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Visual rhetorical analysis uncovers three cultural translation modes in China Electron Microscopy Contest entries, indicating that scientific imaging serves as an aesthetic and cultural mediator.
This study examines how award-winning electron micrographs from the China Electron Microscopy Contest shape a Chinese informed aesthetic mode at the intersection of visual culture and scientific knowledge production. Guided by visual rhetoric, the study combines descriptive coding of the full corpus with interpretive close readings of selected cases to examine how images interact with titles and explanatory notes in award-winning entries from 2010 to 2025. With the aim of describing operations of cultural translation of the microscopic, three recurring modes of visual rhetoric are identified. First, morphological simulation emulates Chinese painting languages, rendering microscopic structure legible within recognizable aesthetic frameworks through selective emphasis and added cues. Second, the translation of iconic Chinese cultural symbols aligns microstructures with culturally recognizable motifs and stabilizes recognition through culturally anchored titles and poetic citations. Third, narrative metaphor and metonymy organize microscopic forms as interpretable scenes and ideas that activate historical, literary, and affective associations. Finally, we argue that the competition functions as a legitimizing device through which the scientific image becomes a form of cultural mediation and a support for situated aesthetic critique.
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Tan et al. (2026) studied this question.
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