Elements of a Rhetorical Situation

What exactly is a rhetorical situation? An impassioned love letter, a prosecutor's

closing statement, an advertisement hawking the next needful thing you can't
possibly live without—are all examples of rhetorical situations. As different as
their content and intent may be, all of them have the same five basic underlying
principles:

 The text, which is the actual communication, whether written or spoken

 The author, which is the person who creates a specific communication
 The audience, who is the recipient of a communication
 The purpose(s), which are the various reasons for authors and audiences
to engage in communication
 The setting, which is the time, place, and environment that surrounds a
particular communication

Each of these elements has an impact on the eventual outcome of any rhetorical
situation. If a speech is poorly written, it may be impossible to persuade the
audience of its validity or worth, or if its author lacks credibility or passion the
result may be the same. On the other hand, even the most eloquent speaker can
fail to move an audience that is firmly set in a belief system that directly
contradicts the goal the author hopes to achieve and is unwilling to entertain
another point of view. Finally, as the saying implies, "timing is everything." The
when, where, and prevailing mood surrounding a rhetorical situation can greatly
influence its eventual outcome.

Text
While the most commonly accepted definition of a text is a written document,
when it comes to rhetorical situations, a text can take on any form of
communication a person intentionally creates. If you think of communication in
terms of a road trip, the text is the vehicle that gets you to your desired
destination—depending on the driving conditions and whether or not you have
enough fuel to go the distance. There are three basic factors that have the biggest
influence on the nature of any given text: the medium in which it’s delivered, the
tools that are used to create it, and the tools required to decipher it:

 The Medium—Rhetorical texts can take the form of pretty much any and
every kind of media that people use to communicate. A text can be a hand-
written love poem; a cover letter that’s typed, or a personal dating profile
that’s computer-generated. Text can encompass works in the audio, visual,
spoken-word, verbal, non-verbal, graphic, pictorial, and tactile realms, to
name but a few. Text can take the form of a magazine ad, a PowerPoint
 presentation, a satirical cartoon, a film, a painting, a sculpture, a podcast,
or even your latest Facebook post, Twitter tweet, or Pinterest pin.
 The Author’s Toolkit (Creating)—The tools required to author any
form of text impact its structure and content. From the very rudimentary
anatomical tools humans use to produce speech (lips, mouth, teeth,
tongue, and so forth) to the latest high-tech gadget, the tools we choose to
create our communication can help make or break the final outcome.
 Audience Connectivity (Deciphering)—Just as an author requires
tools to create, an audience must have the capability to receive and
understand the information that a text communicates, whether via reading,
viewing, hearing, or other forms of sensory input. Again, these tools can
range from something as simple as eyes to see or ears to hear to something
as complex as sophisticated as an electron microscope. In addition to
physical tools, an audience often requires conceptual or intellectual tools to
fully comprehend the meaning of a text. For instance, while the French
national anthem, “La Marseillaise,” may be a rousing song on its musical
merits alone, if you don’t speak French, the meaning and importance of the
lyrics are lost.

The Author
Loosely speaking, an author is a person who creates text to communicate.
Novelists, poets, copywriters, speechwriters, singer/songwriters, and graffiti
artists are all authors. Each author is influenced by his or her individual
background. Factors such as age, gender identification, geographic location,
ethnicity, culture, religion, socio-economic condition, political beliefs, parental
pressure, peer involvement, education, and personal experience create the
assumptions authors use to see the world, as well as the way in which they
communicate to an audience and the setting in which they are likely to do so.

The Audience
The audience is the recipient of the communication. The same factors that
influence an author also influence an audience, whether that audience is a single
person or a stadium crowd, the audience’s personal experiences affect how they
receive communication, especially with regard to the assumptions they may make
about the author, and the context in which they receive the communication.

Purposes
There are as many reasons to communicate messages as there are authors
creating them and audiences who may or may not wish to receive them, however,
authors and audiences bring their own individual purposes to any given
rhetorical situation. These purposes may be conflicting or complementary.

The authors’ purpose in communicating is generally to inform, to instruct, or to

persuade. Some other author goals may include to entertain, startle, excite,
sadden, enlighten, punish, console, or inspire the intended audience. The
purpose of the audience to become informed, to be entertained, to form a
different understanding, or to be inspired. Other audience takeaways may include
excitement, consolation, anger, sadness, remorse, and so on. 

As with purpose, the attitude of both the author and the audience can have a
direct impact on the outcome of any rhetorical situation. Is the author rude and
condescending, or funny and inclusive? Does he or she appear knowledgeable on
the subject on which they’re speaking, or are they totally out of their depth?
Factors such as these ultimately govern whether or not the audience understands,
accepts, or appreciates the author’s text.

Likewise, audiences bring their own attitudes to the communication experience.

If the communication is undecipherable, boring, or of a subject that holds no
interest, the audience will likely not appreciate it. If it’s something to which they
are attuned or piques their curiosity, the author’s message may be well received.

Setting
Every rhetorical situation happens in a specific setting within a specific context,
and are all constrained by the time and environment in which they occur. Time,
as in a specific moment in history, forms the zeitgeist of an era. Language is
directly affected by both historical influence and the assumptions brought to bear
by the current culture in which it exists. Theoretically, Stephen Hawking and Sir
Isaac Newton could have had a fascinating conversation on the galaxy, however,
the lexicon of scientific information available to each during his lifetime would
likely have influenced the conclusions they reached as a result.

Place
The specific place that an author engages his or her audience also affects the
manner in which a text is both created and received. Dr. Martin Luther King’s “I
have a Dream” speech, delivered to a rapt crowd on August 28, 1963, is
considered by many as one of the most memorable pieces of American rhetoric of
the 20th century, but a setting doesn’t have to be public, or an audience large for
communication to have a profound impact. Intimate settings, in which
information is exchanged, such as a doctor’s office or promises are made—
perhaps on a moonlit balcony—can serve as the backdrop for life-changing
communication. 

In some rhetorical contexts, the term “community” refers to a specific group

united by like interests or concerns rather than a geographical neighborhood.
Conversation, which most often refers to a dialog between a limited number of
people takes on a much broader meaning to and refers to a collective
conversation which encompasses a broad understanding, belief system, or
assumptions that are held by the community at large.