Rhetorical Analysis
Chapter 6 in Everything’s an Argument is about one of the most important writing tools that will help you with supporting your arguments. Rhetorical analysis can be applied to almost any text or image. From a range of writing a speech, an essay, an advertisement, song lyrics, photographs, websites, and even a bumper stickers. Chapter 6 helps you to understand the purpose that an author has when they are writing their text and what kind of effect they where hoping to give their intentional audience. Not only will you learn how to identify the intended goals and effects of a text, but you will also understand how those goals and effects are achieved by gaining understanding of the three most basic concepts of a rhetorical analysis: ethos, pathos, and logos.
Objectives:
- To understand what rhetorical analysis is.
- How to find the rhetorical analysis in others writings.
- Learn how to identify pathos, ethos, and logos in others texts and arguments.
Definition:
- The book defines a rhetorical analysis as a close reading of a text to find how and whether it persuades the audience.
Composing a Rhetorical Analysis:
- Gathering Information
- who is the speaker?
- what is the occasion?
- who is the audience?
- what is the purpose?
- what is the subject?
- what is the tone?
2. Examine the appeals
- Appeals are the first process of a rhetorical analysis. Are ethos, pathos, or logos present?
3. Note the style detail
- Is there any repetition in the text?
- What is the tone? Happy? Sarcastic?
4. Form an analysis
- Ask yourself how these strategies of appeals help the author to achieve their purpose.
- Why do you think the author might have chosen these rhetorical strategies for his targeted audience?
Rhetorical analysis samples are intended to figure out two things.
- What an author is trying to achieve from their writing.
- What tactics he/ she is using to prove and back-up their task.
Remember, almost every article, advertisement, and picture has a specific purpose and is targeted to their audience. The rhetorical analysis depends on that.
Here is a video explaining Rhetorical Analysis Strategies.
Chapter 6 Activity
Can you answer these questions from looking at this picture?
- What is the main argument(s) in the text?
- What kind of organizational structure does the author use?
- Who is the intended or perceived audience?
- How does the style in the picture appeal to the intended audience?
Work cited:
Lunsford, Andrea A., and John J. Ruszkiewicz. Everything’s an Argument. Boston, New York: Bedford, 2012. Web. 03 Feb. 2015
Singleton, Matthew. “Rhetorical Analysis: Explaining Strategies.” YouTube. N.p19 Apr. 2013. Web. 05 Feb. 2015.
“University Center for Writing-based Learning.” DePaul University. Web. 03 Feb 2015.
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