What is Rhetoric?

Rhetoric is defined as the art and study of persuasion in writing, speaking, and art. When using
rhetoric, a creator will craft purposeful appeals to logic, ethics, and emotion based on their
intended audience. When studying rhetoric, an analyst studies the rhetorical meaning of a piece,
considering things like the historical context and intended audience to determine whether the
creator utilized rhetorical appeals, devices, style, and tone effectively. Rhetorical analysts may
also work backward, first considering the impact of a specific rhetorician, then deconstructing
their work to determine how they effectively persuaded their audience. The purpose of using
rhetoric is to persuade an audience to think or believe something in order to call them into action.
The purpose of studying rhetoric is to gain an understanding of how to be persuasive in one's
own work as well as to be more aware of when rhetoric may be used against the student.

Rhetorical Appeals
The three rhetorical appeals are ethos, pathos, and logos.
Ethos
Ethos is the appeal to ethics or credibility. Utilizing ethos is meant to make the author and their
argument appear more credible. There are multiple ways to use ethos in rhetoric.

● If the author is an expert in the field they are writing on, they will point out their
expertise.
● If the author is not a scholarly expert in the field or if they are concerned about the
audience buying in to their credibility, they will use quotes from well-known and trusted
sources to support their argument.
● If an author wants to appear more knowledgeable and unbiased on a subject, they will use
counterclaims in their argument. By addressing counterclaims, the author shows they
have researched the topic thoroughly and that they are not trying to hide anything from
their audience.
● If an author wants to create a sense of unity with the audience to appear as a member of
their community, they may use specific first-person collective pronouns such as "our" or
"us". They may also have repeated use of the pronoun "they" to create a sense of other or
of an enemy.

Pathos
Pathos is the appeal to emotion. Utilizing pathos allows the author to make an emotional
connection with the audience. When analyzing an author's work for rhetoric, keep in mind that
pathos is the emotion the author is making the audience feel, not the emotion the author is
exhibiting.
Logos
Logos is the appeal to logic and reasoning. Utilizing logos allows the author to provide a
thoroughly reasoned argument that is organized in a logical manner and supported by sound
evidence. There are multiple ways to use logos in rhetoric.

● To thoroughly reason an argument. This means providing an in-depth explanation to

prove the author's claim. If the audience can ask "why" in response to an author's
argument, it is not thoroughly enough reasoned.
● To organize an argument. If an argument, essay, or speech is poorly organized, then the
audience will not be able to follow it. If the audience can not follow a work, they will not
be persuaded, and the author's rhetoric will be ineffective. A well-organized work has a
strong, easily identified claim or thesis, utilizes transitions to make logical connections
between points, and a strong conclusion.
● To provide sound evidence such as sourced facts, statistics, and data, used to support
their points.

History of Rhetoric
The history of rhetoric as a formal art dates back to the 5th Century B.C, which saw a rise in
sophists, a class of intellectuals devoted to the study of language and culture, who elevated
rhetoric as a study. Rhetoric, however, was quickly met with detractors in the Greek
philosophers Socrates and Plato. Though there are no surviving works by Socrates,
Plato's Gorgias provides insight into Socrates' thoughts on rhetoric. In Gorgias, Plato used
Socrates to denigrate rhetoric as a pseudo-art, unworthy of study, arguing that it was only
concerned with the superficial aspects of language. Aristotle, Plato's student, was a staunch
defender of rhetoric who worked to defend it as an academic artform concerned with both the
style of language and the argument itself. A couple of centuries after Aristotle
came Quintilianus, another defender of rhetoric, who taught the importance of the artforms of
rhetoric and oratory. The influence of early rhetoricians and their detractors has been felt for
millennia, with the study of rhetoric being passed along as an educational institution through the
modern day. Most rhetoricians now, though, are concerned with the deconstruction of how
rhetoric has been used, rather than the creation of rhetoric itself.

Aristotle's Definition of Rhetoric

Aristotle is the most famous proponent of rhetoric.

Historically, Aristotle (384 B.C.--322 B.C.) is perhaps the biggest proponent of rhetoric. His
treatise Rhetorica (also commonly referred to as Rhetoric or On Rhetoric) was written to solidify
the rules and components or rhetoric as well as to defend rhetoric against detractors such as Plato
who claimed that rhetoric wasn't worthy of academic consideration. In the treatise, Aristotle
argues that the use of rational speech is a defining mark of a human being. Rhetorica is divided
into three sections or books.

1. Book 1--Aristotle defines rhetoric as the ability to find the "available means of
persuasion" in any situation and describes it as the counterpart to dialectic. He discusses
the three appeals (ethos, pathos, and logos), the three elements of rhetoric (speaker,
subject, and audience), and the 3 divisions of rhetoric (deliberative, forensic, and
epideitic). In Book 1, he also discusses enthymemes and syllogisms as being key
rhetorical attributes.
2. Book 2--Aristotle discusses the importance of character (ethos) and emotion (pathos). He
outlines the importance of the speaker having good character as well as details the
possible characters of the audience the speaker may encounter. When discussing
emotions, Aristotle defines several emotions and instructs on how the speaker may
invoke the emotion or address an audience who is feeling said emotion.
 3. Book 3---Aristotle outlines how to create a speech: create persuasion from facts, choose
the right language to relay the facts, and the best way to deliver the speech. He focuses,
particularly on style (lexis) or the use of rhetorical devices.

Qunitilianus' Views on Rhetoric

Quintilanus is the most famous instructor of rhetoric.

After Aristotle cemented rhetoric as worthy of study, Quintilianus (c.a. 30 A.D.--100 A.D.)
became famous for actually teaching it. Quintilianus, from Spain, was educated in and taught
rhetoric and oratory in Rome for over 20 years. His most prolific work is Institutes of Oratory,
which contains 12 books that provide detailed instruction on producing oratory and rhetoric,
starting from the education of the orator as a baby, through the duties of an orator to maintain
their character and credibility. Similar to Aristotle's Rhetorica, Quintilianus' Institutes of
Oratory cements oratory as a defining factor of being human, with an emphasis on a rhetorician
being ethical, having high moral character, and deep subject knowledge. Some of the key
components of the work are: