RHETORICAL ANALYSIS
WHAT IS RHETORIC?
• Rhetoric is:
• The faculty (Aristotle calls it a dynamos—an
improvable art)
• of finding (not necessarily using, but certainly finding)
• all the available means (everything a writer, speaker,
or artist might do with language or images)
• of persuasion (writers, speakers, and artists aim to
shape people’s thoughts and actions)
• in a particular case (rhetoric capitalizes on the
particular)
• to achieve meaning, purpose, and effect
• In other words, Aristotle says that rhetoric is a teachable art and
that people can get better at it. To Aristotle, rhetoric was
dominated by invention, for which he used the Greek noun
heuresis, or “a finding.” The English cognate noun, heuristic, means
“a systematic process of finding and solving problems.” Since
rhetors (writers and speakers) operate in specific situations, cases
which embody exigence (requiring immediate attention; need),
audience (people either immediate or mediated over time and
place, capable of responding to this exigence), and intention or
purpose (what the writer or speaker hopes the audience will do
with the material presented: make meaning, realize its purpose,
recognize its effect), rhetorical analysts ought to be able to
determine, by drawing inferences, the exigence, the primary and
secondary audiences, and the intention or purpose of any text they
analyze.
Logos, Pathos, Ethos
• The “Artistic Proofs”: logos, ethos, pathos
• logos: the logical appeal; the appeal to reason; the
“embodied thought” of the text; central and subsidiary idea
that the text develops (what we think)
• ethos: appeal to good sense, good will, and good character
of the reader and exhibits the good sense, good will and
good character of the writer (how we act; morality;
integrity)
• pathos: appeal to the emotions or state of life of the
readers (what we feel)
• Rhetorical analysis reveals how the organization of the
writing appeals to logos, ethos, and pathos and to the
establishment of the tone of the writing.
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ELEMENTS OF RHETORICAL ANALYSIS:
• Effective analysis must consist of a careful
exploration of three things beyond basic
content:
• purpose
• context
• audience
TONE
Tone is the unifying emotional content of a
piece of writing.
Tone refers to the author’s perception and
presentation of the material and the audience.
Tone is an author’s attitude toward his/her
subject; it represents the relationship the author
has toward the subject.
The author’s attitude may be
formal: uses diction & syntax that are academic,
serious, and authoritative
informal: is more conversational and engages
the reader on an equal basis
ADJECTIVES THAT DESCRIBE TONE
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Bitter
Sardonic
Sarcastic
Ironic
Mocking
Scornful
Satiric
Vituperative
Scathing
Confidential
Factual
Informal
Facetious
Critical
Resigned
Astonished
Objective
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Naïve
Joyous
Spiritual
Wistful
Nostalgic
Humorous
Pedantic
Didactic
Inspiring
Remorseful
Disdainful
Laudatory
Mystified
Compassionate
Reverent
Lugubrious
Elegiac
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Macabre
Reflective
Maudlin
Sentimental
Patriotic
Detached
Angry
Sad
Playful
Solemn
Sincere
Cynical
Informative
Scientific
Educated
Witty
Tools to achieve tone
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Diction
Syntax
Imagery
Facts
Symbols
Irony
Foreshadowing
Narration
DICTION
Diction is Word Choice: why does the author choose one
word as opposed to another?
Diction is an essential building block of composition.
When analyzing diction, some features to look for are:
general or specific words; formal or informal language;
abstract or concrete nouns; Latinate (polysyllabic) or
Anglo-Saxon (monosyllabic) words; jargon, slang, or
colloquial words; and, of course, denotation and
connotation.
Elements of Diction
• Denotation: the dictionary definition of a word; the
most specific or direct meaning
• Connotation: the associations or moods that
accompany a word (determines the author’s tone and
purpose)
• Euphemism: substitution of a mild, inoffensive,
indirect, or vague term for a harsh, blunt, or offensive
one (passed away)
• Onomatopoeia: the sound of a word imitates the thing
or action associated with it (thud, bang, tinkle)
• Pun: a play on words, usually humorous, that calls
attention to a particular point
SYNTAX
Syntax is the arrangement of words. It is the study
of the rules of grammar that define the formation
of sentences.
Many rhetorical devices are syntactic.
Rhetorical analysis consists of analyzing the
methods the author employs to convey his
attitude, conviction, or opinion about a particular
subject. You are not analyzing what the author is
saying; you are analyzing how the argument is
created.
Elements of Syntax
Elements of syntax are called schemes.
While there are several categories of
schemes, we will deal with the most
common schemes found in prose works.
ALLITERATION
• The repetition of a phonetic sound (usually a
consonant) at the beginning of several words in a
sentence
• Effect: emphasis; to call attention to the words
and fix them in the reader’s/listener’s mind
• Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.
• A moist young moon hung above the mist of a
neighboring meadow.
JUXTAPOSITION
• Putting two contrasting ideas together
• Effect: contrast; dramatic effect
• “My goodness is often chastened by my sense of
sin.”
• The gasoline savings from a hybrid car as
compared to a standard car seem excellent until
one compares the asking price of the two
vehicles.
PARALLELISM
• Similarity of structure in a pair or series of related words, phrases,
or clauses
• Effect: balance, rhythm, and clarity; equality between parts of
sentences; coherence
• “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the
true meaning of its creed…I have a dream that one day on the red
hills of Georgia…I have a dream that the state of Mississippi…will be
transformed…I have a dream that my four little children…I have a
dream today.”
• We will fight them on the beaches, and fight them in the hills, and
fight them in the forests, and in the villages of the dell.
From Clark Kerr, The Uses of the University. Copyright 1963.
He [the president of a large, complex university] is expected to be a
friend of the students, a colleague of the faculty, a good fellow with the
alumni, a sound administrator with the trustees, a good speaker with the
public, an astute bargainer with the foundations and the federal agencies,
a politician with the state legislatures, a friend of industry, labor, and
agriculture, a persuasive diplomat with donors, a champion of education
generally, a supporter of the professions (particularly law and medicine), a
spokesman to the press, a scholar in his own right, a public servant at the
state and national levels, a devotee of opera and football equally, a decent
human being, a good husband and father, an active member of the a
church.
How does this sentence carry meaning, both in the words, in its length, and in
the grammatical structure?
ISOCOLON
• Parallel elements are similar not only in structure
but in length (that is, the same number of words,
even the same number of syllables)
• Effect: rhythm
• His purpose was to impress the ignorant, to
perplex the dubious, and to confound the
scrupulous.
ANTITHESIS
• The juxtaposition of contrasting ideas, often through
parallel structure
• Effect: contrast; emphasis
• Though studious, he was popular; though
argumentative, he was modest; though inflexible, he
was candid; and though metaphysical, yet orthodox. Dr.
Samuel Johnson on the character of the Reverend Zacariah Mudge, in the London Chronicle, May 2, 1769
• That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for
mankind. Neil Armstrong, as he stepped on the moon, Sunday, July 20, 1969
ANASTROPHE
• Inversion of the natural or usual word order
• Effect: emphasis; focusing attention
• Rich, famous, proud, a ruling despot Pope might
be—but he was middle-class! V.S. Pritchett, from a review in the New
York Review of Books, February 27, 1969
• Backward run the sentences, till reels the mind. (From a
parody of the style of Time magazine)
CHIASMUS
• Reversal of grammatical structures in successive
phrases or clauses (without repetition)
• Effect: emphasis; balance; reinforces antithesis
• Those gallant men will remain often in my
thoughts and in my prayers always.
• “. . .(without the arrogance of false humility and
without the false humbleness of pride). . .” The
Bear, William Faulkner, p. 296.
ANTIMETABOLE
• Repetition of words in successive clauses in
reverse grammatical order
• Effect: reinforce antithesis
• “Let us never negotiate out of fear, but let us
never fear to negotiate.” John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Address, January 20,
1961
• Ask not what your country can do for you, but
what you can do for your country.” John F. Kennedy, Inaugural
Address, January 20, 1961
ANAPHORA
• Repetition of the same word or words at the beginning of
successive phrases, clauses, or sentences
• Effect: emphasis; rhythm; appeal to pathos
• We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landinggrounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight
in the hills. Winston Churchill, speech in the House of Commons, June 4, 1940
• It is 1969 already, and 1965 seems almost like a childhood memory.
Then we were conquerors of the world. No one could stop us. We
were going to end the war. We were going to wipe out racism. We
were going to mobilize the poor. We were going to take over the
universities. Jerry Rubin, from an article in the New York Review of Books, February 13, 1969
EPISTROPHE
• Repetition of the same word or words at the end of
successive phrases, clauses, or sentences
• Effect: emotional emphasis; appeal to pathos
• The government of the people, by the people, and for
the people shall not perish from this earth. Abraham Lincoln,
Gettysburg Address, November 19, 1863
• As long as the white man sent you to Korea, you bled.
He sent you to Germany, you bled. He sent you to the
South Pacific to fight the Japanese, you bled. Malcolm X
EPANALEPSIS
• Repetition of the beginning word of a clause
or phrase at the end of the clause or phrase
• Effect: emphasis; appeal to pathos
• Common sense is not so common.
• “Possessing what we were unpossessed by,
Possessed by what we now no more possessed.”
Robert Frost, “The Gift Outright”
ANADIPLOSIS
• Repetition of the last word of one clause at the beginning
of the following clause
• Effect: emphasis; a sense of logical progression; or, for the
sake of beauty
• Having power makes it [totalitarian leadership] isolated;
isolation breeds insecurity; insecurity breeds suspicion and
fear; suspicion and fear breed violence. Zbigniew K. Brzezinski, The Permanent
Purge, Politics in Soviet Totalitarianism
• Queeg: “Aboard my ship, excellent performance is
standard. Standard performance is sub-standard. Substandard performance is not permitted to exist.” Herman Wouk, The
Caine Mutiny
CLIMAX
• Arrangement of words, phrases, or clauses in
an order of increasing importance
• Effect: emphasis
• I think we’ve reached a point of great
decision, not just for our nation, not only for
all humanity, but for life upon the earth. George
Wald, “A Generation in Search of a Future,” speech delivered at MIT on March 4, 1969
ASYNDETON
• The omission of conjunctions between a series of
words, phrases, or clauses
• Effect: hurried rhythm; strong climactic effect;
synonymity; unpremeditated multiplicity
• “…that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet
any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to
assure the survival and success of liberty.” John F. Kennedy
• I came, I saw, I conquered.
POLYSYNDETON
• Deliberate use of conjunctions between each
word, phrase, or clause
• Effect: multiplicity; energetic enumeration;
intensity and emphasis; flow and continuity;
produces a solemn note; slows the rhythm
• This semester I am taking English and history and
biology and mathematics and sociology and
physical education.
METAPHOR
• An implied comparison between two things of
unlike nature that yet have something in common
• Effect: clarity; beauty of language
• Write your own example.
• Allegory: an extended or continued metaphor
• Parable: an anecdotal narrative designed to teach
a moral lesson
SIMILE
• An explicit comparison between two things of
unlike nature that yet have something in
common
• Effect: clarity
• Write your own example
SYNECDOCHE
• A figure of speech in which the part stands for
the whole, the whole for a part, or any portion,
section or main quality for the whole or the thing
itself
• Genus substituted for species: weapon for sword,
arms for rifles, vessel for ship
• Species substituted for genus: bread for food
• Part substituted for the whole: hands for helpers,
roofs for homes
• Matter for what is made from it: silver for money,
waves for ocean
METONYMY
• A type of metaphor in which the name of one
thing is substituted for another with which it is
closely associated
• Effect: definition; commentary
• White House for the President; bottle for wine;
City Hall for government (You can’t fight city
hall.)
PERSONIFICATION
• Investing abstractions or inanimate objects with
human characteristics
• Effect: appeals to pathos
• “A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth’s sweet-flowing breast.” Joyce
Kilmer, “Trees”
• The thunder grumbled all night as the rain
slapped the windows.
APOSTROPHE
• Addressing an absent person or a personified
abstraction
• Effect: appeal to pathos
• “O eloquent, just, and mighty Death! Whom
none could advise, thou hast persuaded…” Sir
Walter Raleigh, History of the World
• “O Rose, thou art sick.”
William Blake, “The Sick Rose”
HYPERBOLE
• Deliberate exaggeration
• Effect: emphasis; heightened effect; bolsters an
argument
• I said ‘rare,’ not ‘raw.’ I’ve seen cows hurt worse
than this get up and get well.
• We walked along a road in Cumberland and
stooped, because the sky hung so low. Thomas Wolfe, Look
Homeward, Angel
LITOTES
• Deliberate use of understatement formed by
denying the opposite
• Effect: enhances and intensifies the expression;
ironic sentiment
• Heat waves are not rare in the summer.
• It isn’t very serious. I have this tiny little tumor
on the brain. J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
RHETORICAL QUESTION
• Also called erotema
• Asking a question whose answer is obvious or
assumed
• Effect: asserting or denying something obliquely;
persuasion
• If not now, when?
• Is justice then to be considered merely a word?
OXYMORON
• Two words that together create a contradiction; a
paradox reduced to two words
• Effect: complexity, emphasis, or wit; produces a
startling effect
• “I must be cruel only to be kind.” Shakespeare, Hamlet
• Jumbo shrimp
• “Why then, O brawling love! O loving hate!...
O heavy lightness, serious vanity!” Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
PARADOX
• An apparently contradictory statement that
contains a measure of truth
• Art is a form of lying in order to tell the truth.
Pablo Picasso
• “The child is father to the man.” William Wordsworth, “My
Heart Leaps Up”
ALLUSION
• A short informal reference to a famous person, event,
place, or literary work
• Effect: to explain (by making a sort of analogy), clarify,
or enhance; to introduce variety
• “…just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus…so
am I compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond
my own home town.” Martin Luther King, Jr., Letter from Birmingham Jail
• If you take his parking place, you can expect World War
II all over again.”
ANALOGY
• A relational comparison of or similarity between two
objects or ideas
• Effect: clarity; explanation of a thought process;
establishment of a pattern of reasoning
• Knowledge always desires increase; it is like fire, which
must first be kindled by some external agent, but
which will afterwards propagate itself. Samuel Johnson
• When I think of the final exam in English, I think of
dungeons and chains and racks and primal screams.
SYLLOGISM
• A three-part argument construction in which two
premises lead to a truth
• Effect: appeal to logos; defense of a truth;
conclusion
• All human beings are mortal.
Heather is a human being.
Therefore, Heather is mortal.
ZEUGMA
• Two or more elements in a sentence are tied together by the same
verb or noun; especially acute if the verb or noun does not have the
exact same meaning in both parts of the sentence
• Effect: economy (saves repetition); connects thoughts and shows
relationships between ideas
• She dashed his hopes and out of his life when she walked through
the door.
• A man could lose himself in Los Angeles as easily as a cufflink. -Benjamin Black, The Silver Swan, p. 228.
• Copernicus’s book describing the revolutions of the sun and planets
caused a revolutionary change in man’s perspective of himself in
the universe.
Style
“Style is a thinking out into language.” Cardinal Newman
The Greeks conceived of style as that part of
rhetoric in which we take the thoughts collected
by invention and put them into words for the
speaking out in delivery.
“Style, in its finest sense, is the last acquirement of
the educated mind; it is also the most useful.” Alfred
North Whitehead
Style
• “Style is this: to add to a given thought all the
circumstances fitted to produce the whole effect
which the thought is intended to produce.” Stendhal
• Jonathan Swift defined style as “proper words in
proper places.”
• There cannot be such a thing as an absolute “best
style.” A writer must be in command of a variety
of styles in order to draw on the style most
appropriate to the situation.
Style
How do writers acquire the variety of styles
needed for the variety of subject matter,
occasion, and audience that they are bound to
confront? The classical rhetoricians taught that
person acquired versatility of style three ways:
1. Through a study of precepts or principles
2. Through imitation of the practices of others
3. Through practice in writing
ANALYZING STYLE
Features you can look for when analyzing prose
style:
1. Kind of diction
2. Length of sentences
3. Kinds of sentences
4. Variety of sentence patterns
5. Coherence devices
6. Figures of speech
7. Paragraphing (length, development, transitional
devices)
KINDS OF SENTENCES
• Grammatical: simple, compound, complex,
compound-complex
• Rhetorical: loose (cumulative), periodic,
balanced, antithetical
• Functional: statement, question, command,
exclamation
RHETORICAL SENTENCES
• Loose (cumulative): the independent clause comes
first, followed by one or more dependent clauses
• Periodic: a sentence with several dependent clauses
that precede the independent clause
The effect of a periodic sentence is that it saves the
important part of the sentence until the end, creating
eagerness on the part of the listener/reader.
Example: After planning the menu, shopping for
the ingredients, assembling the recipes. And preparing
each dish, Marie finally sat down and ate dinner with
her family.
Some interesting observations can be made about a person’s style and
habits of thought by studying the kinds of sentences used and the
proportions in which the various kinds are used.
W. K. Wimsatt, in his valuable study The Prose Style of Samuel Johnson, saw in
Dr. Johnson’s persistent use of parallel and antithetical clauses a reflection on
the bent of his mind: “Johnson’s prose style is a formal exaggeration—in
places a caricature—of a certain pair of complementary drives, the drive to
assimilate ideas, and the drive to distinguish them—to collect and to
separate.” And so Dr. Johnson disposed his collection of ideas in parallel
structures; he reinforced the distinctions in ideas by juxtaposing them in
antithetical structure.