Rhetoric In Jay Heinrich's Book 'Thank You For Arguing'

The first chapter introduced the reader to the art of rhetoric. He describes how rhetoric works through real life examples. He demonstrates ways that rhetoric persuades us like, argument from strength, and seduction. He tells the reader that the sole purpose of arguing is to persuade the audience. He showed that the chief purpose of arguing is to also achieve consensus, a shared faith in a choice.

Often times in daily life, a person will use rhetoric. Whether it’s arguing with a sibling or the sound of an alarm, rhetoric is in use. Rhetoric is effective persuasion and persuasion is swaying someone to do or believe in something. The reason rhetoric is important to be taught in school is because not only does it often show up in daily life but it can show up in the media as well.

We use rhetoric every day without even realizing it. Correctly using rhetoric on a specific group of people can drastically increase an arguments’ strength. Benjamin R. Barber wrote an article conveying his research on the failing school systems in the U.S titled America Skips School published in Harper’s Magazine. Barber uses rhetorical elements like ethos, pathos, and logos to build his argument. He establishes his credibility and then emotionally connects with his audience and explains who and what is to blame for the lack of quality education in America. Once he establishes a solid connection using these

Rhetoric gives you an avenue to tell a story from your perspective in a way that connects with the intended audience without having to be one hundred percent substantiated. This writing style is evident in almost everything we read from billboards to Internet ads and even political speeches.

Rhetoric can push users farther than the normal argument, and past the habits of the natural human mind. When one comes to understand the theory of words, argument and how opposition thinks, then can the situation fully be revolved for their favor and their future. Rhetoric is a valuable skill that should be taught in schools in order to assist in high school environments, and help prepare for a future in the workplace.

Before starting this class, I never understood what rhetoric was or how it affected me in my everyday life. Over the past week, I have started to grasp the concept of exactly what is rhetoric and I have made my own definition for it. To me rhetoric is the act of persuading a person or a group of people in something or to do something. When I first thought about rhetoric I immediately began to think about politicians and the upcoming elections. Politicians use rhetoric all the time especially when they are out doing campaign rallies in hopes of trying to gain votes. They have to use rhetoric in order to persuade voters to believe in them and want them as their senator, congressman, mayor, and etc. Besides politicians and political world, I could not think of other ways rhetoric affected me in my life at all until I began to think about people in the workplace.

To understand rhetoric and how it is applied in writing, we must have an understanding of the word itself. Rhetoric is the way we use persuasion to get an opinion or information across to an audience. With an understanding of rhetoric, wan can see how it relates to writing. When we write or read a text, the author is always trying to convey an idea across. Rhetoric is the tool that is used in order to do convey that idea. Rhetoric helps us in our writing to communicate effectively with our audience. Whether it is a subject we agree with or not, rhetoric is used as a persuasive tactic, as well as an informative way to understand and effectively identify with others, and our own perspective.

Rhetoric is often denoted to as the art of persuasion. A set of linguistic traits and semantics used to evoke emotional responses from its intended audience, opening the floor for unanticipated influence by said audience. It would be an atrocity to ignore the efforts behind this simple yet powerful manipulation. This is referred to as rhetorical discourse. Essentially, there are six characteristics of rhetorical discourse, these characteristics being; rhetoric is planned, adapted to an audience, shaped by human motives, responsive to a situation, seeks persuasion, and is concerned with contingent issues (Herrick 8). Further, each of the characteristics lends itself to support the social functions of rhetoric; testing ideas, assisting advocacy, distributing power, unearthing facts, shaping knowledge, and building communities (Herrick 15).

More than just debate, rhetoric is influencing an audience to think or feel a certain way in order to motivate them to action. Shockingly, many do not appreciate the value of learning such a relevant skill. Studying rhetoric may benefit the ability of a student to recognize fallacious logic, and create sound arguments based on more than just logic and evidence. While devoting time to such an “impractical” skill may seem frivolous, studying rhetoric can benefit students greatly.

In an ideal society, the art of rhetoric - the utilization of effective argumentation and persuasion through communication - is an important tool that makes use of language in order to participate in valuable discourse. The study of rhetoric elevates the influence you have on others, shields you from intellectual despotism and vastly enhances the power we possess as a democratic citizen. The Mesopotamians and Ancient Egyptians both valued the ability to speak with eloquence and wisdom, however it wasn’t until the rise of Greek democracy that rhetoric became a high art that was studied and developed systematically

Rhetoric is the study of effective thinking, writing, and speaking strategies and is an essential part of writing. To be valuable, a text must be developed and written with a clear perspective and purpose in mind. For most writers they first have to find the function their writing will serve in its particular context. Writers then need to express this purpose and choose specific rhetorical strategies which will achieve it. Writers use many different strategies such as symbolism, style, tone and voice. In Mark Twains “Advice to Youth” his style and tone really allow for him to capture his audience. Twains humor allows for the young audience to relate to what he is saying. This humor also helps them to connect with the speaker by allowing

Kenneth Burke’s definition of rhetoric “Wherever there is persuasion, there is rhetoric. And wherever there is ‘meaning’ there is persuasion” particularly stood out to me among the various interpretations of the term. This definition aims to explain the link between persuasion and rhetoric and how that link can serve to impact an audience, which I wasn’t familiar with prior to this course.

There are various models of rhetoric that have been applied in speeches, especially in the political and social world. For a long time, the world has been exposed to the persuasive model of rhetoric that has dominated most of the speeches we have had. A different approach to rhetoric has however not received the attention that it deserves. The rhetoric approach is called invitational model of rhetoric. The invitational approach promises to bring more impressive and long term results as opposed to the traditional model of rhetoric. This essay will examine and compare the traditional and the invitational models of rhetoric.

In a learning environment, teachers work to prepare students for life beyond what is being taught as the importance of education is shown through the student’s productivity in a “real world” setting. Learning rhetoric in high schools can beneficial to the student’s general intelligence, as the value attributed to these skills are those that can be effective throughout a student’s lifetime. More specifically, learning rhetoric can help students make informed judgment on those trying to persuade them to do something, as well as to persuade others. Apart from the direct application of rhetorical strategies, the value of this addition to high school curriculum can expand the structure and style of students’ writing.

Jay Heinrichs, the author of the book Thank You For Arguing, enhances the art of rhetoric and the many ways that an individual should handle situations. His leading modern work on rhetoric helped Heinrichs to become a professor of the Practice of Rhetoric and Oratory at Middlebury College. Heinrichs transforms arguments between people by the use of rhetoric, writes an informative chapter, and proves that his book should be continued to be used because it has a positive influence on students.