Rhetoric

Rhetoric

As of the discussion in class, Rhetoric is the art or the way to persuade and person or people of a certain line of thoughts. We can also describe Rhetoric as the power of convincing and as of proving some facts with supporting evidence; there is no way that we can prove something with out evidence, there is only faith, but that isn’t what we are looking for with rhetoric, were the main goal is persuade the audience on something.

There are three types of rhetorical discourse that we still use now days: Legal Speech which stands for the art of convincing the audience of the innocence or the guiltiness (example. Lawyer, Judge, Jury, Defendant- the lawyer try to prove to the judge and the jury that the defendant is innocent by using the power of the rhetoric and the Rhetorical Appeals. The defendant seeks to prove that he is innocent and he uses the lawyer as a “tool” that will help him to achieve his goal. The judge and the jury listen to the appeals of the lawyer, this is done to find the truth of either the defendant is innocent or guilty, it all depends on how the lawyer and the defendant use the legal speech) The second one is the Political, this discourse is the most common all now days( political campaigns and elections). This discourse stands for the art of persuading people to, in a democracy, vote for them, because they are the best choice of all.(Politics try to “destroy” there adversaries in an “Oral War” or a “Discourse War” and always the “stronger Speaker” tends to win the “War” that happens every four years) The last of the discourse is the Ceremonial, this type of discourse is the art of the religions of convincing that the other religions are not so good and that their religions are the “Way” to whatever the stand for. The three types of discourse have one thing in common; they try to persuade the audience.

To achieve the goal of persuasion, Plato, Aristotle, Gogias, Cicero and Quintilian were the key people on the field of the development of the art of persuading audience. The most important of them is Aristotle whom invented or came with these Appeals, this appeals are: Pathos that is the Ancient Greek word for the Emotional; Logos that is the Ancient Greek word for the Rational; and Ethos that is the Ancient Greek word for the Ethical or the Moral. Aristotle used these appeals to convince more effectively. This is done by knowing and analyzing your audience to using the perfect appeals in any giving situation. The use of the emotional appeal comes from that, the emotions the bond of the Speaker and the Audience, and what they may have in common like: ethnicity, sexuality, religion, political opinion, sickness and any other situation that maybe describe as the right of the human to be free and equal. An example of this can be Dr. King’s “I Have A Dream” were he address to an audience with his same problems and to the ones that were making there life so miserable. The second is the rational, the rational stands for is the most logical way of doing something or “Star Trek’s Mr. Spock” would say “there is a logical explication for that”, because it refers to the reason and the evidences. And the last one is ethical; this one stands for what is right and the moral behavior of the human beings.

There also other example of what rhetoric is; in the ancient world the Epicureans and the Stoics were groups of philosophers that argue about almost every single thing, but they were doing this in a diplomatic way. Their meetings took place on the highest court at the Areopagus, the Areopagus was the place were men went to discourse important matters like religion, politics and laws (rhetorical discourse), and only the greatest minds of the time were invited to be on the seasons.

Now day we got rhetoric in everything, the ads, the television, the news paper, the cell phone and the Internet; people trying to convince people to believe or to “buy” every single thing. We have the 1-800-call-fast with the “miracle products”, another example the political ads on the TV and the news paper; or the “buy your salvation”, and the Internet that has it all and some how people with can’t imagine a day with out the most revolutionary invention of the last century, maybe it would stop the world or it could send us back to the Stone Age.

But that is what rhetoric is all about, call it the power of persuade, to convince or some how “buy” the audience, by employing carefully the right words and constructing great speeches that can change the face of the planet, like President George W. Bush’s Patriotic Act for example.