Article published In:
Journal of Argumentation in ContextVol. 11:3 (2022) ► pp.329–349
Crafting multimodal argumentative meshworks
Li Ziqi’s “Mushroom at the End of the World”
Short videos depicting rural China have gained popularity on social media domestically and internationally. Among the genre’s creators, Li Ziqi stands out for her unique style of culinary craft, starting from the most basic materials. I interpret Li Ziqi’s mushroom videos as multimodal “argumentative meshworks” casting a counterstatement to the “involuted” urban life and nature/culture division. To unfold the analyses, I first place videos in the context of urban ills. Built on previous studies of multimodal argumentation and entanglement anthropology, I define “argumentative meshworks” in three aspects: a human-nonhuman entanglement, a simplicity-complexity harmony, and a production-audience interaction. Then I select three mushroom videos as artefacts to unpack the multimodal meshworks. Following the empirical call argumentation studies, I use viewers’ comments to support my points throughout the whole piece. This inquiry explores multimodal argumentation’s new possibility to not only stress things out but create space for harmony and peace of mind.
Keywords: argumentative meshworks, visual argument, sound argument, multimodal argument, human-nonhuman entanglement, craft, food
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.The problems of urban involution and precarities
- 3.Multimodal argumentative meshworks
- 3.1An entanglement of humans and nonhumans
- 3.2A harmony of simplicity and complexity
- 3.3An interaction of craft production and audiences engagement
- 4.Li ziqi’s “mushroom at the end of the world”
- 4.1Crafting multimodal argumentative meshworks
- 4.2The hybridity of craftsmanship
- 5.Conclusion
- Acknowledgement
- Notes
-
References
References
Allison, M. & Bloomfield, E. F.
2019 “Rhetorical imaginings and multimodal arguments at the European Green Belt: Juxtaposing nonhuman nature and technology in our collective memory of the Cold War.” Journal of Argumentation in Context
8
(3), 354–382. 
Amossy, R.
2009a “The New Rhetoric’s inheritance. Argumentation and discourse analysis.” Argumentation,
23
1, 313–324.
2009b “Argumentation in discourse: A socio-discursive approach to arguments.” Informal Logic,
29
(3), 252–267.
Amossy, R., Koren, R. & Yanoshevsky, G.
2009 “Introduction.” Argumentation,
23
1, 293–300.
Birdsell, D., and L. Groarke
1996 “Toward a Theory of Visual Argument.” Argumentation and Advocacy 33(1), 1–10.
2007 “Outlines of a Theory of Visual Argument.” Argumentation and Advocacy 43(3–4), 103–113.
Blair, J.
1996 “The possibility and actuality of visual arguments.” Argumentation and Advocacy 33(1), 23–33.
2015 “Probative Norms for Multimodal Visual Arguments.” Argumentation 29(2), 217–233.
Brunner, E., and H. Li
2018 “Fragmented arguments and forces majeure: the 2007 protests in Xiamen, China.” Argumentation and Advocacy 54(4), 287–304,
Brunner, E.
2019 Environmental Activism, social media, and protest in China. Lexington Books.
Craig, D., J. Lin, and S. Cunningham
2021 Wanghong as Social Media Entertainment in China. Palgrave Macmillan.
Dahl, J. M. R.
2015 “Visual argumentation in political advertising: A context-oriented perspective.” Journal of Argumentation in Context
4
(3), 286–298.
Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F.
1988 A thousand plateaus: Capitalism and schizophrenia. London: Athlone Press
DeLuca, K. M.
1999 “Unruly Arguments: The Body Rhetoric of Earth First!, Act Up, and Queer Nation.” Argumentation and Advocacy
36
(1), 9–21.
DeLuca, K. M., and Betlemidze, M.
2018 “The queen is dead; long live the queen? Hearing voices and sounds beyond the human.” Argumentation and Advocacy 54(4), 351–358,
Eckstein, J.
2014 “Yellow rain: Radiolab and the acoustics of strategic maneuvering.” Journal of Argumentation in Context
3
(1), 35–56.
2017a “Radiolab’s Sound Strategic Maneuvers.” Argumentation 31 (4), 663–680.
2017b “Sound arguments.” Argumentation and Advocacy 53 (3), 163–180.
2018a “The acoustics of argumentation and advocacy.” Argumentation and Advocacy 54:4, 261–269,
2018b “Designing Soundscapes for Argumentation.” Philosophy & rhetoric 51 (3), 269–292.
2018c “Response to Groarke: Figuring Sound.” Informal logic 38 (3), 341–345.
2018d “Dished: Food as Argumentative Strategy,” In F. H. van Eemeren and B. Garseen (Eds). Proceedings of the 9th Conference of the International Society for the Study of Argumentation, 302–307. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Press.
Eckstein, J. and Young, A. M.
2015 “Cooking, Celebrity Chefs, and Public Chef Intellectuals.” Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies 12:2, 205–208,
Finocchiaro, M. A.
2013 Meta-argumentation. London: College Publications.
Geertz, C.
1973 The interpretation of cultures: Selected essays. New York, NY: Basic Books.
Goldthread
2019 Exclusive Interview with Li Ziqi, China’s Most Mysterious Internet Celebrity. YouTube, September 12. [URL]
Goodale, G.
2013 “The Sonorous Envelope and Political Deliberation.” Quarterly Journal of Speech 99 (2), 218–224,
Gordon, C., P. C. Pezzullo., and M. Gabrieloff-Parish
2020 “Food Justice Advocacy Tours: Remapping Rooted, Regenerative Relationships Through Denver’s ‘Planting Just Seeds’.” In Crick Nathan Ed., The Rhetoric of Social Movements: Networks, Power, and New Media, 299–316.
Groarke, L.
2015 “Going Multimodal: What is a Mode of Arguing and Why does it Matter?” Argumentation 29 (2): 133–155.
2018 “Making room for auditory argument.” Argumentation and advocacy 54 (4), 340–344.
Groarke, L., C. Palczewski, and D. Godden
2016 “Navigating the Visual Turn in Argument.” Argumentation and Advocacy: Special Issue: Twenty Years of Visual Argument ed: David Godden, Catherine H. Palczewski, and Leo Groarke, 52(4), 217–235.
Hariman, R.
2015 “Between Confusion and Boredom in the Study of Visual Argument.” Argumentation 29(2), 239–242.
Hill, F. I.
1983 “The rhetoric of Aristotle.” In A Synoptic History of Classical Rhetoric, ed. J. J. Murphy, 19–76. Davis: Hermagoras Press.
Ho, H.
2020 “Cosmopolitan locavorism: global local-food movements in postcolonial Hong Kong.” Food, Culture & Society 23(2), 137–154,
Ingold, T.
2000 The perception of the environment: essays on livelihood, dwelling and skill. London: Routledge.
2011 Being Alive: Essays on Movement, Knowledge and Description. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.
2017 “Five questions of skill.” Cultural Geographies 25(1), 159–163.
2020 Correspondence. Polity.
Jia, Y., and Jia, X.
2016 “The Anthropocosmic Perspective on Intercultural Communication: Learning to Be Global Citizens Is Learning to Be Human.” Intercultural Communication Studies XXV1: 1
Kjeldsen, J. E.
2012 “Pictorial Argumentation in Advertising: Visual Tropes and Figures as a Way of Creating Visual Argumentation.” In Topical Themes in Argumentation Theory, ed. Frans H. Van Eemeren and Bart Garssen, 239–256. Springer.
2013 Virtues of visual argumentation: How pictures make the importance and strength of an argument salient. OSSA Conference Archive. Paper 89.
2015a “Where is visual argument.” In book: Reflections on Theoretical Issues in Argumentation Theory 107–120. ed. Frans H. van Eemeren and Bart Garssen. Springer.
2015b “The Rhetoric of Thick Representation: How Pictures Render the Importance and Strength of an Argument Salient.” Argumentation 29(2), 197–215.
2016 “Symbolic Condensation and Thick Representation in Visual and Multimodal Communication.” Argumentation and Advocacy 52(4), 265–280,
2017 “Audience Analysis and Reception Studies of Rhetoric.” In Rhetorical Audience Studies and Reception of Rhetoric, ed. J. E. Kjeldsen, 1–42. Springer International Publishing.
2018a “Visual rhetorical argumentation.” Semiotica 2018(220), 69–94.
2018b “The rhetoric of sound, the sound of arguments. Three propositions, three questions, and an afterthought for the study of sonic and multimodal argumentation.” Argumentation and Advocacy 54(4), 364–371.
Klein, J. A.
2014 “Connecting with the Countryside? ‘Alternative’ Food Movements with Chinese Characteristics.” In Ethical eating in the postsocialist and socialist world, ed. Yuson Jung, Jakob A. Klein, and Melissa L. Caldwell, 116–143. University of California Press.
Latour, B.
2005 Reassembling the social an introduction to actor-network-theory. Oxford University Press.
Li, H.
2020 “From Disenchantment to Reenchantment: Rural Microcelebrities, Short Video, and the Spectacle-ization of the Rural Lifescape on Chinese Social Media.” International Journal of Communication (Online), 3769–3787.
Miele, M., and J. Murdoch
2002 “The Practical Aesthetics of Traditional Cuisines: Slow Food in Tuscany.” Sociologia Ruralis 42 (4): 312–328.
Olson, K. M. & Goodnight, G. T.
1994 “Entanglements of consumption, cruelty, privacy, and fashion: The social controversy over fur.” The Quarterly journal of speech
80
(3), 249–276.
Perelman, C., and Olbrechts-Tyteca, L.
1969 [1958] The new rhetoric: A treatise on argumentation. Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press.
Prody, J. M.
2013 “A Call for Polycultural Arguments: Critiquing the Monoculture Rhetoric of the Local Food Movement.” Argumentation and Advocacy 50 (2), 104–119.
Qian
2021 “Making memory work: The SARS memory and China’s war on COVID-19.” Memory Studies, 14:6, 1489–1502.
Rice, J.
2015a “Craft Rhetoric.” Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies 12:2, 218–222,
2015b “Craft networks,” In Paul Lynch and Nathaniel Rivers, ed., Thinking with Bruno Latour in Rhetoric and Composition. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 237–255.
Rittel, H. W. J., Webber, M. M.
1973 “Dilemmas in a general theory of planning.” Policy Science 41, 155–169.
Senda-Cook, S., and McHendry, G. F.
2017 “Embodying Resistance: A Rhetorical Ecology of the Full Cycle Supper,” in Tracing Rhetoric and Material Life. Cham: Springer International Publishing. pp. 223–250.
Serafis, D., Greco, S., Pollaroli, C., and Soria, C. J.
2020 “Towards an integrated argumentative approach to multimodal critical discourse analysis: evidence from the portrayal of refugees and immigrants in Greek newspapers.” Critical Discourse Studies,
17
(5), 545–565,
Tindale, C. W.
2020 The anthropology of argument: cultural foundations of rhetoric and reason. Routledge.
Trinh, T.
1989 Woman, Native, Other Writing Postcoloniality and Feminism. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Tseronis, A.
2015 “Multimodal argumentation in news magazine covers: A case study of front covers putting Greece on the spot of the European economic crisis.” Discourse, Media and Context,
7
1: 18–27.
Tsing, A.
2015 The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Tu, W.
1985 Confucian Thought: Selfhood as Creative Transformation. New York: State University of New York Press.
1998 “Joining East and West: A Confucian perspective on human rights.” Harvard International Review,
20
(3), 44–49.
Tucker, M. E.
2014 “The relevance of Chinese Neo-Confucianism for the reverence of nature.” In Callicott, J., & McRae, J. ed., Environmental Philosophy in Asian Traditions of Thought. State University of New York Press.
Walker, G., and M. Bender
1994 “Is it More than Rock and roll?: Considering Music Video as Argument.” Argumentation and Advocacy 31(2), 64–79.
Wang, Q., and S. Ge
Xiang, B., and J. Lindquist
2014 “Migration Infrastructure.” International Migration Review 48(1), 122–148.
Zhan, Q. and Y. Xu
2019 “Network Red Marketing Strategy Analysis – Taking Li Ziqi, a Well-known Food Blogger on Weibo, as an Example.” Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, 352. International Conference on Advanced Education, Management and Humanities (AEMH 2019).
Zhang, C. & Xu, C.
2017 “Argument by multimodal metaphor as strategic maneuvering in video advertising the case of the Lin Dan Commercial.” Journal of Argumentation in Context
6
(3), 359–380.
Zhen, L.
2021 “Social Coding Platform as Digital Enclave: A Case Study of Protesting “996” on GitHub.” International Journal of Communication, 151, 886–904.