Rhetorical Analysis
&
Clarity in writing
Eng 105 Th. Oct 13th
Your Questions
Ethos, Pathos, Logos

Do ethos, pathos, and logos need to be related
to the thesis?
 Yes - If you think the author did a good job using
e/p/l to effectively make their point, you’ll be
supporting that claim and giving example from
that standpoint.
 And vice-versa for ineffective arguments
 An argument can be effective but still have some
bad points - most will. Don’t hesitate to talk
about those.
Lack of ethos, pathos, logos
 What
if my paper doesn’t have any
ethos/pathos/logos?
 If there is an argument, there is logos somewhere. If there is an author, there is
ethos - somewhere. If there are words
other than cold, academic speech “obliterated” where something less loaded
could be used, that is pathos
Effective or Ineffective?
 How
do I know if an argument is or isn’t
effective?
 Need to put aside personal opinion - that
can easily taint your judgementµ
 Go by the use of appeals. Is it TOO
emotional? Is ethos as glaring as a
president putting on a blue collar shirt and
rolling up his sleeves to appeal to the
working class? Or is it legitimate?
Which is easier?
 Is
it easier to analyze something you
agree with or something you disagree
with?
 If you agree with it, you will be less likely
to notice problems - “preaching to the
choir.”
 If you disagree, you may find flaws where
flaws do not exist
Having problems with Ethos
 Anything
that makes the author sound
good
 Any titles, history, MA MFA PHD, Etc.
 Anywhere the author tries to relate his/her
experiences to the reader’s in any way
 Any words that appeal to a certain group
 Words like “us, we, fellow Americans, etc.
 Conversational tone rather than academic
Fallacies
Don’t focus the paper only on fallacies
 Talk about fallacies in the Logos/Logical
argument section - you may also mention them
near your thesis if the author uses many of them
and it really hurts/helps the paper
 They can add to an argument - many effective
papers use terrible logic. Productive use of
fallacies is a fine art that has gotten many
people into positions of power.

What if there is very little of
one argument type?
 There
should be at least two of each in
your paper
 Talk some about what the author should
have done in this case
 Talk about how this helped/hurt the
argument - perhaps not appealing to the
audience helped make a very logical
argument more powerful by drawing more
attention to statistics
Idea Generation - Length!

Go through your article line by line before you
write - mark up a list on the article itself of the
ethos, pathos, logos, audience, author, tone,
bias, fallacies, argument type, etc.
 Don’t force yourself to write sequentially - NO
great writer/author writes perfectly from “Once
upon a time” to “The end.”
 Force yourself to find at least 2-3 examples of
each appeal. You may think it’s silly, but you
may surprise yourself!
Why the hell are we writing
this?
 Critical
thinking skills
 Skills/Ideas will be used in other 105
papers
 Skills/Ideas will be used in ALL classes
that need papers - and many will.
 Helps with awareness of media, culture,
advertising, politics, internet, etc.
Editing for Clarity
P. 339/Section 10 in spiral bound
book
Redundancies
 Students
living in close proximity in the dorms
need to cooperate together if they want to live
in harmony.
 Students living in the dorms need to cooperate
to live in harmony.
Repetition
 The
children enjoyed watching television more
than they enjoyed reading books
 The children enjoyed watching television more
than reading books
Wordy to Concise
 It
is a common desire to use long, academicsounding phrases in place of single-word
alternatives – but in reality, the concise choice
is the best choice
 At this point in time = Now
 In order to = To
 For the purpose of = to
 In the event that = If
Missing words
 Missing
words can change the meaning of
a sentence - make sure subjects, verbs,
etc. all agree
 The gang members neither cooperated
nor listened to the authorities
 The gang members neither cooperate with
not listened to the authorities
Misplaced Modifiers
 The
hikers watched the storm gathering
force from the cabin’s porch
 Leaking in the basement, I found a pipe
 From the cabin’s porch, the hikers
watched the storm gathering.
 I found a pipe leaking in the basement
Be assertive
 This
seems like it might be an example of
a logical fallacy…
 This
is a logical fallacy.
Author in the paper
 Do
not use “I”
 The paper’s existence implies an author
already, as well as an opinion
 Therefore, you don’t need “In my opinion”
either.