Transcript word choice

Persuasive Appeals and
Techniques
These are not the droids
you’re looking for.
Aristotle’s Three
Persuasive Appeals
Aristotle is thought to be one of the
greatest philosophers, teachers, and
thinkers of all time.
In his famous work, Rhetoric (finished
322 BCE), Aristotle identifies three major
types of persuasive appeals:
logos, pathos, and ethos.
LOGOS –
a logical appeal
Appeal to the
intellect of your
audience using
organization
and proof
(evidence)
Climate Change:
Logos Arguments
PATHOS – an
emotional appeal
Appeal to the heart
of your audience by
affecting your
audience’s feelings
of love, anger,
disgust, fear,
compassion,
patriotism, or other
emotions
Climate Change:
Pathos Arguments
ETHOS – a personal, ethical appeal
The audience buys the message because
they trust the messenger.
They believe the messenger because of his
or her honesty, reputation, competency,
fairness and credentials.
Climate Change:
Ethos Arguments
Vice President, Al Gore in
An Inconvenient Truth
Gabriele Hegerl,
research professor at Duke's School
of the Environment and Earth Sciences
Persuasive Techniques
1. allusion
a reference to someone or something that is already
known from history, literature, religion, politics, sports,
or popular culture
1. allusion
The force was with him the
day he took the English III test.
Don’t confuse
allusion with illusion
2. rhetorical question
• A question asked for an effect,
not actually requiring an answer.
2. rhetorical question
How many roads must a man walk down before
you call him a man?
Yes, an’ how many seas must a white dove sail
before she sleeps in the sand?
Yes, an’ how many times must the cannon balls
fly before they’re forever banned?
Bob Dylan, “Blowin’ in the Wind”
3. repetition
• the repetition of words, phrases, and
ideas for emphasis or impact
…you want to fall on him, weeping,
because you are so lonely, so lonely
always, and all contact is contact, and
all contact makes us so grateful we
want to cry and dance and cry and
cry.
» Dave Eggers, “Accident”
3. repetition
“Because it is my name!...How may
I live without my name? I have
given you my soul; leave me my
name!
John “The Stallion” Proctor
4. parallel structure
• the repetition of words or phrases that
have similar grammatical structures.
“…government of the
people, by the people,
for the people shall not
perish from the earth.”
4. parallel structure
"Our transportation crisis will be solved by a
bigger plane or a wider road, mental
illness with a pill, poverty with a law, slums
with a bulldozer, urban conflict with a gas,
racism with a goodwill gesture."
--Philip Slater, The Pursuit of
Loneliness.
4. parallel structure
"Humanity has advanced, when
it has advanced, not because it
has been sober, responsible,
and cautious, but because it
has been playful, rebellious,
and immature.
--Tim Robbins,
actor/writer/director