Visual Rhetorical Analysis

This photograph, taken in 1967 in the heart of the Vietnam War Protests, depicts different ideologies about how problems can be solved. In the picture, which narrowly missed winning the Pulitzer Prize, a teen is seen poking carnations into the barrels of guns held by members of the US National Guard. This moment, captured by photographer Bernie Boston symbolizes the flower power movement. Flower power is a phrase that referred to the hippie notion of “make love not war”, and the idea that love and nonviolence, such as the growing of flowers, was a better way to heal the world than continued focus on capitalism and wars. The photograph can be analyzed through the elements of image as defined by ‘The Little Brown Handbook’ on page 86. There are a total of nine elements that contribute to the communicative quality of an image. The message that this particular image tries to convey is the strong sense of way that conflict should be handled; by way of guns or by way of flowers. The ‘way of guns’ is violence and excessive force which heavily contradicts the ‘way of flowers’ which is a more peaceful and diplomatic way of handling conflict or disagreement. This photograph depicts these ideologies through its use of emphasis, narration,point of view, arrangement, color, characterization, context and tension.

This photograph depicts the Vietnam War Protests and the counter culture movement in America. The emphasis of this photograph is the young man placing flowers in the gun barrels; however, the National Guardsmen that holds the carnations also draws attention. It seems that the guardsman is taking the flowers out of the gun barrel, which adds an element of tension and intrigue to the photograph. This photograph is titled ‘Flower Pow...

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... in a common effort that contributed to protest activities. The photograph also uses tension to portray the two conflicting ideologies. There is visible tension between the guardsmen and the protestors; the guns represent war and violence while the flowers represent peace, love and nature. The National Guardsmen also look very uneasy while the protestors look content and comfortable. The union of the two creates tension in this photograph because they are so meaningful alone, making this photograph a very iconic image of the time.

This image uses the elements of image that are described in ‘The Little Brown Handbook’ to depict the two conflicting ideologies about solving conflict. The ‘way of guns’ which relies on violence and force to suppress the opposition and the ‘way of flowers’ which attempts to influence change through nonviolence and peaceful measures.