Rhetoric Meaning

1074 Words3 Pages

Rhetoric is, in my understanding, the art of persuading an audience by adapting your argument and the way you present it to an audience, time, place, and any given situation. There a few components in a presentation which, when understood and taken advantage of, can increase the impact of the argument, or so I think. In this post, I'll attempt to discuss what those components are, and how they work in giving a powerful speech using the art of rhetoric.

According to Aristotle, there are three ways of persuading your audience, and he referred to these three ways as "Ethos", "Logos", and "Pathos". While the origin of this Greek philosophy is quite ancient, it is important to learn about them because it is …show more content…

Pathos is often referred to as "Emotions" because it refers to the emotions of the audience. Being able to connect to the audience on an emotional level, and being able to move them emotionally is a key part of persuading the audience. In order to invoke an emotional response from the audience to help with persuasion, there a few things the author could take advantage of. If the author is presenting to an audience that shares common beliefs or values, it could be a powerful tool to move the audience emotionally. Aside from the audience and their values and emotions, the author must consider what kind of emotional response they want to get from the audience and build their argument and presentation in a manner that fits their goals. Being able to connect with the audience by the means of Pathos will give the author a lot of support from their audience, which makes Pathos a really strong tool in the hands of someone …show more content…

Being able to consider and use all three of these components to their advantage would greatly improve the chances of the author being able to persuade their audience with their argument. When Kairos, the situational awareness factor is being considered, and the Rhetorical Triangle's components, Ethos, Logos, and Pathos is applied to it in order to build an argument, it is very likely that the author will have a strong, impactful argument and will win over their audience. This can be observed a lot in political speeches. All politicians use rhetoric tools in order to persuade their audience and win over their votes and support. When discussing rhetoric and giving speeches, it would be a shame not to mention Martin Luther King Jr., so I'll go ahead and do that. His speech, "I have a dream" is a perfect example of rhetoric tools in use, because, in his speech, he keeps his words simple and shows enough emotion to be seen as sincere by his audience, and when politics are involved, sincerity is almost nonexistent so it helps winning over the audience. On top of that, he uses more abstract concepts like having dreams to describe his visions for the future of the society, which adds an emotional layer to his speech, demonstrating a great use of

Open Document