RHETORICAL STRATEGIES

RHETORICAL STRATEGIES Jon Stewart’s The Daily SHow & the rhetorical question. Explores leading question, the issue of framing, agency, responsibility, etc. http://www.cc.com/video-clips/8ov5kh/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-the-question-mark

What are Rhetorical Strategies? Tools that help writers and other communicators craft language (textual) or images (visual) so as to have an effect on the audience/reader. Strategies are means of persuasion, a way to get the reader’s/audience’s attention.

How do we analyze strategies? • There is a several step process to analyzing strategies used in text: • Identify the rhetorical strategy in the text and give an example. • Describe how they work. • Describe why they are used – what purpose do they accomplish? • Always include a discussion of how the strategy helps the author/film maker develop and support the argument. • Let’s look at different types of strategies…

Authorities or “Big Names” • Commonly referred to as “appeals to authority,” using “Big Names” makes a statement/claim/ argument seem authoritative, well researched, believable. • In analysis, answer the following question: • How does this appeal to authority build trust in the author’s argument? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xsZ45Weng0

Cause & Effect Analysis • Analyzes why something happens and describes the consequences of a string of events. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • What is the significance of the author’s examination of past events or their outcomes? • What is the author’s purpose in performing this examination? Is it to inform, speculate or argue about why an identifiable fact happens the way it does? • How does the cause and effect analysis further the argument of the text/film? • How does the clip from the election ad shown previously demonstrate this strategy?

Commonplaces • Also known as “hidden assumptions,” “hidden beliefs,” and “ideologies” • They include assumptions, many of them unconscious, that groups of people hold in common. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • Who is the intended audience of the piece? • What are some of the assumptions of this intended audience? What hidden assumptions or beliefs does the speaker have about the topic? • How is the speaker or author appealing to the hidden assumptions of the audience? • How does the use of commonplaces further the argument?

Comparison & Contrast • Discussion of similarities and differences. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • Which two or more related subjects are discussed? • How are the subjects alike or different? • How does the comparison further the argument of the piece? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2CqOj5WpMs

Definition • When authors define certain words, these definitions are specifically formulated for the specific purpose he/she has in mind. • These definitions are crafted uniquely for the intended audience. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • Who is the intended audience? • Does the text focus on any abstract, specialized, or new terms that need further explanation so that the readers/viewers understand the point? • How has the speaker or author chosen to define terms for the audience? • What effect does the definition have on the audience, or how does this definition help further the argument?

Description • Details sensory perceptions of a person, place or thing. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • Does a person, place or thing play a prominent role in the text or film? • Does the tone, pacing or overall purpose of the essay benefit from the sensory details? • What emotions might these details evoke in the audience (see Pathos)? • How does the description help the author further the argument? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dn50mTEGnrU

Division & Classification • Divides a whole into parts or sorts related items into categories. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • If the author/film maker trying to explain a broad or complicated subject? • Does it benefit the text/film to reduce the subject to more manageable parts to focus the discussion? • How does the division and classification help further the overall argument? • How does the division and classification of injuries to various body systems/organs in the Quit Smoking ad shown before help its argument?

Exemplification • Provides examples or cases in point. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • What examples, facts, statistics, cases in point, personal experiences, or interview questions does the author/film maker add to illustrate claims or illuminate the argument? • What effect do these have on the reader/audience? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9WB_PXjTBo

Ethos • Aristotle’s term ethos refers to the credibility, character or personality of the speaker or author or someone else connected to the argument. • Ethos brings up questions of ethics and trust between the speaker or author and the audience. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • How and why is the speaker / author trying to get the audience to trust her or him? • What specifically does the author do to obtain the audience’s trust? • How does the author/speaker show fairness? Understanding of the topic? Trusworthy-ness? Consideration of the audience’s needs? • How does the author/speaker construct credibility for his/her argument?

Logos • Refers to the use of logic , reason, facts, statistics, data and numbers. • Logos often seems tangible and touchable, so much more real than other rhetorical strategies. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • How and why does the other chose logos? • How does the author show there are good reasons to support his or her argument? • What kind of evidence does the author use to construct logos, and how does this further the argument?

Pathos • Refers to feelings. • The author/speaker wants the audience to feel the same emotion that he/she is feeling, whether or not they actually agree with the topic. • In this way, the audience is more likely to eventually agree with the author/speaker later on. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • What specific emotion does the author invoke? How? • How does he/she use emotion as a tool to persuade the audience • How does the use of emotion help further the argument? • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERRlDEoHG9Y

Identification • This is rhetorician Kenneth Burke’s term for the act of “identifying” with another person who shares your values or beliefs. • Many speakers or authors try to identify with an audience or convince an audience to identify with them and their argument. • In analysis, answer the following question: • How does the author build a connection between him/herself and the audience? • How does this connection further the argument? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9xCCaseop4

Metadiscourse • Language about language. • Announces to the reader what the writer is doing, helping the reader to recognize the author’s plan. • Can be used to both announce the overall project or purpose of the paper and to announce its argument. • Can provide “Signposts” along the way, guiding the reader to what will come next and showing how it is connected to what has come before. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • What is the author’s voice in this text/film? How does it enter and guide the audience through the text/film? • How does the author’s use of metadiscourse further the argument?

Below are some examples of metadiscourse in writing, denoting: • the writer's intentions: "to sum up," "candidly," "I believe" • the writer's confidence: "may," "perhaps," "certainly," "must" • directions to the reader: "note that," "finally," "therefore," "however" • the structure of the text: "first," "second," "finally," "therefore," "however" • Most writing needs metadiscourse, but too much buries ideas. Technical, academic, and other non-fiction writers should use metadiscourse sparingly.[

Metaphors, Similes, Analogies • Commonly referred to as “figurative language” • Comparison of two parallel terms or situations in which the traits of one are similar to another – often one relatively firm and concrete, and the other less familiar and concrete. • Simile is an analogy that use “like” or “as” • These allow the author / film maker to use concrete, easily understood ideas to clarify a less obvious point. • In analysis, answer the following question: • What two things are being compared? • How does the author’s / film maker’s use of figurative language help further the argument? Help the audience view the argument in a new way? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk7yqlTMvp8

All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances; Shakespeare from the play As You Like It

Motive • Sometimes an author may reference the motives of his or her opponents. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • How does the author / film maker use his/her opponents arguments to make a point? • Does the use of an opponent’s motive make the author’s / film maker’s argument stronger? How? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uROhNSsi79E

Narration • Recounts an event, tells a story, that supports the argument. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • How does the narration illustrate or clarify the argument? • What effect dos the story have on the audience? • How does this narrative further the argument? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_WAB7TXtXQ

Precedent • When an author speaks or argues from precedent, he or she references a previous situation, one that can be compared to the author’s situation. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • Does the author reference any historic incidences that he/she claims are similar to the ones being discussed? • What details about this historic situation help further the author’s argument?

Prolepsis • Anticipating the opposition’s best argument and addressing it in advance. • Also known as “Counterargument and Rebuttal.” • Uses the reality that readers often interact with the text and ask questions of it – disagreeing and pointing out where there are differing opinions or weaknesses in argument – as a tool to help the reader believe the argument. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • How does the author present any counterarguments or rebuttals? • What effect do the counterarguments or rebuttals have on the power of the author’s argument?

Process Analysis • Explains to the reader how to do something or how something happens. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • Were any portions of the text more clear because concrete directions about a certain process were included? • How did the description of a process help the author develop his or her argument? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZihWYatUrEw

Questioning • Rhetorical Questions: a question designed to have one correct answer. The author leads the reader into a position rather than stating it explicitly. • In analysis, answer the following questions: • Why does the author ask a question with an obvious answer? • How does the use of the rhetorical question strengthen the author’s argument? • Transitional Questions: Leads the reader into a new subject area or area of the argument. • How does the transitional question help guide the reader? • How does the use of the transitional question help the author organize his argument?

Organization & Structure Topical: argument organized according to subtopics. Describing a baby’s bubble bath, first in terms of the soap used, then the water conditions, then the type of towel. Chronological: argument organized with information in time order. Description of a baseball game from the first pitch to the last at-bat. Spatial: argument follows a visual direction. Description of a house, from the inside to the outside, or a person, from their head down to their toes.

Organization & Structure Problem-Solution: argument presents a problem and a potential solution. Description of the need to make coffee at home to save money. Cause and Effect: argument describes the relationship between the cause or catalyst of an event and the effect. Description of identifying the over-consumption of candy as the cause of tooth decay.

Logical Ordering of Information Inductive: argument moves from one specific example to draw a general conclusion. Specific to broad. Deductive: argument moves from a generalized theory or assumption to decide the causes or characteristics of a specific example or event. Broad to specific. Linear: argument is told using linear order, scaffolding information or reasoning. Circular: supports the argument using assumptions or information from the argument itself. Recursive: the text consistently moves forward, but circles back on the specific points in the process.

RHETORICAL STRATEGIES