rhetorical terms

audience

audience

the listener, viewer, or reader of a text

Gehrig's audience was his teammates and fans in the stadium that day, but it was also the teams he played against, the fans listening on the radio, and posterity--us.

Concession

An acknowledgement that an opposing argument may be true or reasonable. is usually accompanied by refutation challenging the validity of the opposing argument.

Connotation

Meanings or associations that readers have with a word beyond its dictionary definition, or denotation. are usually positive or negative, and they can greatly affect the author's tone. Consider the words below, all of which mean "overweight."

Context

the circumstances, atmosphere, attitudes, and events surrounding a text.

Counterargument

An opposing argument to the one a writer is putting forward. a strong writer will usually address it through the process of concession or refutation.

Ethos

Greek for "character." Speakers appeal to ethos to demonstrate that they are credible and trustworthy to speak on a given topic. Ethos is established by both who you are and what you say.

Logos

Greek for "embodied thought." Speakers appeal to logos, or reason, by offering clear, rational ideas and using specific details, examples, facts, statistics, or expert testimony to back them up.

Occasion

The time and place a speech is given or a place is written.

Pathos

Greek for "suffering" or "experience." Speakers appeal to pathos to emotionally motivate their audience. More specific appeals to pathos might play on the audience's values, desires, and hopes, on the one hand, or fears and prejudices on another.

Persona

Greek for "mask." The face or character that a speaker shows to his or her audience.

Polemic

Greek for "hostile." An aggressive argument that tries to establish the superiority of one opinion over all others. Polemics generally do not concede that opposing opinions have any merit.

Propaganda

The spread of ideas and information to further a cause. In its negative sense, propaganda is the use of rumors, lies, misinformation, and scare tactics in order to damage or promote a cause.

Purpose

The goal the speaker wants to achieve.

Refutation

A denial of the validity of an opposing argument. In order to sound reasonable, refutations often follow a concession that acknowledges that an opposing argument may be true or reasonable.

Rhetoric

As Aristotle defined the term, "the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion." In other words, it is the art of finding ways to persuade an audience.

Rhetorical Appeals

Rhetorical techniques used to persuade an audience by emphasizing what they find most important or compelling. The three major appeals are to ethos (character), logos (reason), and pathos (emotion).

Rhetorical Triangle

(Aristotelian triangle)- A diagram that illustrates the interrelationship among the speaker, audience, and subject in determining a text.

SOAPS

A mnemonic device that stands for Subject, Occasion, Audience, Purpose, and Speaker. It is a handy way to remember the various elements that make up the rhetorical situation.

Speaker-

The person or group who creates a text. This might be a politician who delivers a speech, a commentator who writes an article, an artist, who draws a political cartoon, or even a company that commissions an advertisement.

Subject

who or what the sentence is about

Text

While this term generally means the written words, in the humanities it has come to mean any cultural product that can be "read"--- meaning not just consumed and comprehended, but investigated. This includes fiction, nonfiction, poetry, political cartoons, fine art, photography, performances, fashion, cultural trends, and much more.

Deductive reasoning

A form of logical reasoning wherein a general principle is applied to a specific case.

Inductive reasoning

Making a generalization based on specific evidence at hand.

Juxtaposition

Placing two very different things together for effect.

Parallelism

(Also known as parallel structure or balanced sentences.) Sentence construction which places equal grammatical constructions near each other, or repeats identical grammatical patterns. Parallelism is used to add emphasis, organization, or sometimes pacing to writing. "Cinderella swept the floor, dusted the mantle, and beat the rugs."

Anaphora

Repetition of a word, phrase, or clause at the beginning of two or more sentences or clauses in a row. This is a deliberate form of repetition and helps make the writer's point more coherent. "I came, I saw, I conquered."

Antithesis

Two opposite or contrasting words, phrases, or clauses, or even ideas, with parallel structure. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times."

Polysyndeton

a list or series of words, phrases, or clauses that is connected with the repeated use of the same conjunction. The most common conjunctions used with polysyndeton are and and or.

Asyndeton

a list or a series in which no “and” is used at all, rather the items are separated by commas.

Asyndeton has an effect that is quite different from polysyndetons.