Download Rhetorical Analysis-Tips - Paper - Fall 2006 | RHE 309K and more Papers Creative writing in PDF only on Docsity! RHE 309k Rhetorical Analysis -- tips 02/06/06 Here are some tips to help you as you draft your papers. Although you can mention whether or not you agree with the author, do not dwell on this. Focus on the quality of the argument and its persuasiveness in terms of its rhetorical situation. For example, the rhetorical situation for King’s speech at Holt Street Baptist Church is the Montgomery Bus Boycott. You should analyze the argument in terms of its audience, although you can analyze its effects on other audiences later in your paper, perhaps toward the end. Do not merely summarize and describe the argument. Your job is to analyze and evaluate the piece, making your own clear argument about its quality. Invention: here are some tips to help you brainstorm ideas. I would suggest just free-writing in response to these prompts. Then you will have something to work with when you start drafting. Use your topic proposal as well to generate ideas. How would you characterize the rhetor’s diction? Think of adjectives like formal, informal, casual, chatty, lofty, and the like. Find examples of these you could point to. Now think about the effect of the rhetor’s diction. How appropriate is it to the rhetorical situation? How would you characterize the rhetor’s tone? Think of adjectives like measured, calm, forceful, passionate, and so on. Find examples of these you could point to. Again, now think about the effect of the rhetor’s tone. Find examples of appeals to ethos, pathos, and logos. How does the rhetor try to gain credibility with the audience, for example (ethos)? How successful are these attempts? How might his or her words appeal to the audience’s emotions (pathos)? Would evoking these emotions help or hinder the argument’s persuasiveness? Why or why not? What about the soundness of the reasoning itself (logos)? Assess the quality of the evidence presented, providing reasons to support your evaluation. Your rough draft should include the following things: An introduction that describes and briefly summarizes the argument, its setting, the rhetor, date, and audience. A thesis statement, preferably expressed as a claim followed by a because clause in which you give your reasons for holding your claim. Example of a descriptive statement that is not going to lead to an argument: Within his speech “The Ballot or the Bullet,” Malcolm X stresses the injustices placed on blacks by the white man and claims that blacks do not belong in America.
