ELEVATOR PITCH

ATTENTION GRABBER
Take a minute to picture your typical, 21st century nurse. Perhaps youre
imagining men and women drawing blood as they work late into the night?
PURPOSE OF PIECE AND RHETORICAL SITUATION
When the article Nurses are Lucky Girls was published in 1954, the author
chose not to depict these grueling, intense conditions, but instead portray the benefits of a
job as a female nurse.
BROADER CONTEXT
By basing her article off a visit she made herself to a hospital, she became a
credible source to the audience. Furthermore, by choosing images and text that
emphasized lively socialization and opportunities to secure a doctor or patient as a steady
beau, the author invented a persuasive message that specifically ignored unappealing
aspects of the career. She also used kairos to identify the ideologies of both men and
women in that era, and to demonstrate they could both approve of nursing, as it enabled
women to fulfill their role of domesticity.
THE CLOSER
Though this may seem like one of many advertisements of the 1950s, it is
significant in that it encouraged civic engagement by ensuring that nursing would not
disrupt the rigid social structure of the era. This artifact demonstrates how rhetorical
devices were used to appease the dominant gender ideals that existed while persuading
women to engage in a controversial act.