Toward a Topos of Visual Rhetoric: Teaching Aesthetics Through Color and Typography

Introduction

As the importance of visual rhetoric has grown in the field of technical and professional communication (TPC) over the past 30 years, increasing attention has been directed toward visual rhetoric pedagogies. Producing technical communication requires proficiency in both visual and verbal literacies (see Brumberger & Northcut, 2013, pp. 1–7) with instruction tending to be situated, as Lauer (2013a) characterizes it, “at the intersection of visual literacy, visual rhetoric, and document design approaches” (p. 119). Indeed, instruction in design principles and page layout is often included in commonly used technical communication textbooks targeted to non-majors (see Alred, Brusaw, & Oliu, 2015; Johnson-Sheehan, 2015; Lannon & Gurak, 2014; Markel, 2015). Yet, while teaching perceptual principles gives instructors a pragmatic heuristic for guiding students in making visually effective design decisions, perhaps because such instruction is now routine in many technical communication service courses, this method often goes unquestioned with limited attention directed toward critiquing its limitations.

In this article, I argue that a critical component of document design instruction that has tended to be undertheorized in visual rhetoric pedagogical scholarship and oversimplified in textbook coverage is the role of aesthetic considerations. Aesthetics is closely linked to abstract notions of style, beauty, and taste. Thus, this aspect of document design is often seen as subjective and grounded in the notion that such work involves creativity and artistic expression, revealing the influence of what Schriver (1997) has described as the romantic tradition. Yet, the aesthetics of document design is very much contextually situated, reflecting particular cultural values (see Kostelnick, 1995) that I suggest can be identified and explained.

To address this shortcoming in visual rhetoric instruction in the technical communication service course, I propose a heuristic that teachers and students can use together to create a vocabulary for discussing the aesthetic aspects of color and typography in document design work. I focus on these visual elements specifically because we tend to interpret color and typography through metaphoric associations, which rely on shared cultural knowledge. I argue that the heuristic I propose allows students and teachers to generate a collection of visual topoi or commonplaces for describing the aesthetic value of color and typography that they can then draw from to inform visual analysis and production work.

My argument in this article grew, in part, from an investigation among technical communication instructors that sought to learn about their teaching practices as well as any challenges they may face related to visual rhetoric in their technical communication service courses. Thus, I begin by describing several focus groups sessions that explored these topics, detailing points raised by participants about the limitations of instruction in perceptual principles and rhetorical theory. I then conduct a literature review that explores the ways that aesthetics has been addressed in pedagogical scholarship focusing on visual rhetoric in service courses in TPC as well as in several commonly used textbooks for non-majors. While textbook coverage does not necessarily reflect actual instructional practices, their content can nonetheless lend insight into dominant pedagogical patterns and trends in the field.

Drawing from the focus group discussions and an instructional approach that participants identified as modeling, I propose that teachers and students in basic technical communication service courses can use what I characterize as definitional and descriptive terms to provide summative and evaluative assessments of document design work. I suggest that definitional terms are likely already in use because these terms stem directly from the principles of design and rhetorical theory, two commonly used pedagogical approaches in the field. I then propose a framework specifically for generating descriptive terms, which focuses on working with color and typography and that students and instructors create together. By using this heuristic to generate descriptive terms, I argue that students and instructors can construct a vocabulary for discussing aesthetics that complements the definitional terms and that instructors and students can use as a collection of visual topoi for guiding discussions about visual analysis and production of technical communication artifacts in the basic service course.

Focus Groups

Literature Review: Addressing Aesthetics in TPC

Aesthetics has long been an important consideration in the creation of “functional texts” (Kostelnick, 1994, p. 101). In TPC today, we tend to use the term in two ways: (a) to describe the extent to which a creator’s specific design choices—layout, color and typography, image selection—are perceived as visually pleasing (visual appeal), and/or (b) to describe the particular design style or visual effect that the creator of a technical document or artifact constructs by making specific visual choices (design style). These two categories align with Dake’s (2005) characterization of aesthetics as “the quality [of an object or visual representation] itself and the response to it” (p. 4). While these aspects are not separate—we frequently assess and react to design work simultaneously—this division provides an organizational framework for discussing the ways that aesthetics has commonly been addressed in TPC. In this section, I use these categories, visual appeal and design style, to review the pedagogical literature on visual rhetoric and visual rhetoric coverage in four select technical communication textbooks that are commonly used in the basic technical communication service course.

Aesthetics: Visual Appeal

Several references that use aesthetics through the visual appeal perspective described earlier can be found in the pedagogical scholarship. For instance, Amare and Manning (2007) use the word aesthetic when discussing layout considerations in their “visual rhetoric tutorial,” specifically using “decorative aesthetic” twice (pp. 57, 64). Aesthetic also characterizes the “tone” of two student posters (p. 205) and is included in a list of suggestions for classroom practice (p. 207) in Lauer and Sanchez’s (2011) article on facilitating visuospatial thinking. Their evaluation criteria in the appendix also differentiate between color and type “contrast” and color and type aesthetic (p. 213) as well as “aesthetic dynamism/creativity” (p. 214). Lauer (2013b) includes a similar evaluation criterion, “aesthetic interest/creativity,” in her work on the role of critical reflection in student design work, while Toth (2013) uses the phrase “aesthetically pleasing” (p. 451) to caution against the design of infographics that do not also reflect strong rhetorical decision-making.

As these examples illustrate, aesthetics is often used as a synonym in visual rhetoric pedagogical scholarship to describe an overall sense of appeal or attractiveness of visual representations. Indeed, this trend can also be seen in several commonly used technical communication textbooks targeted to non-majors: Gerson and Gerson (2017), Johnson-Sheehan (2015), Lannon and Gurak (2014), and Markel (2015). While only Lannon and Gurak (2014) specifically use the word aesthetic to convey the idea of visual appeal, ¹ indirect references to visual appeal and attractiveness are pervasive in many of the chapters that cover visual communication (page layout and document design, and creating graphics). For instance, Markel (2015) advises students to “Create different grids until the design is attractive … ” (p. 263) and describes a three-column layout as “creative” because it allows “the designer to fill the page with content while keeping it visually interesting” (p. 278). Johnson-Sheehan (2015) explains that: “Today, readers expect paper-based documents to be attractive and easy to read, and to include images and color” (p. 447). In their chapter on graphics, Gerson and Gerson (2017) advocate using “ … shading [to] provide[s] the right touch of artistry to enhance the information communicated” (p. 162). Color is also described as facilitating visual interest (Lannon & Gurak, 2014, p. 279; Markel, 2015, p. 303).

Clearly visual appeal is important in design work. Yet, the exact design strategies that creators might use to construct this particular visual effect are not well articulated. Northcut (2013) specifically addresses the difficultly of responding to aesthetic, considerations in students’ design work. She notes that such judgments are often perceived as “whatever I like,” (p. 189) but also that TPC instructors do not necessarily use a consistent vocabulary for discussing visual rhetoric, generally speaking. At the same time, the lack of a direct explanation in the pedagogical scholarship and textbook coverage of the strategies and conventions that lead to strong visual appeal does not indicate that this visual effect is achieved solely through intuition or that these strategies and conventions are unknown. Rather, the visual features and conventions that we often characterize as “good design” can be explained by addressing aesthetics through the second perspective that I identified—that is, as referring to a particular design style or effect created by making specific visual choices.

Aesthetics: Design Style

As previously discussed, aesthetics in TPC conceived through the first perspective I identify, the overall sense of visual attractiveness of a particular document or technical communication artifact, specifically refers to what Dake (2005) describes as our “response” when we assess “the quality [of an object or visual representation]” (p. 4). The visual “qualities” then (or what I am referring to as design style) that invoke the perceived sense of visual appeal (or response) that often tend to characterize effective document design today can be explained to a large extent through what Kostelnick has referred to in much of his work as a “modernist design aesthetic.”

Characterized by “functional simplicity,” and a “clean, minimalist” appearance (Kostelnick, 1998, p. 476), this design style emerged in the early 20th century with the advent of modernism and became closely linked to Gestalt theory. As Kostelnick (1990) explains, “Many modernist principles of design are founded on innate perception,” which designers could then invoke through Gestalt perceptual principles (p. 22). Gestalt cognitive psychology proposed that humans organize and perceive visual information in universal ways that impose a sense of order. For instance, figure/ground contrast explains why we interpret visual information on a page or screen as either figure (the primary visual content) or ground (the background for the figure) and why we see visual information that is grouped together as related. Poorly executed perceptual principles then are directly related to reader comprehension and meaning-making because readers can quickly become intellectually taxed if they cannot easily understand how information is visually organized. At the same time, poorly executed perceptual principles are also an aesthetic issue because readers interpret documents that are difficult to understand as “bad design.” “Good” or “bad” design then is simultaneously both a pragmatic and an aesthetic judgment.

Indeed, Kostelnick (2007) argues in his theoretical work on data visualizations that perceptual principles and aesthetics are closely linked. “Clean” design “looks good” because readers can more easily cognitively process the information therein and because such design schemes follow established visual conventions that reflect this cultural value. Data visualizations in particular achieve this “clarity,” he explains, through “minimalist, high-contrast displays guided by perceptual principles” that we often interpret as “objective, universal, and culturally neutral” (p. 283; see also Kinross, 1985). While the rise of post-modernism has pushed back against many of these positivist values (see Kostelnick, 1994, 1995, 2007), modern design aesthetics can still be found in the 21st century in “the rational page design of computer manuals, the geometry of online icons, and even the sans serif text of a … graphical interface” (Kostelnick & Hassert, 2003, p. 93).

In contemporary instructional materials in TPC, there is no shortage of language that prompts students to create design work that aligns with the conventions of modernist design. For instance, in her well-known handbook on principles for “non-designers,” Williams’ (2014) explains that a good alignment strategy “creates a clean and sophisticated look,” while proximity “reduces clutter, and gives the reader a clear structure” (p. 13). In a redesign quiz, she prompts readers to rework the visual elements to create a “more professional, clean, and direct advertisement” (p. 91), and repetition promotes “clarity of the information” (p. 68). In Williams discussion, the connection between effectively applying the principles she outlines and creating “good design” is clear. Good design is streamlined and uncluttered. Good design is “clean.”

These same themes can also be found in the technical communication textbooks I discussed earlier, which frequently link modernist design values like clarity and simplicity with the strong execution of the principles of design, which facilitates comprehension and readability. For instance, Markel (2015) describes a layout that uses multiple columns as “neat and professional” (p. 276). He advises “ … when you design a page, you want to make the text inviting and easy to read” (p. 277) and “to pay more attention to designing your [online] information so that it is clear and attractive” (p. 281). Gerson and Gerson (2017) state that “Graphics will help you achieve conciseness, clarity, and cosmetic appeal” (p. 160); these visuals should also be “simple and uncluttered” (Markel, 2015, p. 297), and the design should be “clean and easy to read” (Lannon & Gurak, 2014, p. 251). Gerson and Gerson (2017) caution against using “Too many highlighting techniques [because they] are distractions and clutter the document design” (p. 146) and, Johnson-Sheehan (2015) advises following the principle of “consistency” can help “limit[ing] the amount of clutter” (p. 461).

While the above discussion tends to align with aesthetics as referring to a particular design style (modernist), there is overlap with aesthetics as visual appeal (as discussed earlier). For instance, Gerson and Gerson (2017) condemn using “Ugly blocks of unappealing text [that] negatively impact readability” (p. 137), while Johnson-Sheehan (2015) observes: “Unbalanced pages add tension to the reading process” (p. 470). In the scholarly literature, Allen (1996) includes a checklist at the end of her article on ethics and creating graphics that includes a category for aesthetics that links these two perspectives. More specifically, she prompts creators of technical communication to consider: “Is the visual design attractive? Do the enhancements contribute to meaning or add clutter? Are any dimensions important for interpreting meaning blocked from view?” (p. 102). The reference to “attractive” here refers to the document’s overall visual appeal, while the notion that “enhancements” should not “add clutter” points toward attending to the document’s design style—more specifically, a modernist design aesthetic.

As the discussion in this section seeks to demonstrate, aesthetics tends to refer (often simultaneously) to both visual appeal and design style in the pedagogical scholarship on visual rhetoric and in textbook coverage in the field. These two concepts are deeply connected, but the relationship between making specific visual choices, like applying Gestalt principles, and the value judgments that we then assign to these choices—clean, simple, neutral, high readability—are not well-articulated. Indeed, the “clean” aesthetic that characterizes a modernist design style describes more than just the successful application of design principles; clean, simple, and uncluttered are the values that we attribute to executing these principles in particular ways.

Most technical communication instructors are probably far more comfortable invoking rhetorical theory and perceptual principles to discuss student design work than aesthetics for several reasons. We can often easily point to rhetorical theory to explain when design choices do or do not meet the informational needs of the intended audience. We can advise students when they are appropriately adhering to genre conventions or breaking them in ways that might be confusing for readers. And we can point to perceptual principles to explain how arranging information in particular ways is more (or less) visually effective. However, discussing the aesthetic aspects of design choices can be problematic because this aspect is often seen as driven by intuition, creativity, or an innate understanding of what “looks good.” But the visual conventions that characterize “good design” can be explained by particular “conventional codes,” as Kostelnick (2004) puts it, that “embody cultural values and norms” (p. 215). Further, these conventions often “seem[s] transparent [only] because we know the [semiotic] code already” (Kress & van Leeuwen, 1996, p. 32). In the next section of this article, I propose a strategy for identifying and working with some of these codes by focusing on color and typography that technical communication instructors can use in their basic technical communication service course.

Toward a Topos of the Visual: Teaching Aesthetics in the Technical Communication Service Course Through Color and Typography

One strategy for concretely tying aesthetic considerations to document design work through the two perspectives—visual appeal and design style—that I discuss in the previous section lies in the modeling approach that several focus group participants reported using. That is, one of the key instructional strategies for calling attention to the conventions of “good” as well as “bad” design that many participants discussed was critiquing examples of effective and ineffective design with their classes. Generally speaking, instructors reported often using modeling as an analytical tool for evaluating design work. This strategy allows them to focus on micro-level or macro-level concerns or both, demonstrating that design work draws simultaneously on multiple theoretical frameworks—principles of design, color theory, typography, and rhetorical considerations. An instructor teaching scientific posters, for example, might show several “good” and “bad” examples to illustrate genre conventions, point out the ways that the writer or designer used the principles of design, and highlight color, typography, and graphics choices while connecting these decisions to a specific rhetorical situation—a professional conference presentation, for example.

During these modeling sessions, I propose that instructors and students discuss these choices using what I characterize as definitional and descriptive terms. Definitional terms are those that are already well-established in visual rhetoric instruction, such as Williams’ (2014) principles of design, white space, characterizations of different color schemes (e.g., complementary, analogous, triadic), and categories of typeface (e.g., serif, sans serif). I categorize these concepts as definitional terms because they are frequently used to define particular kinds of relationships between visual elements and the specific visual effects that such relationships achieve. For instance, contrast defines the relationship that is created between two visual elements that are very different, such as size and weight in typography, which work together to create a visual hierarchy in textual information. The design principle proximity defines the visual effect that is created when two design elements appear either close together or further away from each other, enabling readers to visually understand information as related or not related.

Descriptive terms, on the other hand, are adjectives like formal, professional, friendly, or playful that describe the ways that viewers might perceive the effects of a particular design choice—that is, the aesthetic value that they might assign through the tone or feeling or style that the choice invokes. Certainly, viewers also place aesthetic value on definitional terms, as demonstrated by the adjectives commonly used to describe visual choices that align with modernist design aesthetics as previously discussed. However, I am drawing a distinction between terms that we tend to use to define design effects and terms that we tend to use to describe design effects in order to propose strategies for addressing the aesthetic spaces of design work that often seem more subjective and thus less concrete and well-defined.

At the same time, some aesthetic considerations are less ambiguous than others. For instance, research on intercultural communication demonstrates that warm and cool colors are often interpreted similarly across cultures (e.g., Madden, Hewett, & Roth, 2000). Amare and Manning (2013) suggest that color can be understood primarily through emotional associations, and Kress and van Leeuwen (2002) argue that certain aspects of color, such as saturation and modality (realism), often hold consistent meanings. Bright, saturated, warm colors often metaphorically signify vibrancy and excitement, for example, while Brumberger’s (2003a, 2003b) work on typography proposes that some typefaces have “personas” (see also Mackiewicz & Moller, 2004). Script typefaces usually convey elegance, for instance, while a sans serif typeface like Helvetica conveys the clean, streamlined aesthetic of modernism. These metaphoric associations of color and typography and the feeling or tone or style that they convey are constructed through cultural conventions that invoke particular values. In other words, there is nothing inherently vibrant about a bright color or elegant about a script typeface or neutral about Helvetica. Rather these visual elements—typography and color—invoke abstract ideas that are connected to when and how such elements have been previously used [see also van Leeuwen’s, (2006) discussion about “connotation” and “experiential metaphor” in typography, informed in part by Lakoff & Johnson, (1980)]. For instance, a contemporary script typeface invokes the nostalgia of the handwritten letters that were common before the invention of digital composing technologies, while Helvetica invokes the sentiments associated with modernism.

Because color and typeface are interpreted through metaphoric associations that are often interpreted in consistent ways (like the examples discussed earlier), I suggest that incorporating descriptive terminology (in addition to definitional terms) can provide a strong framework for discussing these aesthetic choices with students. More specifically, I propose that students and instructors can generate their own descriptive adjectives for these two design features (color and typography) through two brainstorming exercises that draw from shared cultural knowledge, which I describe in more detail in the next section. Through these exercises, students and teachers can then develop a collection of visual commonplaces or visual topoi that can inform class discussions of aesthetic considerations (along with definitional terms) during visual analysis, and that students can then also draw from as a tool of invention when creating their own design work.

Visual Topoi: A Heuristic-Based Approach for Visual Analysis and Production

Visual topoi are grounded in the notion of the topics in invention in classical rhetorical theory, which have been described as “strategies of argument useful in dealing with any subject” (Aristotle, 2007, p. 21). Aristotle (2007) is often credited with theorizing the scope of the topoi in outlining the canons of rhetoric, differentiating between common and special topics. Common topics, he explains, are applicable to any argument and include loose organizational structures such as past or future fact, greater or less, and possible or impossible, whereas special topics are grounded in specific subject matters. Common topics are “artistic” because arguers create or invent these and apply them to any speaking situation. Conversely, special topics are nonartistic because arguers need only use them.

In ancient Greek thought, however, topoi and commonplaces were fairly synonymous, referring to the “‘places’ the rhetor turns to,” as Jost (1991) puts it, “ … to discover what to say on a given matter” (p. 3). Crowley (1998) further explains: “Ancient invention also drew on communal epistemologies that privilege the commonplace; that is, they began with tradition, precept, generally accepted wisdom, what everybody knew.” (p. 209).

Today, metaphoric associations invoke this sense of common cultural knowledge because in order to understand a metaphor, the audience must already know the essential comparison between the two things or concepts being compared. Furthermore, we interpret color and typography primarily through metaphoric associations. In the technical communication classroom, instructors and students can draw from this shared cultural knowledge to construct visual commonplaces for these two design elements by first exploring the meanings of colors that tend to have strong cultural associations in Western cultures: red, yellow, green, and blue. Instructors might begin by introducing the idea that colors have different meanings by listing these colors on the board and asking students to provide a few adjectives for each. For example, red can convey anger or passion or love, while blue can be peaceful or sad or calming.

After establishing this idea, the instructor might then explain that context also influences meaning. For instance, a red heart in a Valentine’s Day card conveys something quite different than the red heart used in a defibrillator sign, although both images might use a similar red hue. The instructor then might show different logos (which rely on color, shape, and context to convey meanings) and ask the class to “read” the color choices. The logos of fast food chains work well for this discussion because they tend to use warm, bright colors, whereas the logos of grocery stores frequently use cool shades of green. Instructors can point out these visual choices when asking students consider why the designer of the logo used a particular color scheme. In other words, the instructor might ask: What tone or feeling or style was the creator of the logo trying to invoke and why? This discussion can also be linked to other instructional activities related to color theory such as the rhetorical effect of a triadic color scheme (red, yellow, and blue), which is often used by toy companies, for instance.

Through these exercises, students often quickly grasp the idea that color choices create particular rhetorical effects. However, perhaps because we generally tend to be less critical viewers of typography, students often need more guidance when considering the ways that typography conveys meaning metaphorically. Thus, instructors might teach students about color associations first and then use a similar approach to teach students about typography. More specifically, instructors might begin by showing students several typefaces that have strong cultural associations (script and Comic Sans, for instance) followed by typefaces that tend to be more flexible in how they are interpreted and more commonly used like serif (Times New Roman) and sans serif (Arial) options. Instructors might also differentiate between what Mackiewicz and Moeller (2004) have described as text typefaces and display typefaces—that is, typefaces used for body copy and those used for headers, respectively—and discuss how the design style of the typeface (e.g., rounded or narrow letters, and serif vs. sans serif) may be interpreted metaphorically.

Instructors might then prompt a class discussion about typeface associations that is structured similarly to the discussion about color by providing a short list of sample adjectives: formal or informal, professional, playful, friendly, heavy or soft, sophisticated. Students can then use these descriptive terms to discuss the typefaces shown as well as propose other terms at the prompting of the instructor. After this second brainstorming session, instructors might return to the logos that were previously shown and ask students to simultaneously consider how color and typeface construct meaning in each as well as refer back to the previous class discussion about color to reinforce students’ previous observations.

The goal of these activities is not to develop a prescriptive list of associations for every color and typeface. Rather, students learn that these visual elements often have a range of meanings, some of which are more fixed than others, and which are contextually and culturally situated. Indeed, the notion of visual topoi draws on shared cultural knowledge about color and typeface meanings, which can be constructed by students and instructors through these brainstorming activities and then used as a complement to the established definitional terms previously discussed, which many instructors may already be using. Using visual topoi as a tool to facilitate invention in terms of color and typography choices also reinforces that such choices are grounded not in subjective personal preferences but in cultural knowledge. In other words, if color and typography invoke particular kinds of associations, which are culturally dependent, then viewers are likely to interpret many of these choices in ways that align with particular cultural norms. The exercises that I propose provide a framework for students and instructors to overtly identify these norms as visual topoi or commonplaces and then use them to make strategic design choices. For example, if students decide that red invokes several potential associations that vary depending upon the particular communicative context, then when they use this color, they do so in order to create a specific rhetorical effect. Instructors might also use the concept of visual topoi to prompt invention in the early stages of an assignment, for instance, by asking students to brainstorm the style, tone, or feel they want their document to convey to their audience and then speculate about how they might achieve this effect through color and typography choices. This inventional activity allows students to explore ideas for their work, which instructors might open up for class discussion as well. As a final step and after the completion of an assignment, instructors might also require students to then articulate their design choices through critical reflection (see Lauer, 2013b). Asking students to explain their design choices can firmly link their decision-making process to rhetorical considerations, while also emphasizing that design work involves a balance between following the rules (adhering to Gestalt principles, for instance) and purposeful, rhetorically informed decision-making.

Conclusion

Over 25 years ago, Kostelnick (1990) described the emergent role of the technical communicator as encompassing “typographer, graphic designer, and aesthetician” (p. 6). Indeed, as design software has become increasingly sophisticated, professional communicators now routinely engage in these tasks. At the same time, the expectations for professionals who produce technical communication have also grown to include proficiency in both language-based and visual modes. If the goal of the technical communication service course is, as Matveeva (2008) suggests, to “prepare [students] for workplace communication” (p. 388), and if such “communication skills are no longer limited to linguistic texts,” as Northcut (2013, p. 191) observes, then as technical communication instructors we need strategies for teaching non-majors in our basic service courses about constructing visual information in ways that more fully account for the complex and multifaceted ways that visuals persuade and construct meaning.

In this article, I have argued that responding to aesthetic considerations is a fundamental component of document design instruction. Indeed, Northcut (2013) postulates, “aesthetic values may actually be the most important factor in the viewer’s interpretation of a visual text” (p. 189). Yet, as I have also endeavored to argue, this aspect has not been addressed in ways that are always practically useful for instructors. For instance, textbooks often prompt students to create design schemes that reflect the values of modernist design aesthetics (e.g., clarity, simplicity, functionality) but with limited attention toward explaining the ways that applying perceptual principles achieves this particular effect as well as how this effect might be achieved through other design choices like color and typography. On the other hand, some pedagogical scholarship references aesthetics directly, but much like the textbooks, such discussions do not elaborate on the visual conventions that characterize particular kinds of aesthetic effects.

The heuristic I propose for generating a collection of visual topoi specific to color and typography choices endeavors to address these limitations by serving as a complement to the definitional terms instructors may already be using to teach their students about design work. The framework for generating visual topoi also seeks to go beyond vague, holistic value judgments of “good” or “bad” in characterizing students’ design work by giving teachers and students strategies for pointing to specific aesthetic values like formal or friendly or professional. Certainly as instructors of technical communication we can (and should) tell our students when they create a design scheme that “looks good” (and find appropriate ways to also communicate to our students that their design needs more work when this is the case). But we also need strategies for explaining the aesthetic effects of our students’ design choices in ways that go beyond just effective execution of the principles of design or adhering to genre conventions, particularly when these frameworks do not fully explain why a student’s work may be visually effective or ineffective. In this way, the visual topoi also seek to strike a balance between following the “rules” that often guide teaching students about visual rhetoric, like applying perceptual principles or adhering to genre conventions and making rhetorically grounded choices that also respond to aesthetic considerations. The framework I propose for generating visual topoi offers instructors strategies for responding to design work in this fashion as well as accounting for the multiple ways that the visual elements of a particular design persuade.