Steele Steele Elizabeth Steele Professor Kumar Rhetorical Analysis

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Elizabeth Steele
Professor Kumar
Rhetorical Analysis
February 5, 2015
Ideal Democracy: A Rhetorical Analysis
“Democracy is simply a form of government” (Becker). Carl Becker, born in 1873 in
Blackhawk County, Iowa where he grew up. He was a historian that studied at the University of
Wisconsin and obtained his doctorate from Columbia University. Becker became a co-worker
and friend of James Harvey Robinson, a founder of “the new history” movement and together
they worked on deciding the “true” meaning of history and figured out that it is not just about
politics. “Robinson and Becker established the New School for Social Research in New York
City” (1), where Robinson became the president of.
Becker was known for his documents about history but his early work focused on
Democracy and where it all started as well as how it developed into what it is now. Becker wrote
a book “The United States; an Experiment in Democracy” (1920). This book was touching on
the idea about the Revolution and what the purpose was for the Revolution. Becker achieved
many good things and defining history and the political aspect in history. In 1931 Becker became
the president of The American Historical Association. Based off of his education, experience,
status and research Becker is well qualified for writing the documents that he does.
After reading Becker’s document Ideal Democracy, the context was well written. By the
remarks he was making about Democracy and connecting it with a dictatorship or a form of
government in general, talking about Stalin I can point out that the document was written during
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War World II by the context in which he wrote. Becker wrote his article in a very professional
manner. I would expect all of his documents to fit in the genre scholar because after all he is a
historian with an educated past. By the way he writes it demonstrates that this document is
clearly intended for not only citizens but citizens that can break apart a scholarly document and
be able to understand it. Becker provides well detailed information that clearly showed he had to
perform a lot of research to obtain such information.
Becker wrote this document for a specific reason. He wanted to inform his audience
about politics and how they play a role within our Democracy. He wrote this, wanting American
citizens to be well educated about what exactly a Democracy is and if we are really living in a
Democracy. “Democracy is a form of government” (Becker). I like how Becker said this because
it gets his audience thinking. His readers are thinking “Democracy is government, politics” and
that is exactly what Becker is trying to point out, politics will always play a role in the
government and since Democracy is a form of government, it will always involve politics.
Becker wanted his audience to be aware of this because our perception of Democracy is the
people have the say, it’s all about the people. However, do the people really have a say? There is
still one person in charge, even though the president/person in charge has a cabinet of people to
help him run things they are all still politics.
Becker’s purpose is to inform citizens about Democracy. His writing style is based on
information that he has researched, because him to, wanted to know the true meaning of
Democracy. “Like liberty or science or progress” (147-3). Becker say’s liberty, meaning
“freedom”, are Americans really free? Does it feel that like freedom being ran by a ruler or is
more like a dictatorship? Science, meaning created, was Democracy created based on science?
Progress, Democracy is a progress based on events. When reading “Like liberty or science or
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progress” I immediately thought progress because Democracy is just that. Americans got their
freedom from fighting in many wars which is a progress to keep going, improving Democracy.
However, other readers may have a different perspective than what mine is.
The content of this document is fairly well written. Becker uses past experiences with
Democracy, mainly focusing on Greece because that is where the idea of Democracy came from.
He uses examples from what other historians have said about Democracy and studied other
countries to see if there was a form of government within that demonstrated Democracy. In fact,
Becker mentions Athens, the birthplace of Democracy. He explains how diversity is the norm in
modern Democracy. When he mentions “diversity” that causes me to drift away and think about
the Declaration of Independence, because it demonstrates how all men are created equally and
that is exactly what diversity is.
Becker organized this document very well. The way it is formatted makes it easier to
follow. He has the document laid out into five different sections:

Section one: The preface, who is Carl Becker and what are his credentials as well as his
beliefs on Democracy.

Section two: Becker’s definition of Democracy, why he is writing about the topic of
Democracy.

Section three: Ideal Democracy, where Democracy came from, how the founding father’s
intended Democracy to be and what Democracy is.

Section four: Talks about the history of Democracy, talks about Greece and how they
perpetrated Democracy.
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
Section five: Included questions to help guide the audience in understanding the
document.
Becker wants his readers to know what they are reading and by doing so he provided
questions at the end to help guide them and understand the meaning of the document. Scholars
have the intention to help guide their audience in the right path because if they didn’t, readers
probably wouldn’t understand what they are reading due to the difficulty of the document .
Becker also wrote this document in a way to help guide his readers, what I mean by this is by the
way he fragmented it. Some paragraphs are long, containing over six paragraphs and some are
short containing less than four. I feel Becker did this to help keep his readers engaged. When a
long paragraph is read, the human mind tends to “zone out”, Becker adds a tiny paragraph after a
long one due to helping keep the reader on tract but also to introduce a new topic, like a
transition.
Becker formatted his document in a scholarly format. He wrote it in that format due to his
credentials and the topic in which he is writing about. I felt that Becker formatted his document
fairly well because the way he wrote it fit in with the style of writing, scholarly. When it comes
to the sentence structure of the document I noticed a lot of “run-ons”. Throughout the document
there were sentences that were really long, I feel Becker could have shortened them to help his
readers understand vs. having to analyze long sentence structures.
Diction used throughout the article would be best described as difficult. I say difficult
because someone with an eighth grade reading level would not understand this, I would even say
high school level readers would have a difficult time analyzing this document. Becker uses big
words that speak a lot of volume. The words he uses are powerful, they need to be to give his
audience a form of reaction of understanding. Becker uses strong diction in his writings because
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he is an informative writer, a scholar. If his diction wasn’t strong, his readers would be
disappointed due to the lack of knowledge. Diction to me speaks a lot of volume in a writers’
work and they need to be convincing of what kind of “point” they are perpetrating.
So why did Becker write this document? Becker wrote Ideal Democracy to inform his
audience about what Democracy is, how we interpret Democracy, where Democracy originated
and how other countries perceive Democracy. Becker is a historian, therefore he performs
research on the past as well as topics that are at a concern. Democracy, clearly a concern in the
United States… Becker wanted to figure out just what exactly the meaning of Democracy is and
if our government is living through Democracy or through a different form of government.
In conclusion, analyzing this document gave me a broader view on Democracy. After reading
Becker’s Ideal Democracy I now question our government, and wonder if we are living through
Democracy or simply just dictatorship playing as a Democracy. Becker did a fair job in
providing his audience with an understanding about modern Democracy.
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Citation
Becker, Carl. Modern Democracy. London: Yale University Press, Oxford University Press,
1941. Print.
The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica. “Carl Becker | Biography- American Historian.”
Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica, 26 Feb. 2012. Web. 08 Feb. 2015.
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Reflection:
1.) How would you explain what rhetoric is?
I would explain rhetoric to be the way an author writes in a specific genre. Carl Becker is
a historian that writes scholarly articles. Therefore, the type of language Becker uses is
very “professional” and writes in a difficult form to read.
2.) Why is it important to know about rhetoric and how what you learned about rhetoric can
you use in your writing?
It is important to know about rhetoric because not knowing can cause a misleading view
on what has been read or heard. Learning about rhetoric can help me in my writing
because when I am given a certain genre to write in, I will know what type of rhetoric to
use to direct that certain genre to a discourse community to not only help my discourse
community, but myself as well.
3.) What is discourse community?
Discourse community is an audience that is strictly intended to read a certain type of
genre. An example would be college students as a discourse community. College students
are required to read text books, articles, essays, etc. that are written by someone with high
credentials and interpret what they are reading, to help them learn.
4.) Why is it important to know about discourse communities and how can you use what you
know about discourse communities in your writing?
It is important to know about discourse communities because when a writer writes an
article, book, essay, etc. they need to know who they are writing to. Certain genres are
not intended for a particular audience. I can use what I know about discourse
communities in my writing by keeping in mind an audience that will cling to that type of
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genre in which I am writing. An example would be if I were to write an article about
women’s fitness, my discourse community would be towards women, and women who
are interested in “women’s fitness.” A man would not read an article about women’s
fitness.
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