I agree with the suggestion that rhetoric defines the topes and poetry provides the examples. I don’t agree that rhetoric and poetry are distinctly different from each other. I think rhetoric uses poetic techniques in writing in what rhetoric calls arrangement. There is a certain type of presentation that is appealing to audiences and a part of poetry is focused on the way it flows. The way words are framed are an important part of both rhetoric and poetry. The way writing is framed affects the strength of the writing as a whole, and this partly includes diction which is a significant part of rhetoric. Rhetoric and poetry are both written to an audience that is not present and both are presenting an idea in hopes of making other people see certain things through their view. And another essential thing they share is the need for narration, I didn’t think automatically that narration was an important factor but when it was pointed out in this week’s reading then it made a lot of sense.

Something I question though is the sentence “to speak or write is to perform a positive ethical action” (1194). The reason I think this might no longer be true is because so much writing can be seen as unethical, the exact thing I’m thinking of is cyberbullying. Before social media made it so easy to publish our immediate thoughts without thinking, many people write things that may not be ethical and may be something that really shouldn’t have been said.

I enjoyed reading about how delivery wasn’t always important and no one is quite sure when it became important. But on page 328 it brings attention to the author of Rhetorica ad Herennium and the fact that they placed importance on delivery saying that without it the other parts of rhetoric weren’t effective. I think delivery does play a large role in presenting a piece of writing because the way it is delivered is what draws attention and then lets the other aspects of writing take place. It talks a lot about the physical delivery, such as gestures, fluctuation in tone, and facial expressions. All of this is also taught in drama classes and is learned by all actors which was talked about in the beginning of the chapter. Something I’ve been paying close attention to is the word “invention”. Once again I see it as it describes the process of memory and the use of memorization on page 331. It makes sense that punctuation is what keeps delivery alive in writing as it tells us where the rhetors would pause and stop speaking. Also delivery is in the formation of the structure like in poetry. The clearest example that comes to mind is Dr. Seuss and the way his writing could sometimes be all over the place, even in circles that make you turn the book around. Or in poetry when you place one sentence on one side of the page and the next sentence on the other side. I also love when on page 337 I am discouraged from using topic sentences and separate paragraphs for different topics. I am the type of person to just write continuously and then when editing I have to take all the different topics I combined into one paragraph and rearrange the order of the sentences in hope that it all works out in the end. I still remember when one of my teachers finally told me that I was indeed allowed to start sentences with “and”, and “but”. I was confused as to why for so many years I was forced to find a different way to begin my sentences, when in the end I began to use those words happily at the beginning of my sentence. I think invention also relates to the part that was describing how to use different tools to visually attract people to writing on such things as flyers. Using different fonts and colors and bold or underlined words is a form of invention. Inventing ways to best attract the attention of the audience. 

Chapter 11 explains the importance of our very first assignment, which makes me wish I had read it before. Learning of how useful it is to copy and imitate other great author’s shows how beneficial writing has been to rhetoric. Being able to look into others writings allows us to improve our own writing. Reading aloud helps to develop the ability to make writing into something truly beautiful. Writing has a purpose, that is rhetoric, and being able to please people makes it more likely they will continue to listen or to read. There are certainly some writings where authors have not achieved the ability to make a sentence flow. Reading aloud to find where punctuation should or should not be is a great technique that I should use more and will try to use more. There is just so much to learn from previous authors and so many techniques that can be used and further developed by the writers learning from them. Something technology has taken away from the beauty of writing is texting. Texting doesn’t involve punctuation and most terms have been abbreviated. Texting is one of the main forms of communication and when we send more text messages than we simply write it changes the way we form sentences. We lose the ability to utilize punctuation and strong diction. We ignore it because it’s no longer necessary to use in order to communicate with people. Ignoring the tools we have on a daily basis really affects the strength of our ability to sit down and create a writing. 

I found all the information about the development of feminism in rhetoric arena very interesting. Feminism in general is interesting and to understand the very beginning of it makes it even more attention drawing. Rhetoric used to be limited to men which I found interesting especially the part where they described how men were happily expected and welcomed to study in any field in college while for women they were discouraged and not supported to be interested in any subject. Rhetoric is useful no matter what you field you go into so I think it’s great how these women paved the way so that everyone could study rhetoric. It’s also important to see the expansion of rhetoric happen during the time of slavery. A significant writer during this time was Frederick Douglas. His writings are very moving and expose an entire world that people were not experiencing themselves. In this way rhetoric plays an important role in enticing people to explore new perspectives and to learn of experiences they hadn’t imagined

Essay 2

Print

Print was a huge part in the evolution of rhetoric. It changed the way rhetoric would be used and changed how audiences received information and the way audiences could be persuaded.

The creation and use of print has had huge effects on the world, and changed the culture as a whole. One of the most important parts of writing is how is brought people together and into one community. This brought the same knowledge to everyone and when print took off libraries made the general knowledge available to the population. Bringing general knowledge to the population increased the desire to learn to read, overall improving the literacy rate and allowing authors to reach a larger audience.

One of the most significant parts about print and libraries is how it made information accessible to all. This is important because being able to find more information on a topic strengthens the use of logos. It allows fellow rhetoricians to build off of each other and in that way they can strengthen their writing through use of logos and ethos. They can present facts and information that have been discovered and documented and that improves the persuasive power of a writing. When reaching out to people who are more oriented around science and math it would make more sense to focus on logos in order to connect with them. With print it is easier to use those facts and strengthen logos which helps in connecting with that specific audience. With writings published, stored and easily accessible it is easy for someone writing to draw out specific points and approach them with clear arguments. This creates stronger arguments and increases the rhetorician’s ability to write persuasively.

Print also allows events to be documented and which produces evidence that supports other arguments. An interesting way rhetoric has changed because of print is the ability to persuade people to behave in one way by presenting an event that happened to someone else and was written about. An example of this is, is when doctors, parents, counselors etc. are trying to explain the dangers of alcohol poisoning, one of the most successful ways to get the desired results is use a real story of someone else, who died tragically because of it. This is called the identifiable victim effect, it is effective because of the use of pathos and it reaches out to the target audience because typically the example is someone within the same age range which makes it real and really connects to the audience.

With print came new styles of writing. One example of a new writing style is narrative. Using narrative as the style of the writing is a good way to put pathos to use. Developing ethos is what makes the authors writing more credible. If you build yourself up to connect with the audience they are more likely to continue to read and listen. Also developing ethos, groups you with the audience and by finding common ground the audience will more likely accept you and then accept your ideas. Print and media has made it easier to build up that ethos, because things about the author/presenter may have been published and media creates wide known reputations. With these widely known reputations it makes it easier for a rhetorician to develop ethos.

The five parts of rhetoric according to Boethius included memory and delivery. Memory and delivery become less important when it is being presented in the written form, and delivery played a very large role in the success of a speech and the persuasiveness. The important part of an argument is that all the factors are put in together. The difference is that now memory and delivery aren’t as important, because so much of writing is through media sources. Memory isn’t important as we now have screens for presenters to read off of while presenting. The politicians delivering their speeches also have people who write for them. Because of these new opportunities the importance placed on memory and delivery has significantly decreased. Print changed the ways in which rhetoric is most efficiently presented and changed the strengths of rhetoric. An important part about writing a persuasive argument is being able to shift your argument around the strengths available. This goes into the fading importance of memory and delivery. With print, memory and delivery are not the strong points of rhetoric, and more attention is placed on information from other sources and

Print brought gossip, and information into the population which changed the landscape of media because now information of events happening throughout the world was brought to the general population. A great example of this is the newspaper. No longer did people have to wait for information to be passed through people, or delivered through letters. Because this general knowledge is provided to everyone it makes it easier for a rhetorician to present their ideas because the audience they are speaking to will generally be aware of the topics being presented.

Print created a massive change in culture as a whole. With print news was spread to more people and information was more easily obtained. These are the things that changed rhetoric. Because everyone could be made aware of specific things it led to the ability to have massive followings of one event. With things like the printing press it was easy to reach out to large numbers of people and provide them with news reports and easily rile people up against a cause. This gave rhetoric a chance to alter the response people have to different situations presented. Public relations is an example of this because to maintain a certain image they change the wording and presentation of information through writing to affect consumer’s view of things. This added a new use for rhetoric.

Print changed the strengths of rhetoric and added new abilities for rhetoric to utilize. Print created more uses for rhetoric and expanded its opportunity to reach out to people. Print strengthened the power of rhetoric by allowing it to be spread quickly and efficiently.