Blog Response 1

What is Rhetoric?

After reading Aristotle’s Rhetoric and Cicero’s De Inventione I understand rhetoric to be a complicated yet simple art. In its simplest form Aristotle’s definition is “the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion.” (Aristotle’s Rhetoric Pg 7, Book 1 section 2) but as I dove deeper into the study of rhetoric I found it is much more complicated than that. Rhetoric is general in the sense that the art is not confined to a specific subject. But rhetoric is specific in its purpose, persuasion.

What are some types of persuasive appeals?

The different types of persuasive appeals I learned in the past as ethos, logos and pathos, however; none of the material I just read mentioned them by name but I saw the idea of them. Aristotle writes “Of the modes of persuasion furnished by the spoken word there are three kinds. The first kind depends on the personal character of the speaker;” [Ethos] “the second on putting the audience into a certain frame of mind;” [Pathos] “the third on the proof, or apparent proof, provided by the words of the speech itself.” (pg  7) [Logos].

What is a rhetorical situation?

According to Bitzer rhetoric does not exist without a rhetorical situation which according to Bitzer’s The Rhetorical Situation, is “a complex of persons, events, objects, and relations presenting an actual or potential exigence which can be completely or partially removed if discourse, introduced into the situation, can so constrain human decision or action as to bring about the significant modification of the exigence.”(pg 6) And “exigence is rhetorical when it is capable of positive modification and when positive modification requires discourse or can be assisted by discourse.” (pg 7) A rhetorical situation can be simple or complex, organized or not, just as rhetoric can.

What is an audience?

An audience in Aristotle’s position is simply “the person addressed” or “the hearer” (pg 15) the only condition being “the hearer must be either a judge, with a decision to make about things past or future, or an observer” (pg 15) While Bitzer defines a rhetorical audience as one that “consists only of those persons who are capable of being influences by discourse and of being mediators of change.” Bitzer’s The Rhetorical Situation (pg 8)