreaties to a largely unconcerned group of
individuals provided numerous constraints. As a result, the development of sympathetic
characters became the rhetorical strategy used in our campaign in order to invoke emotion and
create identification. A sympathetic character is an individual that readers, or audiences, are able
to sympathize or relate to (Canning & Reinsborough, 2013). Our objective was to create
identification between our audience and the homeless through the use of relatable, sympathetic
characters on our blog. The homeless individuals are consequently portrayed through personal
photographs with short quotes or stories. These photos principally focus on the facial expressions
of the homeless individuals in order to create identification through shared physical
characteristics. Though our audience may not be able to relate on a psychological level, one
cannot deny or dehumanize the unifying physical and biological characteristics that we all share.
Additionally, our quotes and short stories helped aid in establishing identification. The
captivating photograph and story of “Katie the Aspiring Medical Student,” allows our audience
to identify with her demographically on a basis of shared student status (Arnold, 2014). These
stories de-emphasized our sympathetic characters’ homelessness and focused on the
individualistic and humanizing aspects of who they are. These pathos appeals were employed in
THE FACES OF HOMELESSNESS CAMPAIGN: A REFLECTIVE ANALYSIS 3
order to alter the perceptions much of our audience holds towards the homeless. Ultimately, The
Faces of Homelessness campaign decreased constraints that arose from indifference among UCF
students, regarding the homeless, through the use of these rhetorical methods.
Through the use of sympathetic characters and identification we lessened some of the
constraints surrounding this particular exigence. However, it was necessary for our emotional
appeals to be in a medium that effectively catered and fully involved our audience. In a
generation dominated by visual imagery and social media presences, we determined that the
most successful rhetorical medium would be a blog featuring photographs that induced symbolic
action. This blog was promoted through our various social media platforms in order to reach our
target audience successfully. Thus, our campaign is strengthened by the creation of a virtual
experience through a predominantly photographic blog appealing to the visual culture. Visuals
are powerful because they create presence and immediacy. According to Rhetoric and Civic Life,
“Visuals are a powerful example of presentational symbolism because they create virtual
experiences in a particularly intense way, by making audience members feel as though they were
present to witness an event” (Palczewski, Ice & Fritch, 2012, p.62). Additionally, in Explore
Beautiful Trouble, a primary principle of a successful campaign is to show your message through
visuals rather than badgering or telling your audience what to think (Canning, Reinsborough &
Buckland, 2013). Our rhetorical ideas were most efficiently and persuasively displayed through
the creation of our virtual experience. Our display of rhetorical ideas provided for us the most
effective means of altering the perceptions of our audience. In general, our strong social media
presence combined with the immediacy of a primarily visual display, through our blog, was the
best rhetorical procedure in reaching and persuading our audience.
THE FACES OF HOMELESSNESS CAMPAIGN: A REFLECTIVE ANALYSIS 4
As young, female students with diminutive social power, our need to establish character
and credibility became obvious to eliminate constraints that this produced. We establish
character through the use of practical wisdom, goodwill and virtue. Practical wisdom exhibits
itself through our decision to provide current informative statistics on specific pages of our blog.
The page “Our Campaign” features content issued by the 2013 Council on Homelessness Report.
The information is condensed so that it is succinctly summarized and easily accessed. In
addition, links are provided under the “Articles/Links” page to verify and confirm the authority
of the information. These factual reports all showcase the sound reasoning and common sense
used through our attempt to establish credibility. Furthermore it marginally establishes expert
power, or the power stemming from knowledge. Virtue is defined in Rhetoric and Civic Life as:
“the value the audience considers worthy of merit” (Palczewski, Ice, & Fritch, 2012, p.153).
Virtue is established in our campaign through generosity, kindness, and moral excellence. Our
audience is able to assess and observe the virtue and goodwill exercised, in our relations with the
homeless, through our blog. The interviews, the stories, and our dealings with the homeless all
contribute to establishing virtue. Thus, through the use of current homeless statistics, the placed
interest of the homeless above our own interests, and the virtuous characteristics exhibited on our
blog we construct ethos and a positive social image.
In conclusion, the constraints our group faced in regards to efficiently reaching and
persuading our audience were numerous. However, rhetorical strategies utilizing sympathetic
characters and identification diminished constraints that arose from audience indifference. In
addition, we made appeals to the virtual world through emotional imagery and consistent
powerful presences on social media. These rhetorical methods decreased many limitations that
arose from our need to most effectively and persuasively display our rhetorical ideas to reach an
THE FACES OF HOMELESSNESS CAMPAIGN: A REFLECTIVE ANALYSIS 5
unresponsive audience. Lastly, restrictions arose from the necessity to establish credibility to our
audience. These constraints were tackled by constructing character through practical wisdom,
goodwill, and virtue as seen on our blog. In conclusion, The Faces of Homelessness campaign
excellently developed many rhetorical methods learned throughout this semester to, ultimately,
persuade and alter the perceptions of our audience.
THE FACES OF HOMELESSNESS CAMPAIGN: A REFLECTIVE ANALYSIS 6
References
Arnold, E,. The Faces of Homelessness. Retrieved April 22, 2014, from
http://thefacesofhomelessness.wordpress.com/
Canning, D., Reinsborough, P. (2013). Lead with sympathetic characters. Explore Beautiful
Trouble. Retrieved from http://beautifultrouble.org/principle/lead-with-sympathetic-
characters/
Canning, D., Reinsborough, P., Buckland, K. (2013). Show, don’t tell. Explore Beautiful
Trouble. Retrieved from http://beautifultrouble.org/principle/show-dont-tell/
Palczewski, C. H., Ice, R., & Fritch, J. (2012). Rhetoric in civic life. State College, PA: Strata
Pub.