Shea, The Language of Composition, 4E, Chapter 1

Rhetoric

Aristotle defined _____ as “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.

Texts

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

Rhetorical situation

The exigence, purpose, audience, writer, context, and message of a text.

Context

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

Exigence

The aspects of the rhetorical situation that prompted the writer or speaker to create the text, including its occasion.

Occasion

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

Purpose

The goal the writer or speaker of a text wants to achieve.

Rhetorical triangle

A diagram that illustrates the interrelationship among the writer, audience, and subject of a text.

Writer

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.

Persona

Greek for “mask.” The face or character that a speaker or writer shows to the audience.

Audience

The listener, viewer, or reader of a text. It has both shared and individual beliefs, values, needs, and backgrounds. Most texts are likely to have multiple _____s.

Message

The main idea or position the writer wants to convey to the audience about the subject of a text.

Subject (of a sentence)

A word that identifies what or who does the action or embodies the state of being expressed by a verb in a sentence.

Subject (of a text)

The topic of a text. What the text is about.

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).

Ethos

Greek for “character.” Writers and speakers appeal to ethos to demonstrate that they are credible and trustworthy to speak on a given topic. Ethos is established by both who the speaker is and what the speaker says.

Logos

Greek for “embodied thought.” Writers and 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.

Counterargument

An opposing argument to the one a writer is putting forward. Rather than ignoring a _____, a strong writer will usually address it through the process of concession and refutation.

Concession

An acknowledgment that an opposing argument may be true or reasonable. In a strong argument, a concession is usually accompanied by a refutation challenging the validity of the opposing argument.

Refutation

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

Rebuttal

A rebuttal presents a contrasting perspective on an argument or its evidence, proposing that some or all of a competing position is unfounded.

Pathos

Greek for “suffering” or “experience.” Writers and speakers appeal to _____ to emotionally motivate their audience. More specific appeals to _____ might play on the audience’s values, desires, and hopes, on the one hand, or fears and prejudices, on the other.

Style

The word choices writers make, the syntactical patterns they create in their writing, and the conventions of grammar and mechanics that they use. These language choices help shape an audience’s perception of the work and the effectiveness of its argument.

Denotation

The literal definition of a word, often referred to as the “dictionary definition.”

Connotations

Meanings or associations that readers bring to words beyond their dictionary definitions, or denotations. _____ can be positive or negative, and they often affect the author’s tone.

Modifiers

An adjective, an adverb, a phrase, or a clause that modifies a noun, pronoun, or verb. The purpose of a _____ is usually to describe, focus, or qualify.

Clause

A group of words containing both a subject and a verb.

Diction

A writer’s choice of words. In addition to choosing words with precise denotations and connotations, a writer must choose whether to use words that are abstract or concrete, formal or informal, literal or figurative. Analysis of _____ looks at these choices and what they add to the speaker’s message.

Figurative language

Language that uses figures of speech; nonliteral language usually evoking strong images. Sometimes referred to as metaphorical language, most of its forms explain, clarify, or enhance an idea by comparing it to something else; the comparison can be explicit (simile) or implied (metaphor). Other forms of _____ include (but are not limited to) personification, paradox, overstatement (hyperbole), understatement, and irony.

Metaphor

Figure of speech that compares two things without using like or as.

Simile

A figure of speech used to explain or clarify an idea by comparing it explicitly to something else, using the words like, as, or as though to do so.

Analogy

A comparison between two seemingly dissimilar things. Often, an _____ uses something simple or familiar to explain something complex or unfamiliar.

Personification

Attribution of a lifelike quality to an inanimate object or an idea.

Allusion

Brief reference to a person, an event, or a place (real or fictitious) or to a work of art.

Syntax

The arrangement of words into phrases, clauses, and sentences. This includes word order (subject-verb-object, for instance, or an inverted structure); the length and structure of sentences (simple, compound, complex, or compound-complex); and such schemes as parallelism, juxtaposition, antithesis, and antimetabole.

Independent clause

A clause that can stand by itself and still make sense. In other words, it contains a subject (noun) and a predicate (verb).

Compound sentence

Two independent clauses joined by a coordinating conjunction (and, but, or, nor, for, yet, or so) or a semicolon.

Complex sentences

A sentence containing an independent clause and one or more subordinate clauses (beginning with words such as after, before, although, because, until, when, while, and if).

Coordination

Joining parts of sentences to emphasize important ideas, give readers information, and add rhythm to writing. _____joins two ideas with a coordinating conjunction, usually to show that both ideas are equally important.

Subordination

Joining parts of sentences to emphasize important ideas, give readers information, and add rhythm to writing. _____ joins two ideas with a subordinating conjunction, usually to show that one idea is less important than the other.

Periodic sentence

A sentence that begins with details, qualifications, or modifications, building toward the main clause.

Cumulative sentence

A sentence in which an independent clause is followed by details, qualifications, or modifications in subordinate clauses or phrases.

Parenthetical

A clause or phrase interrupting a sentence to provide information that is typically not essential to understanding the writer’s main point but still helps writers achieve their purpose or speak to the audience’s needs.

Parallel structure

Similarity of structure in a pair or series of related words, phrases, or clauses.

Antithesis

Contradictory ideas that are juxtaposed, often using parallel grammatical construction.

Punctuation

Symbols used in writing to show to what extent ideas are connected or separated.

Comma

A form of punctuation that shows separations within a sentence. Commas are used to set off subordinate clauses, phrases, or items in a list.

Colon

A form of punctuation. It often introduces an example.

Semicolon

A punctuation mark that puts together two sentences; usually the sentences share some meaning.

Dash

A form of punctuation that adds another thought to a sentence — like a bridge. It can also be used to interject a thought — an interruption, really — into a sentence.

Hyphen

A _____ connects words together, making them into one combo-word cluster.

Tone

A writer or speaker’s attitude toward the subject conveyed by stylistic and rhetorical choices.

Shift

A point in a text that indicates a change. It is most often a change in the writer’s or speaker’s tone or perspective.

Irony

An incongruity between expectation and reality.

Verbal irony

A figure of speech that occurs when a speaker or character says one thing but means something else or when what is said is the opposite of what is expected, creating a noticeable incongruity. Sarcasm Is _____ used derisively.

Situational irony

A pointed discrepancy between what seems fitting or expected and what actually happens.

Dramatic irony

Tension created by the contrast between what a character or writer says or thinks and what the audience knows to be true.

Hyperbole

Deliberate exaggeration used for emphasis or to produce a comic or an ironic effect; an overstatement to make a point.

Understatement

The presentation or framing of something as less important, urgent, awful, good, powerful, and so on, than it actually is, often for satiric or comical effect; the opposite of hyperbole, it is often used along with this technique, and for similar effect.

Composition

The physical arrangement of visual elements within the frame of an image.

Background

The part of an image that is behind the objects depicted in the foreground.

Line

A path traced by a moving point in an image, either real or implied. _____s convey a sense of borders, direction, and motion to the viewer.

Color

_____ is dependent on light; without light there is no _____. _____ properties include hue (the name of the _____), value (its relative light or darkness), tint (a _____lighter than a _____’s natural value — for example, pink is a tint of red), shade (a _____ darker than the hue’s normal value — for example, burgundy is a shade of red), and intensity (the relative purity of a _____).

Focus

The point in an image to which the viewer’s eye is immediately drawn. This can also refer to the level of clarity in an image — elements in high _____ are clear and distinct, while elements in low _____ are blurred and indefinite.

Shape

A two-dimensional form that occupies an area with identifiable boundaries. It can be created by a line (such as a square outlined in pencil on white paper), a shift in texture (such as a square of unmown lawn in the middle of a mown lawn), or a shift in color (such as a blue polka dots on a red shirt).

Framing

The presentation of visual elements in an image, especially the placement of the focal point of an image in relation to other visual aspects of that image.

Foreground

The part of an image that is nearest to the viewer.

Annotate

The act of noting observations directly on a text, especially anything striking or confusing, to record ideas and impressions for later analysis.

Thesis statement

The articulation of the main argument in an argumentative piece of writing. Usually a single sentence, it often previews or sets the stage for the central claims the writer will make.

Topic sentence

A sentence that states the main point of a paragraph, usually the first sentence.

Commentary

An explanation of why the evidence and/or quotations are important to the development of a line of reasoning and how they support the thesis.

Line of reasoning

The connections between the claims in the writer’s argument and the evidence presented to support them.