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Your professor has asked you to write about the “rhetorical situation” for an essay you have read
or for an essay you have to write. This handout will help you understand what is meant by
“rhetorical situation.”
Winston Churchill delivered speeches to the British public over the radio during World War II in
order to inspire them.
You want to text your parents to send you more money so that you can live better at college.
The questions below are designed to help explore each of these parts. Because all parts of a
rhetorical situation can influence the other, answers to each of the questions below should be
reconsidered in light of answers to the other questions.
What is EXIGENCE?
Exigence is the answer to questions like “So what?” “What’s the Occasion?” “Why should we
care about this subject?” “What’s the big deal?” It’s the reason why you are writing.
Metaphorically, it can even be considered “the bur under the saddle” (a disturbance that needs to
be rectified).
1
---is something wrong in the world that must be responded to by action (Godzilla is attacking
your city.).
---provokes a rhetorical response to something that needs to be changed (A superhero must
speak to the monster in order to save the city.).
---is rhetorical when the writer wants to influence the audience (The hero must convince the
monster to depart.).
What is AUDIENCE?
Audience would be those who have an interest in the topic and perhaps the ability to react to
the topic (do something about it). Audience would also be those who can be persuaded to
act or change (A school board that has fired a popular principal).
As Bitzer defines audience, "A rhetorical audience consists of only those persons who are
capable of being influenced by discourse and of being mediators of change."
—What range of people might read the discourse? What patterns or groupings can be found
within that range?
—What does the audience care about or value?
—Where and for what purposes might they read it? (Why would they care about your issue?)
—What constraints might affect the way they read it?
—What does the audience already know about the issue?
—What does the audience think counts as evidence for this issue? (Facts? Anecdotes? Critical
sources?)
2
—How is the audience supposed to react to the discourse? (Attitude change? Action?)
Now, how would you describe the same event to your mother?
The changes you make to language, to the tone and style, the events and actions you
emphasize, the information you leave out, all indicate your own awareness of audience
and how your words affect different people in different ways.
After discovering the constraints, writers ask themselves, “How can I address each of these,
perhaps harnessing the positive effects or minimizing the negative effects?”
3
How do I pull all of this together to analyze a “rhetorical situation”?
Let’s take an example:
Living at college is more expensive than you had planned; you need more money. You decide
to contact your parents so they can send you more funds.
Exigence: need more funds, right away, to live and to buy books, especially to get to the end
of the month
Audience: parents
As the writer, you should consider
—their views about money and responsible spending
—their image of college life. Do they understand it as you do? Do they realize how much
more expensive it is since they were in school?
—their motives for sending you to college in the first place (learn to adjust and live on your
own)
—their attitude about paying for college and being in debt in order to support you at college
Constraints:
—level of language you can write in (formal? Informal? slang?)
—method for sending request for funds: E-mail? Letter? Call? Text? Even a telegram?
—the number of times you may have already asked for funds from your parents
— parents may not have money to spare
—parents may believe students need to learn how to handle money and to stand on they own
—parents may feel the student has had enough money for the month
—parents may be thinking ahead to the holidays, when they themselves will need extra funds
because expenses for them could be higher than ususal
pp. 1-14.
WA/AT/BDD: 5/2017