An Analysis Of Aristotle's Elements Of Rethoric

Aristotle’s Elements of Rethoric

ENGL 1103

University of the People

Aristotle’s Elements of Rethoric Clear, concise and effective written communication is not easy to master; it requires practice, patience and persistence. Written communication is more difficult because unlike oral communication, it requires experience and knowledge to convey tone, clarity, conciseness, arrangement, and expectation; qualities needed in the business environment to write clear and effective communications, void of misunderstandings.

In our textbook, Business Communications for Success introduces Aristotle’s elements of rhetoric, an effective set of strategies to present and persuade an issue. Aristotle’s styles of rhetoric are divided in three categories:

Pathos is the emotion given to written words, sets the tone, emphasis, and engagement.

Tone: it is the choice of words, vivid language and details to convey how serious the writer feels about a topic, assignment, or argument. You can call it the “jolt” in your brain to get you interested in the writing. Personally, I try to set the tone in each writing assignment, within the introductory paragraph, to let the reader know the relevance or importance of the topic. An example in a business setting is ads. We all have come across interior advertisements on the subway or bus, they always try to appeal to our emotions to persuade us to take action or acknowledge an issue.

Logos is the logic of thoughts, needed in writing words to convey clarity, conciseness, and

In my assignments if not concise, it would take more than the needed pages to express my thoughts, and the meaning would be lost. In a business setting, going back to the ads, they are expensive and constrained by space. Any information needs to be concise, to the point; otherwise, it would be more expensive and the message ineffective.

Arrangement: it would be the order in which written thought, key points, and all other aspects are presented to the audience to enhance their perception of the message. In my writing assignments, I try to follow an order and bring together the paragraphs to relate to each other without breaking the relationship between the key points. Going back to the ads, we can clearly see the arrangement aspect within the business setting by means of size, colors and presentation in a magazine. A whole page ad will command more attention to the message than a quarter page ad.

Ethos is the writer’s expertise on the subject or the validity of sources to reinforce credibility, expectation and