Today, I want to speak about
amusement parks in terms of rhetorical analysis. Specifically, the main pages
of the websites for said amusement
parks – the gateways for such things as ticket purchasing, trip planning, and
gathering information. That said, there are many amusement parks in North
America – especially in the United States – that one could analyze, and as such
I decided to set a few ground rules for selecting only three parks. First, the
park’s location had to be within the United States. Secondly, the park had to
have a seasonal operating schedule (that is, the parks could not be open year-round).
Third, I decided that only one park could be analyzed per owner (one park owned
by Cedar Fair, etcetera), as owners of multiple parks tend to use websites with
similar layouts for said parks. Fourth, I decided that the park must have high
attendance, assuring that the website is heavily trafficked and often utilized.
To this end, I came up with the following amusement parks: Cedar Point in
Sandusky, Ohio; Hersheypark in Hershey, Pennsylvania; and Six Flags Great
Adventure in Jackson, New Jersey.
(It must be noted that Cedar Fair, the owners of Cedar
Point, possess two parks whose attendance ratings outmatch Cedar Point’s;
however, Knott’s Berry Farm operates year-round and Canada’s Wonderland is
located in Canada. The same thing applies to Six Flags Great Adventure – though
Six Flags Magic Mountain outpaces its sister park in attendance, it, like
Knott’s, boasts a year-round operation.)
Now that the above has been properly established (apologies
for the length of said establishment), we can move on to analyzing the websites
of these three amusement parks rhetorically.
To make a rhetorical analysis of the
main page of these amusement parks’ websites, we must address five areas:
audience, purpose, context, author, and genre.
The audience of Cedar Point is, as
can be imagined, amusement park-goers and so-called “roller coaster
enthusiasts.” As Cedar Point boasts that it is “The Roller Coaster Capital of
the World,” one can imagine that it attempts to draw crowds of people who enjoy
roller coasters, amusement rides, and other thrilling elements. This can
especially be seen in Cedar Point’s main page’s slideshow, as one of the five
slides features Valravn, which will become Cedar Point’s eighteenth roller
coaster upon its completion in May. Its secondary audience might be those who
prefer a relaxing vacation – though Cedar Point caters to the thrill seekers
above all, the park owns several hotels and other lodgings, and its location on
Lake Erie does allow for both a mile-long beach, a marina, and other
water-based activities.
Pictured: Cedar Point's main webpage
Hersheypark’s website’s audience is
much of the same, though it seems to cater more to families than to thrill
seekers. Of its three slideshow frames, two feature a family of some type,
echoing its own statement for you to “come together at Hersheypark and discover
why happiness is best when shared.” That said, like Cedar Point, it is
attempting to draw those who enjoy thrills – Hersheypark possesses 13 roller
coasters, and if you scroll down, its main page emphasizes them, too. Its
secondary audience echoes Cedar Point’s, as well – it too possesses several
lodging options, including a hotel and campgrounds. It also appeals to animal
lovers – Hersheypark’s admission includes admission to ZooAmerica, an 11-acre
zoo adjacent to the property.
Pictured: Hersheypark's main webpage
Pictured: ZooAmerica
Interestingly enough, Six Flags
Great Adventure also appeals to animal lovers. It promotes itself as an
amusement park and a safari, which keeps
around 1200 animals from six continents. That said, its website appeals to
thrill seekers almost as much as Cedar Point’s audience does – its slideshow
consists of a thrill ride and a roller coaster, and many of the pictures on the
main page display exciting circumstances or roller coasters. That said, its
website does not appeal as much to those looking for a package deal – unlike
Cedar Point and Hersheypark, Great Adventure does not own any lodgings.
Pictured: Six Flags Great Adventure main page
The authors of the amusement parks’
websites are not explicitly stated – however, page 25 of Writer/Designer allows for an “implied author,” as well. As with
many websites of its type, Cedar Point’s website is implied to have been
written by Cedar Point itself – or, as this case may have been, by its parent
company, Cedar Fair. The park’s – and thus the website’s – credibility is
clear: Cedar Point is older than many amusement parks (opened in 1870, it
stands as the second-oldest operating amusement park in the United States - its 150th anniversary will be in 2020, which means that it survived two World Wars and the Great Depression), establishes it as a
credible source of information – both of roller coasters, which one of its
slogans echoes, and of amusement parks in general. It also has a long reputation
– Cedar Point is notable for its record-breaking roller coasters. This year, it
will open Valravn, a dive coaster set to break 10 world records. Cedar Point
also opened the first 200-foot roller coaster, Magnum XL-200; the first
300-foot coaster, Millennium Force; and the first 400-foot coaster, Top
Thrill Dragster.
Like Cedar Point, Hersheypark’s
website is implied to be Hersheypark. Its credibility is tied to that of
Hershey Chocolate Company, as the company itself owns the amusement park. This,
I feel, is plenty of credibility to the average American – Hershey chocolate is
a staple in many American homes. Hersheypark is also very old – though not as
old as Cedar Point, the park opened in 1906, and possesses several notable roller coasters, such as Storm Runner and Fahrenheit.
Six Flags Great Adventure, for its part, has Six
Flags to back it up – a huge company, Six Flags owns many parks, and it
certainly wrote Great Adventure’s website. Its credibility is Six Flags’s
credibility. In addition, Great Adventure possesses the tallest roller coaster in the world, Kingda Ka, which absolutely helps establish its credibility when it comes to roller coasters.
Having established the authors and
the audiences of the websites, we must turn to their purposes – the goal of the
websites, of course, is to draw people to the parks. Cedar Point, for its part,
operates from mid-May until the end of October; it does not have any
inhabitants outside of those months. As such, it must draw as many people as
possible during the summer season, in order to make a profit. The higher the
attendance, the higher that profit. For this reason, all three parks aim for their
websites to be inviting and easily accessible. This can be applied
to both Hersheypark and Great Adventure – though Hersheypark opens for a few
weekends in April and has a Christmas event, all but the adjacent ZooAmerica is
closed during the winter. Great Adventure has a longer season, but it is seasonal
all the same – though open weekends in late March and April, it still must
bring in a hefty profit to cover the downtime between seasons. All three want to draw
visitors for the summer at any point in the year – as such, maintaining their
websites is critical.
Context, which is described as
“additional information about a text, such as where the text is located, how it
is meant to be read, or what surrounds it” (24) does not seem to apply overly
much to any of these websites; that said, Cedar Point and Hersheypark do have
long histories. As said above, Cedar Point was opened in 1870 and Hersheypark
in 1906; therefore, they were in operation long before the Internet even
existed. As it stands, though, their websites show no real signs of hailing
back to that history (at least, not in a way that is of note). In addition,
genre does not much apply to any of the parks' websites – their websites have
modernized throughout the years, of course, keeping in line with Writer/Designer’s definition of genre,
in that genre “can morph according to the local culture, the historical time
period… and many other influences,” but local culture and the historical time
period do not seem to feature much on these websites’ main pages. I am not sure
if a genre exists purely for the sake of amusement parks, but if one does, all
three parks possess that same genre.
Now that we have discussed the five
areas of the rhetoric, we must examine the design choices of the individual
websites.
First, we’ll speak on Cedar Point.
Cedar Point’s website makes use of contrast – heavily, in fact. It contrasts
bright green with its dark gold background, in order to draw the eye to where
one can purchase tickets and season passes; similarly, the tab where one can
find lodging is bright red on the same background. Cedar Point’s main page’s
five-picture slideshow uses the same tactic – three of the five slides use
blue, which is a complimentary color to the dark gold/almost-orange of the
background, and all three of those slides also use bright colors like red and
white, to emphasize the contrast. The red, white, and blue slide directly below
particularly emphasizes the bright contrast, though the others certainly do as well.
Pictured: slideshow elements from Cedar Point's main webpage
In addition, the slide that
advertises Valravn, Cedar Point’s newest roller coaster, is quite different
from the rest – it is dark, where everything else is bright; it draws the eye
to it.
Pictured: Cedar Point's final, dark slideshow element
Furthermore, the website uses organization and alignment to its benefit
– the tabs are organized above the slideshow to provide correct navigation, and
certain important 'buttons' are aligned below the slideshow to show off season
passes, one of the park’s hotels, and drink deals for the 2016 season. Though
there is not much text that could be said as ‘left’ or ‘right’ aligned, what is
there is definitely left aligned.
Pictured: important 'buttons' and left-aligned text
Hersheypark, for its part, takes a
different route – instead of bright colors, it uses slate blues and other
pastels contrasted with white to draw one’s attention. The brightest points on
the page are the pictures in the slideshow, which feature families and a roller
coaster. These pictures contrast well with their light, pastel counterparts - the pictures really seem to pop.
Except for the colors presented in the slideshow pictures, the hues Hersheypark uses are analogous – they sit adjacent to each other on the color wheel, which makes them stand out. Hersheypark’s website also uses extensive organization and alignment – much like Cedar Point’s website, navigation tabs can be found above the slideshow, with important boxes (links) below, aligned perfectly with each other.
Pictured: the elements of Hersheypark's slideshow, featuring the website's brightest colors
Except for the colors presented in the slideshow pictures, the hues Hersheypark uses are analogous – they sit adjacent to each other on the color wheel, which makes them stand out. Hersheypark’s website also uses extensive organization and alignment – much like Cedar Point’s website, navigation tabs can be found above the slideshow, with important boxes (links) below, aligned perfectly with each other.
Pictured: Hersheypark's aligned link boxes and analogous colors
Six Flags Great Adventure uses colors
even brighter than Cedar Point’s – like Hersheypark, its website uses analogous
colors, but instead of pastels, Great Adventure boasts bright reds, oranges, and
yellows. In what seems to be standard for websites of amusement parks, tabs
exist above the two-picture slideshow, directing people to different pages
depending on where they wish to go. These tabs are in white, contrasting with
the bright colors, and the blue and gray of the sky in the slideshow pictures
helps to offset the brightness as well.
The alignment of the boxes below the slideshow are a bit different for Great Adventure, with other links and text aligned below them, but they are largely similar to those presented by Hersheypark, even if they are larger and provide more information. That said, while the proximity of the elements on Cedar Point’s and Hersheypark’s main webpage were unremarkable, Great Adventure’s main page seems almost clustered in comparison. The proximity seems to be too close – the boxes overlap the slideshow, and it almost feels like too much text in too little space. That said, all the text present seems to be left-aligned.
Pictured: Six Flags Great Adventure's slideshow elements
The alignment of the boxes below the slideshow are a bit different for Great Adventure, with other links and text aligned below them, but they are largely similar to those presented by Hersheypark, even if they are larger and provide more information. That said, while the proximity of the elements on Cedar Point’s and Hersheypark’s main webpage were unremarkable, Great Adventure’s main page seems almost clustered in comparison. The proximity seems to be too close – the boxes overlap the slideshow, and it almost feels like too much text in too little space. That said, all the text present seems to be left-aligned.
Pictured: Great Adventure's large, informative link boxes and left-aligned text
As one can see, a great amount of rhetorical analysis can be done on the main webpages of popular amusement parks. In addition, design and color choices have been and continue to be important in all of this - if the park can gain your attention, they may just gain your attendance, too. And as for me? I'm off to go plan my trip to Cedar Point this May. Wish me luck!
That’s a nice site you people are carrying out there. compare hotel prices
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