Kristine’s emoji story featured a show that I watch weekly as a distraction and a guilty pleasure so I immediately knew what she was talking about when I saw her emoji title. Kristine chose an episode of the popular HGTV show, House Hunters International. The family in the show are tired of the cold winters in Canada and decide to embark on a move to the much warmer climate Mexico has to offer. For myself, I am very familiar with the plot of House Hunters. Families provide the audience with their wants and desires in a home, including budget, they are then shown three different homes and then make a decision that is right for them. The show then comes in a few weeks or months later for a quick update to see how the family has settled in. Due to being familiar with the plot, it was easier for me to understand what was going to happen in the story. Because Kristine used the specific country flag emoji’s I was also able to tell where the couple was from and which country they wanted to move to.

In Kristine’s reflection, she pointed out that there were extra details in the show; the family taking a trip to the zoo and going go carting but she left that out as to not take away from the main plot of the show and confuse her blog visitors. This reminded me of when Kress pointed out that, “in this new semiotic world, it is the readers who fashion their own knowledge, from information supplied by the makers of the site” (2005, p. 10). Those who are consuming the media, in this case, Kristine’s emoji story, are interpreting the story based on the literacies and prior knowledge they have. For myself, a watcher of House Hunters, I may have been able to still follow along if Kristine had chosen to add the trip to the zoo or the go carting pieces but other consumers may have become quite confused.

References

Kress, G. (2005), Gains and losses: New forms of texts, knowledge, and learning. Computers and Composition, 2(1), 5-22.