An Analysis of Effectiveness

An Analysis of Effectiveness

Martin Luther King Jr. and Toni Morrison are two of the many great writers of the late twentieth century. Their styles follow rhetorical guidelines to create persuasive arguments and clear writing. To show how they accomplish this I will be comparing the rhetorical style used by King in 'Letter from a Birmingham Jail,'; with that of Morrison in 'Friday on the Potomac.'; Each of these works result from strong opinions surrounding the issue of racial equality in the United States, and each appeals to the desire of achieving that equality. In order to address a sensitive topic such as racism and achieve the desired results, the authors had to implement various methods of persuasion. While each author chooses different manners with which to accomplish this, each forms clear writing with convincing arguments. They achieve this clarity due to their understanding and use of ethos, pathos, and logos as the foundations for creating these arguments.

Before we can examine the writing on the basis of these three elements, we must first understand the meanings of each. They were conceptualized by Aristotle as the keys to persuading an audience. Ethos, directly translated, means 'worthy of belief,'; and deals with establishing credibility. Pathos involves 'putting hearers…into the right frame of mind with regard to certain issues and the speakers persuasive intent'; (Smith 83). Logos includes the arguments that are used to make a point, and involves the basis upon which the arguments were made. The use of these three elements in harmony with each other will produce a persuasive argument according to Aristotle. Being that he did 'write the book on rhetoric,'; I will be using the ideas of Aristotle as the blueprint for effective writing to which I will compare the works of King and Morrison.

First I will examine Martin Luther King Jr.'s letter which embodies all of the characteristics outlined by Aristotle. The most clearly presented element in King's article is the use of ethos. King establishes himself as a credible and learned man early in the letter so that the reader has an immediate connection with him, and then he carries the thought throughout the letter's entirety. Within the first paragraph he uses this tactic when he writes, 'If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would h...

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...How could the notion of union, nation, or state surface when race, gender, and class…dominated every moment and word of the confirmation process?'; (Morrison xii). The answer to the question lies within itself and forms the basis of her argument to follow throughout the essay. She then begins to demonstrate how race, gender, and class played into the hearings, in order to substantiate the argument. The reader then has no choice but to agree with her ideas.

Thus, we see that both Morrison and King were both admirable in their abilities to persuade their audiences, though each did so using different tactics. King focused mainly on establishing his own credibility so that his statements would bear the appropriate weight necessary for effectiveness. Morrison, however focused her strategy on the manipulation of the audience by using their emotions and empowering them to confirm her arguments. Regardless of the individual focus of each author's style, they both contained the necessary elements of successful writing as defined by Aristotle: ethos, pathos, and logos. These elements form the backbone upon which all good writing should form, and these two passages verify that.