RhetoricThe Art of Persuasion

LOGOSLOGOS “Genetically modified

seeds have caused poverty, hunger, and a decline in bio-diversity everywhere they have been introduced, so there is no reason the same thing will not occur when genetically modified corn seeds are introduced in Mexico.”

LOGOS is an appeal to reason or logic. This reasoning begins with a generalization based on reliable evidence.

"Does this place look like I'm . . . married? The toilet

seat's up, man!"(The Dude in The Big Lebowski, 1998)

ETHOSETHOS• Use reliable and

credible sources• State opposing views• Establish common

ground with reader• Acknowledge your

personal interest in the topic

ETHOS is an ethical appeal based on the character, credibility, or reliability of thewriter.

"The personality of the orator outweighs the issues."

(John Leopold)

"I'm not a doctor, but I play one on TV."

(1960s TV commercial for Excedrin)

PATHOSPATHOS• These appeals sometimes

use interview sources and individual stories to paint a picture. Personal stories illuminated the truth and put a face on a problem.

• Be careful not to DISTRACT from the truth with an emotional appeal.

PATHOS is an emotionalappeal. It appeals to an audience’s needs, values, andemotional sensibilities.

"A brilliant young woman I know was asked once to support her argument in favor of social welfare. She named the most powerful source imaginable: the look in a mother's face when she cannot feed her children. Can you look that hungry child in the eyes? See the blood on his feet from working barefoot in the cotton fields. Or do you ask his baby sister with her belly swollen from hunger if she cares about her daddy's work ethics?"

(Nate Parker as Henry Lowe in The Great Debaters, 2007)

Typical Teenager Argument

“Everyone else can go”

“But we’re not even doing anything this weekend.”

“It’s not hurting anything.”

Why do you hate me? You are ruining my life!

“You never let me do anything!”

“He has been driving for a long time and has never had an accident.”

“Even Albert Einstein got a D on the test.”

Logic

“A negro mother wept in the street Sunday morning in front of a Baptist Church in Birmingham. In her hand she held a shoe, one shoe, from the foot of her dead child. We hold that shoe with her.”

from the Atlanta Constitution

The sad truth is that despite its success as a sportswear slogan, “Just Do It” isn’t a terribly popular idea in real American life. We’ve become a society of rule-followers and permission-seekers. Despite our can-do self image, what we really want is to be told what to do. When the going gets tough, the tough get consent forms.”

~David Brown riffing on Nike’s slogan

“At exactly fifteen minutes past eight in the morning, on August 6, 1945, Japanese time, at the moment when the atomic bomb flashed above Hiroshima, Miss Toshiko Sasaki, a clerk in the personnel department of the East Asia Tin Works, had just sat down at her place in the plant office and was turning her head to speak to the girl in the next desk."

Hiroshimaby John Hersey

"I thought about something Rahim khan had said just before he hung up... There is a way to be good again."The Kite Runnerby Khaled Hosseini

"His hangover was visible. It heaved itself to his shoulders and sat there like a bag of wet cement."

The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak

"His hangover was visible. It heaved itself to his shoulders and sat there like a bag of wet cement."

The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak

His reasoning was transparent. It transformed itself to the jury like a caterpillar into a butterfly.

Really, it is most unreasonable to demand that a man should think of other people so much better than he is able to think of himself.

Joseph Conrad

Really, it is most unreasonable to demand that a man should think of other people so much better than he is able to think of himself.

Joseph Conrad

Really, it is most unreasonable to demand that a man should understand other people so much better than he is able to understand himself.

"I accept the salt of tears evoked by sweet onions and betrayed love."

- Maya Angelou, "A Song to Sensuality", an selection in the book of collected essays, "Even

the Stars Look Lonesome", (p.37)

"I accept the salt of tears evoked by sweet onions and betrayed love."

I embrace the comfort of silence caused by the storm’s devastation and love’s departure.

"My worries seemed to be piling up, one on top of the other, like bricks on a wall.

How To Steal A Dog (p..11)

Patricia O'Conner

"My worries seemed to be piling up, one on top of the other, like bricks on a wall.

My anger seemed to ignite, each flame licking the wound, like gasoline on the inferno.

"When she shut the engine off, we got swallowed up in quiet."

How To Steal A Dog (p.11)

Patricia O'Conner

"When she shut the engine off, we got swallowed up in quiet."

When I plugged the headphone in, I got fired up by Eminem’s rage.

"The best day of my life happened when I was five and almost died at Disney World."

Going BovineLibba Bray (p.1)

“It’s been 84 years, and I can still smell the fresh paint. The china had never been used; the sheets had never been slept in. Titanic was called, ‘The Ship of Dreams’—and it was, it really was.”

From the Movie: Titanic

"Reality has become so intolerable, she said, so bleak, that all I can paint now are the colors of my dreams."

Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi, (p. 11)

The three bodies hang there, even with the white sacks over their heads looking curiously stretched, like chickens strung up by the necks in s meatshop window; like birds with their wings clipped, like flightless birds, wrecked angels.

The Handmaids Tale Margaret Atwood (p. 177)