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Ethos And Logos In Booker T. Washington's Up From Slavery

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In Booker T. Washington’s writing, “Up from Slavery,” he discusses a controversial topic of slavery. The audience is to the rich white people and his own race. In this writing, he attempts to inform people of his race and other minorities the importance of learning a trade to be able to work from the bottom to the top. He believes that if minorities can work from the bottom and do physical labor, they can eventually work their way to the top. Washington even says they can be separate like fingers, but still together like a hand. Washington discusses the importance of vocational education, slavery, and how to attain success. With this, we can see how Booker T. Washington uses ethos and logos to persuade his audience. To begin, Washington discusses the importance of education. He states, “We shall constitute one-third and more of the ignorance and crime of the South, or one-third its intelligence and progress; we shall contribute one-third to the business and industrial prosperity of the South, or we shall prove veritable body of death, stagnating, depressing, retarding every effort to advance the body politic” (Washington, 451). Washington uses logos to persuade his race to get an education in industrial jobs. He reasons with the minorities in saying that they can positively contribute to the community and gain respect of the rich white men, or they can just stay at the bottom and be useless. He also plays on their emotion when he says, “There is no defense or security for

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