The Rhetorical Analysis Of 'Best In Class'

The rhetoric of “excellence” is pervasive across the academy. It is used to refer to research outputs as well as researchers, theory and education, individuals and organisations, from art history to zoology. But what does “excellence” mean? Does it in fact mean anything at all? And is the pervasive narrative of excellence and competition a good thing? Drawing on a range of sources we interrogate “excellence” as a concept and find that it has no intrinsic meaning as used in the academy. Rather it functions as a linguistic interchange mechanism or boundary object. To investigate whether linguistic function is useful we examine how excellence rhetoric combines with narratives of scarcity and competition and show that hypercompetition that arises

Our teacher, Mrs. Hetrick, provided the answer to our question: “These essays could have easily been generated by a computer program. They tell me nothing about yourselves; why in the world you are telling me all of this? You need to make me care about the message you are conveying, otherwise, your writing is useless.” She then told us that while we were all communicating in the proper format, we had failed to take into consideration whom our audience was. In order to truly persuade and influence our audience, we had to do more than place complicated ideas into a grammatically immaculate sentences; we need to show the audience why they should care about our writing; otherwise, they will just lose interest. I realize now that this experience provided a stable foundation for what I consider to be an example of passionate rhetorical ability, which helps me reflect on what authors Wallace deems as “good” through their rhetorical strategies.

Surprisingly, I obtained two diplomas and a letter signed by the President of the United States of America, Barack Obama, congratulating me for my excellence and achievement in school. Additionally, I accepted a diploma for the “magnificent” personal narrative I wrote, which I read for everyone present at the fifth-grade ceremony. Nevertheless, receiving all the rewards and praise from my family and friends were nothing compared to my third-grade teacher’s last words to me; words that still echo in the back of my mind and make me cringe till this day. “I always knew you could do

As an English teacher at Wellesley High School, in the accomplished community of Wellesley, Massachusetts, David McCullough, Jr. confronts the paradox of reality versus the popular assumptions perpetuated by well-meaning parents and delivered a shockingly poignant attack on the Wellesley High School graduates’ self-perception and preparedness. In addition, he outlined the parents’ role in creating and maintaining this deception. Mr. McCullough used his knowledge and insight of the Twenty-first Century youth culture, humor, and steadfast opinion that his target audience of high school graduates is aphoristically, NOT SPECIAL. However, Mr. McCullough limited his audience’s sensitivity to his assertion using ethics, logic and pathos and later provides a positive, passionate and humanistic world view of how to have a well-lived life.

High school Commencement in the United States is a tradition like no other. Every June, high school seniors dress in their Sunday best and head to the tried-and-true ritual. Parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles swarm to secondary institutions with their cameras in hand. With the sea of hats and gowns, the graduating class is unified and united. Over the recent decades, Commencements across the United States have incorporated cords and stoles. These emphasize both communal and individual achievements throughout students’ secondary education and their community. At Chisago Lakes High School (CLHS), these achievements are recognized at Commencement with a variety of cords. Students who participate in the National

Top students across the nation compete for the title of valedictorian each year, although very few actually receive it. Much to the detriment of the students, the competition can become sophomoric and pointless yet remaining intense and cut throat. In her article, “Best In Class”, Margaret Talbot conveys the message that the competition of valedictorian has unfavorable consequences through her use of diction and testimonies.

Rhetorical choices can be made by a writer to perused readers of their point. They help the reader gain a better understanding of the argument, as well as add passion to the words. In his piece in a religious magazine, Cesar Chavez uses rhetorical devises to strengthen his argument advocating nonviolence in a religious magazine. Chavez uses rhetorical devises to form a persuasive writing style and appeal to the reader’s conscience and sense of reason in order to promote nonviolent resistance.

In “Best in Class” by Margaret Talbot, Talbot uses the rhetorical device of exemplification to build her credibility and imagery to get the audience to be aware of the risk and competition to get to the position of valedictorian.

Within a few decades, the practice of designating a valedictorian had become an established tradition,” (Talbot 229). Talbot uses these fun facts to show how the position of valedictorian has changed over the years going from just one to top 25 due to the fighting and competition.This adds logos to the argument because these statements can be proven. Because nowadays more kids are doing better in school, it should be hard just to pick one valedictorian due to the fact that they are willing to fight to be a one. Talbot again wants to show that the title of valedictorian is just another way “to show off to the local taxpayers” (Talbot 229). Talbot uses the term “taxpayer” to connote that the title of valedictorian isn’t as big and important as some people may take it to be. It really is only important to the family of the valedictorian no one else really cares. She uses an appeal to tradition in this case to show how the older the tradition the more it needs revision through time. At the end of the day, whether families like it or not, schools have the right to decide how many valedictorians they

Reflection: In the following sentence, I am able to expand upon a major topic of discussion for Women’s Rights Activist Florence Kelley. It is difficult at first to identify the purpose behind the rhetorical strategies used by the speaker, but upon further examination it is apparent how Kelley’s diction comprehensively contributes to the integrity of her argument as a

The Salutatorian Addresses, given by Emily Nortnik, Shelbi Ledesma, and Hannah Branson, took the class of 2017 back through the last 13 years of their lives. There were good times and there were challenges, but together they faced life’s ups and downs while unknowingly making cherishable memories. Valedictorians, Lily Lockhart and Elizabeth Ward, graduated with GPAs above 4.3.

Educational Systems Need Change In the anthology Identity a Reader for Writers by John Scenters- Zapico, Cathy Davidson, in her writing “Project Classroom Makeover”, discusses how the educational system needs a big upgrade. She also talks about how so many people in today’s society seem so disinterested in school. Davidson uses rhetorical devices such as ethos, pathos, and logos to get her message across to the intended audience of teachers, that the way schools are teaching needs to change.

In “Class in the Classroom’’ Joshua Halberstam´s most effective rhetorical tool is the format used which maintains the reader's attention throughout the entire article. Halberstam begins the article using questions as subtitles, and making them bold, hinting at the questions he will address in the article.The first question in the subtitle is “Does attendance really count?”, which sets up the format to lead to the next section. All through the article, Halberstam continues using bolded, capitalized subtitles to format sections for the information he wants to provide. For example, he stresses that attending class is a very important components, therefore he subtitled a section “SHOWING UP”. Meanwhile, in the subsections divided by their according

In this course we’ve learned to how to effectively analyze rhetorical situations. We start off by identifying the audience. The audience is the intended or unintended recipients of the rhetorical message. Identifying the audience is important because it will determine the style and language you will use in your writing. For example, if an undergraduate student is writing to their professor the style and language of the writing will be formal. Whereas if the audience is the undergraduate’s peers, then the language can be informal and have a more relaxed tone. Then we explore the context of the rhetorical situation. The context is what helps you interpret meaning in a situation by giving information on what the piece is about. By understanding

James Pennebaker’s text, Ignoring the Text, Celebrating the Style, is an interesting read that applies psychological concepts to derive a message from a text. He places an emphasis on style rather than context as the contributing factor in delivering a message. The text starts by using an example of a study of students’ interpretation of a picture. He illustrates how we can naturally derive the characteristics of the student based solely on the way they choose to speak. He argues, and provides proof, that without stealth words context itself would be worthless. Most impressive is Pennebaker’s examples of application. He explains how presidential hopeful, John Kerry, lost public favor by using an incorrect ratio of “I” to “we” words unlike his