Rhetorical Essay : Using Rhetoric

In his article “If Technology Is Making Us Stupid, It’s Not Technology’s Fault,” David Theo Goldberg effectively informs the reader about the effects that computers in the home and school environment could have on the future education of the coming generations. Goldberg achieves this by executing defined organization and adding unique comparisons about the potentially crippling effects technology can have on a society when put into the wrong hands.

What constitutes good rhetoric and argument? How do these factors affect writing? And, the aforementioned questions considered, what practices should then be regarded as bad, or the negation of good? Before these prompts can be adequately addressed, a brief survey on the nature of values is necessary, so as to enframe this discussion of good and bad practices in operationalized terms, localized for our usage. In the process, the prompts will be considered in full.

Rhetoric is a significant part of our everyday lives. Whether it's convincing our friends to go to a concert on the weekend, to go to a certain place for lunch, or even convincing yourself to do something that you should but don't want to do. Rhetoric is all around us today. Billboard ads, television commercials, newspaper ads, political speeches, even news stories all try, to some degree, to sway our opinion or convince us to take some sort of action. If you take a step back to look and think about it, rhetoric, in all actuality, shapes our lives. Every day we have an array of options of things to do or things to buy. So every day, our opinion or actions are being influenced, however minutely, by rhetoric.

I don’t consider myself a gifted writer by any stretch, but with practice I myself have noticed improvements in my own writing. When not writing essays for classes, my time spent writing dwindles down to mere text messages, emails, and tweets. However, since beginning this class, I noticed that I am no paying more attention to rhetorical strategy in my own and others writings. When I write for a topic now I take take a moment to identify all the rhetorical strategies I am employing and what I can do to maximize the potential to improve my argument.

Rhetorical Evaluation As I began my persuasive essay, I decided to shape my essay around why mechanical engineering is one of the best degrees to pursue with a college education. I found the stance widely debatable, but I also had a great understanding on the topic. Being a mechanical engineering major myself, I bring a strong appeal to ethos with my personal experiences in school and within the career field. Furthermore, I knew plenty of aspects that would appeal to logic to support my stance. I began my essay with my exordium.

Over the course of this quarter, I have written several projects that were like nothing I had ever written before. These foreign styles were a challenge for me. For a long time, I was used to writing only academic essays because that was all I was required to write in high school. I now see that there are many other styles that can deliver that same ideas as an essay if they are written with a clear purpose. Looking back on the course and on my projects I can see that the main issue with my writing was that I focused too much on the style of the projects. I was more concerned with how the projects were written not what was actually being written, because of that the arguments and ideas that I tried to convey lost their impact.

Even if I don’t like to admit it rhetoric has always been somewhat of a haze for me because I knew what it was but I didn’t really find a way to actually explain and use it in my writing. I would like to think that the reason for this is the fact that I have been using rhetoric subconsciously but thanks to the book Thank You for Arguing by Jay Heinrichs I realized just how important rhetoric is in our everyday life. Thank You for Arguing not only pointed out things that were second nature to me it cleared up things that I had no idea how to incorporate it into my writing. Such as the use of the tenses in an argument and the purposes of ethos, pathos, and logos.

Language through rhetorical discourse does something and something was what I needed to do (Wardle and Downs 348). I’m not one to share my feelings or show much emotion towards people or situations. However, if I were to, I’ll put it in writing, whether it’s a text message or letter, just so I don’t have to show it or say it aloud and I’ve always been this way.

The subject of this course is rhetoric, the effective use of language. Basically, rhetoric is about people communicating to other people who have an investment in the same issue or topic. This course introduces students to college-level writing and analysis. That means you can expect to develop critical writing strategies that should help you succeed in college. The focus of this course, however, is not only "college writing"; we will also address the kinds of writing and reading skills that are important in the world beyond college. Therefore, this course has a simple goal: to help you to become "critical citizens" inside and outside the university.

Rhetoric- although it may seem to be a word of specific meanings and scholarly uses, the true interpretation can have a vast range of purpose and understanding. Though things as simple as talking to your teacher, watching television, or choosing what outfit to wear in the morning all involve rhetoric, most people believe rhetoric can only be found in the world of politics. Despite government being a prime illustration of rhetoric, it can be go far beyond the deliberations of politicians. An Overview of Rhetoric analyzes various scholarly definitions by explaining, “...rhetoric is simply part of who we are as human beings: Every time we express emotions and thoughts to others with the goal of influence, we are engaged in rhetoric” (6). Keeping this idea in mind, I believe rhetoric is more strictly defined as conversation of persuasive actions that do little to advance a factual concept or idea, but is still valuable in sharing thoughts and viewpoints to incline another. Thus, I view rhetoric as a practice that could possibly result in negative action, but still holds value when attempting to influence the viewpoints of others.

Rhetoric is a technique that is defined as speaking or writing effectively and often persuasively. Rhetoric is something that is constantly used and something that I am exposed to each day, often without realization. As of last week, I have applied rhetoric to my life several different times. I texted my friends, wrote notes for my biology class, composed e-mails to teacher, tweeted to friends, promoted clubs/organizations, and wrote college application essays. These forms of writing were each very distinct from one another, specifically the texts, composed emails, and college application essays. Just as each of the forms of writing were distinct, the rhetorical situations of each writing form were as equally distinct, so it was necessary to consider each rhetorical situation.

Rhetorical Thinking, I have to be honest, I still have a hard time wrapping my head around this one. I haven’t even the slightest grip on it. I had to google the definition of Rhetorical to even begin to understand. The most I’ve heard the word “rhetorical” is when my football coach said, “It’s a rhetorical question, you dummies.” I want to give full disclosure, I am very aware that I am not the most literate person, nor do I have the widest vocabulary. I never had an interest in literature or in school in general. I faked my entire way through school from 6th grade to graduation. All of this is very new to me, it's all confusing, and difficult for me to understand. I will give my best and I will apply my process of success to this course to be as successful as possible.

As a conclusion, I appreciate your amazing essay. It was interesting to learn from your perspective. How you used rhetorical strategies to give credibility to the readers, feel sympathy and use logic was good, it was very effective. I will look forward to read another fascinating essay from you.

I have always been an energetic person since birth. I was an active member of the track and field team and joined the Army out of high school instead of going pro. The Army taught me quite a few things that I would have learnt otherwise including an intense sense of self motivation and discipline. The training was intense and I liked the physical stress that I was put through because it made me tougher and better able to deal with problems of both an external and internal nature. I learned to become patient and persevering, content in the knowledge that I was able to overcome any obstacle.

ental blocks come in many forms. You don't have to sit in front of a computer unable to type. You may want to write but never find the time. You find excuse after excuse to avoid writing. Procrastination becomes your second name. Excuses range from shopping, taking care of the kids, meeting friends, talking on the telephone, watching TV soaps, reading too much, constantly redecorating the house, lingering over meals and being lost in thought. None of these activities are bad. It's just that most of them could be reduced, eliminated or controlled freeing up time to write.