1. INTRODUCTION TO RHETORIC

2. Rhetoric Defined
2500 years ago, Aristotle defined rhetoric as "the ability to discover, in any given situation, the available means of persuasion" [and, I would add, to use those means effectively, which is the theme of Aristotle's book Rhetoric as a whole].
Kenneth Burke:  "the use of language as a symbolic means of inducing cooperation in beings that by nature respond to symbols."

3. The Rhetorical Situation
As human beings, we “do rhetoric” all the time.
In every situation where you are attempting to persuade someone of something, you are using rhetoric.
One important thing to understand about rhetoric is that you’re already very good at it – in some situations. You can adapt your rhetorical strategies depending on the audience and the exact situation.

4. The Rhetorical Situation
Our goal here is to make you more conscious of rhetoric and its tools and to help you transfer your success in the situations you’ve already mastered to new situations.
One common rhetorical situation you might have already mastered is: Talking a friend into seeing a movie instead of staying home.
A rhetorical situation that this course will help you succeed in is: Writing a paper for a college course.

5. PURPOSE IS ESSENTIAL
The first thing you want to do in any rhetorical situation is to figure out what your PURPOSE is. What do you want to accomplish?
And the first thing you want to do when you’re reading something is to figure out YOUR PROPOSE for reading, and the WRITER’S PURPOSE for writing.

6. The Rhetorical Mindset
One main goal of this course is to get you to think about rhetoric – and give you tools for doing that thinking – both when you’re sending messages (as a speaker or writer) or receiving them (as a reader or listener or viewer).

7. ANY Rhetorical Situation
Is a triangular relation among three elements:
SUBJECT
SPEAKER AUDIENCE

8. This relationship takes place
in a particular social, and physical context.
In other words, it happens in a particular point in our relationships with other people (social context), and a particular place and time (physical context).

9. The same words carry different messages
Depending on what context they occur in. For instance, if I spoke to you about the subject of grading at the beginning of the semester, and then again at the end of the semester, the rhetorical situations would be very different.

10. Three Modes of Persuasion
Defined by Aristotle, these are:
LOGOS – persuasion based upon logic;
ETHOS – persuasion based upon the credibility of the speaker (compare our word ethics); and
PATHOS – persuasion based on emotion (compare our words empathy and pathetic).

11. These three modes
Also correspond to the points of the rhetorical triangle:
Logos SUBJECT
Ethos Pathos --
SPEAKER AUDIENCE

12. LOGOS Appeals to logic (The Mind)
The use of facts and logical argument to persuade.
Logical argument requires a CLAIM backed up by EVIDENCE
In ads, logos focuses on FEATURES of the product
FAVORED IN ACADEMIC SETTINGS, BUSINESS DOCUMENTS, LAW

13. ETHOS Appeals to character, group values/social relations)
Presents author or speaker as being reliable, interesting, intelligent: somebody worth emulating; or someone that cares about us
Appeals to our herd instinct: desire to be accepted in a group
OFTEN USED IN
POLITICS, ADS

14. PATHOS Appeals to emotions
Can use any emotion – love, fear, hatred, envy, patriotism, pity, etc.
Look for emotionally loaded language in texts
In ads, focuses on
BENEFITS of the
product.
The most powerful
appeal, but also the
most likely to backfire.

15. BUT
In practical terms, these three “artistic appeals” (as Aristotle calls them) get mixed together all the time. The most effective messages use all three of them.
For instance, a car salesperson might be able to sell me a car because she seems like she’s not trying to rip me off (ETHOS), because she convinces me the car is a good deal and fits my needs (LOGOS), and because she tells me other people will envy me for my cool new convertible (PATHOS).

16. This is Peitho, the goddess of rhetoric
“Peitho” in Greek means “persuasion.”
She is often depicted as a close companion of Aphrodite – the goddess of love. Why?

17. The bank loan Say you need a loan for $500 (PURPOSE).
Your first rhetorical choice is who to ask for the money (AUDIENCE).
You determine that none of your friends have $500 just lying around, so you need to go to a bank.
What kind of rhetorical strategies should you use to get the loan?

18. A Final Example