Pathos Persuasive Essay

In 1983, Raymond Carver introduced his short story “Cathedral” to the public. The first-person narrative takes place within the narrator’s home, where his wife is waiting upon the arrival of her blind friend Robert. The narrator, however, becomes more concerned about how Robert’s visit will affect him rather than enjoy the situation. Once Robert arrives, the narrator tries to understand the blind man, but he is unaware of what tasks Robert is capable of performing due to the narrator’s inability to “see”. In time, Robert shows the narrator the difference between looking and seeing through illustrations of a cathedral, drawn by the narrator with his eyes closed. “Cathedral’s” narrator exposes readers to anti-heroic views

Throughout history, literature, pictures, and speeches have been laced with modes of persuasion. In modern society, thousands of advertisements are produced a day. Each one uses either ethos, pathos, or logos to convince viewers to shift and support a certain belief. One field of advertisements that relies heavily on pathos and ethos is the health field. The national anti-smoking campaign advertisement, below, uses blatant visuals and medical facts to make viewers understand how smoking negatively impacts people’s lives.

In this essay, I will closely examine the role of ethos, pathos, and logos as they were utilized in the 1992 Presidential Debate video clip. Throughout Clinton and Bush’s debates, they used the three options of persuasion effectively and discretely; however, it is evident that out of the three ways of persuasion, the candidates used ‘pathos’ because of the content they were providing. It was apparent that Bill Clinton was more prepared to display forms of persuasion than George H.W. Bush was because Clinton had prior experience dealing with lower income people. In the upcoming paragraphs, I will explain and analyze how each candidate made use of the three forms of persuasion: logos, pathos, and ethos.

In addition to ethos, Fredrick Douglass and Lyndon B. Johnson appeal to their audience’s emotions to persuade them of their points using pathos. Pathos is a persuasive technique in which a speaker uses language that appeals to their audience’s emotions to prove a point. In “The Hypocrisy of American Slavery”, Fredrick Douglass says, “Standing with God and the crushed and bleeding slave on this occasion, I will, in the name of humanity which is outraged, in the name of liberty which is fettered, in the name of the constitution and the Bible, which are disregarded and trampled upon, dare to call in question and to denounce, with all the emphasis I can command, everything that serves to perpetuate slavery-the great sin and shame of America!”. In this quote, the speaker uses a myriad of charged words to denounce American slavery with great emphasis. The charged words and imagery that Douglass uses creates horrid images in the audience’s head and would appeal to

Human being are not cold blooded animal and nobody is definitely indifferent. Therefore, authors always write down words to arouse readers’ enthusiasm or fervor gradually. Pathos work as the same way, which let readers get moved by emotion weapon. We can find many pathos devices in this well-known speech. “The real hero of this struggle is the American Negro. His actions and protests, his courage to risk safety and even to risk his life, have awakened the conscience of this nation. His demonstrations have been designed to call attention to injustice, designed to provoke change, designed to stir reform. He has called upon us to make good the promise of America. And who among us can say that we would have made the same progress were it not for his persistent bravery, and his faith in American democracy.” From these great words, Johnson described the American Negro as a hero, who had awakened the conscience of this nation. There is no doubt that many people were neutral in this case. However, after that speech, after being persuaded by their president, they might turn to agree with their president. Some of them might give up their prejudices to Negroes. They would recall many Negroes who were used to live with them were also kind and gave their hands sometimes. Pathos work in that way. Authors utilize pathos to tough readers and audiences, like what I have mentioned, everyone has the milk of human kindness. Take text for example again, “This great, rich, restless country can offer opportunity and education and hope to all, all black and white, all North and South, sharecropper and city dweller. These are the enemies: poverty, ignorance, disease.” These impressed words reminded all the people of that USA belonged to everyone. They should be unity to stop poverty, ignorance, disease not discriminate not our fellow man, not our neighbor. This pathos improved this

The implementation of the ethos, pathos, and logos are central to the art of effective communication. They are the necessary building blocks used to win the hearts and minds of an audience. The first integral element, ethos, refers to a character's reputation or credibility. The second element is pathos, which is a character's ability to connect with an audience at an emotional level. The last element, logos, is based entirely on facts and logic. These three modes of persuasion can be seen in the Joe Biden’s campaign video, which when combined persuades the audience to vote for the candidate.

In forming his argument, Dr. Martin Luther King not only appeals to ethos, but also to pathos simultaneously. Again, Alfano and O’Brien offer a definition of pathos, to help in analyzing rhetoric: “Pathos…refers to an appeal to the emotions…so that the audience will be more receptive to the speaker’s message.” (51)

On November 3, 2016 in Berwyn, Pennsylvania our soon to be First Lady, Melania Trump, gave a speech addressing her past along with her hopes for the future of the United States. Over the past two years, political figures have been debating and campaigning for who would become America’s 45th President. As the candidates filtered down to Hilary Clinton, the Democratic nominee, and Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, the amount of rallies held to gain their supporters’ votes grew in abundance. Days prior to the Election Night, Melania Trump delivered her speech in hopes of gaining the votes of citizens who had not yet decided. Throughout this paper I will discus how the theory of ethos is used across Mrs. Trump’s speech to work for and against her.

In their National Convention speech, both Michelle Obama and Melania Trump used rhetorical conventions to persuade the audience to elect their husbands as the next President of the United States. To begin with, both women use ethos to show the audience that their husbands are capable of becoming the next president. Both women build credibility on their husbands by voicing admirable qualities each of them have. For example, Michelle Obama states that Barack Obama is a very smart, caring, dignified, and respectful man. On the other hand, Melania Trump proclaimed that Donald Trump has great patriotism, leadership, and loyalty. All these qualities show that both presidential candidates are well suited in becoming the president. Michelle Obama and Melania Trump don’t just state that their husbands possess these qualities; they give evidence of these qualities through the use of ethos.

In the speech “Development of the Civil Rights Movement in the US”, by Senior student, Mike JEnsen, Mike uses different rhetorical tools in order to impact his audience. The First rhetorical tool he uses to support and elucidate the expression of his most important opinions is Pathos. “Fellow citizens have moved mountains for basic equal human rights, and in spite of everything people are still shattered as never before.” In this example he appels to his fellow citizens, to the history that he share and to some of the most ongoing things in the news, that everybody somehow can relate to – racial discrimination. In the next two sentences, he is trying appel, with the help from Logos, the audiences common sense. “I am here to support a message

On the fiftieth anniversary of the events on “Bloody Sunday”, Obama gave a speech filled with encouraging words about how far American has come. Throughout his speech he included various pathos examples. For instance, he states, “[…] All of us need to recognize, as they did, that change depends on our actions, our attitudes, the things we teach our children. And if we make such effort, no matter how hard it may seem, laws can be passed, and consciences can be stirred, and consensus can be built” (Obama). He addresses the people as one, as if each and every one of us has as much responsibility as the next, and rightfully so. Ethos is another rhetoric analysis, it defines someone’s character or identity and Obama does just that when he says, “[…] who serve in elected office from small towns to big cities; from Congressional Black Caucus to the Oval office” (Obama). Obama refers to himself when speaking about the oval office because he was the first African American to be elected president, which is him talking about his own credentials.

Lunsford, Ruszkiewicz and Walters (2016)... Chapter two of our textbook showcases how powerful emotions are in human beings and how they can be used in everyday life for arguments. Chapter two of our textbook begins by explaining to the reader how to identify and read for Pathos by using an example of Senator Marco Rubio’s speech on repression in Venezuela. Senator Rubio’s example flows perfectly into the next section of chapter two where the textbook explains how we can use Pathos to “feel the pain” of the group you are trying to connect to. Lastly, the textbook introduces its most important point for using Pathos to sustain an argument: when passionately fighting for change: use common human terms; you may be vastly more successful than using

Source: CDC, National Center for Health Statistics, National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Health, United States, 2002. Flegal et. al. JAMA. 2002;288:1723-7. NIH, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, Clinical Guidelines on the Identification, Evaluation and Treatment of Overweight and Obesity in Adults, 1998.

“Your assignment is to write a persuasive essay and present it to the class in a week. You will be graded based on how convincing it is. Today we will be choosing topics,” announced Mr. Bowerbank, my 7th grade English teacher and ruler of classroom 110. My class simultaneously groaned at the prospect of work. I simply lifted my head with intrigue as it was already May and about time we had our first essay. He then proceeded to give examples of topics we could choose and gave us some time to think before we had to tell him our topic. My classmates were already rushing to tell the teacher their idea lest someone else steal it. That meant the usual abortion, death penalty, or drug use topics were out. I really couldn't think of anything and the teacher was slowly making his way through the remaining students like an executioner beheading criminals in a line. I have always thought that he would make a marvelous supervillain if he had a curly mustache, a tophat, and a cape. Eventually my name was called. I slowly dragged myself over to his desk. Even sitting down, he still seemed to tower over me. “What is your topic Cindy?” As usual in such desperate times, my mind turned to food. “Waffles are better than pancakes.” I figured that a waffle was just a differently shaped pancake with a nicer texture. “Hmm. Excellent topic. I look forward to your essay!” I survived to live yet another day.

Why spend money that is really needed for other things? Why live uncomfortably? Why be trapped in this hole called a home that belongs to another person? Why not live free and peacefully? When a person rents he or she usually throws away money that could be used to purchase something that belongs to them. Money is not easy to come by so why pay out hundreds toward something that is not benefit to the person paying it out. There is no good explanation for making a decision like this. The best option in a situation like this is to buy a house. Buying a house is a better option than renting an apartment.