English III

Terms for Persuasion Unit

Monday (2 January 2012)

• Welcome back! Please get out a couple of pieces of paper for notes and copy down the following:

• Rhetorical Devices: a technique that an author or speaker uses to influence or persuade an audience.

• Rhetorical Purpose: the author’s primary aim in a piece of writing (to narrate, argue, review, explain, examine, etc.)

Rhetorical Device

• Repetition: the act of repeating for emphasis

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

(excerpt from MLK Jr.’s speech I Have a Dream)

Rhetorical Device

• Parallel Structures: a rhetorical device in which the same grammatical structure is used within a sentence or paragraph to show that two or more ideas have equal importance

My sister walks or rides her bike to work. (parallel verbs)

Having fun is as important as working hard. (parallel phrases)

Rhetorical Device

• Understatement: the rhetorical technique in which something is represented as less than it actually is (a form of irony or humor)

"I have to have this operation. It isn't very serious. I have this tiny little tumor on the brain."(Holden Caulfield in The Catcher In The Rye, by J. D. Salinger)

Rhetorical Device

• Overstatement: a rhetorical device in which an exaggerated statement is made; also called hyperbole

I would give my right arm for a piece of pizza right now.

Understatement or Overstatement?

• I wish lunch was early; I’m starving to death!

• The children in Ethiopia really don’t have that many problems; they’re provided at least one meal a week by charity organizations.

Writing Elements

• Style: the way something is written, in contrast to its content (e.g., Hemingway’s writing style is terse, blunt, and conversational)

• Tone: the author’s particular attitude, either stated or implied in the writing (e.g., serious, humorous, logical)

Writing Elements, cont.

• Diction: the choice of words in speaking or writing for clear and effective expression

• Perspective: stance/viewpoint (a viewpoint is a position from which something is observed or considered)

Logical Fallacies

• Bandwagon: idea that if A is popular, then A is correct.

Everyone is selfish; everyone is doing what he believes will make himself happier. The recognition of that can take most of the sting out of accusations that you're being "selfish." Why should you feel guilty for seeking your own happiness when that's what everyone else is doing, too? (Source: Harry Browne, from How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World (1973).)

Logical Fallacies

• Incorrect factual claims: occurs when the claims (opinions stated as facts) are inaccurate – presented as factual, but actually false).

You should not go sailing across the Pacific because you may sail right off of the edge of the Earth.

Logical Fallacies

• False Authority: Authority A believes that P is true. Therefore, P is true.

ORCelebrity C endorses Brand X Therefore, Brand X is good.

As my English professor, Dr. Doyle, once said, to cure a cold you should eat a teaspoon of sugar each day.

ORMichael Jordan wears Nike shoes, so those must be the

best basketball shoe to wear.

Logical Fallacies

• Loaded Terms: A word or phrase is "loaded" when it has a secondary, evaluative meaning in addition to its primary, descriptive meaning.

Unloaded LoadedPlant Weed Animal Beast

Loaded Words (fallacy)

• Loaded language is not inherently fallacious, otherwise most poetry would commit this fallacy. However, it is often a logical boobytrap, which may cause one to leap to an unwarranted evaluative conclusion. The fallacy is committed either when an arguer attempts to use loaded words in place of an argument, or when an arguee makes an evaluation based on the colorful language in which an argument is clothed, rather than on the merits of the argument itself.

Logical Fallacies

• Caricatures: Argument in which a speaker misrepresents another speaker’s argument so that only a weak shell of the original argument remains; also called the straw man fallacy

Straw Man explained

• Straw Man arguments often attack a political party or movement at its extremes, where it is weakest.

• For example, it is a straw man to portray the anti-abortion position as the claim that all abortions, with no exceptions, are wrong. It is also a straw man to attack abortion rights as the position that no abortions should ever be restricted, bar none. Such straw men are often part of the process of "demonization", and we might well call the subfallacy of the straw man which attacks an extreme position instead of the more moderate position held by the opponent

Logical Fallacies

• Begging the Question: Assuming the thing to be true that you are trying to prove. It is circular.

Student: I am a good student because Frank says

so. Teacher: How can we trust Frank?Student: Simple. I will vouch for him.

Logical Fallacies

• False Assumptions: Making broad generalizations based on one person/situation that may not be true for the whole.

I ate lasagna for dinner the night before my test, and I earned an ‘A’! Therefore, I should eat lasagna every night for dinner before any test in order to score well.

**This example would also serve for faulty cause/effect

Logical Fallacies

• Incorrect Premises: One of the two premises in a syllogism is incorrect.– Syllogism: a form of deductive reasoning in which

the conclusion is supported by a major and minor premise. The concluding sentence of a syllogism takes its predicate from the major premise and its subject from the minor premise.

Syllogism

• Major premise: All warm-blooded animals are mammals (predicate).

• Minor premise: All horses (subject) are warm-blooded.

• Conclusion: All horses are mammals.

Incorrect Premises Example

• All mammals are warm-blooded.• All snakes are mammals.• All snakes are warm-blooded.

FALSE!

Organization Structures• Classification: advantages/disadvantages +

writer’s position• Hierarchical: order of importance + writer’s

position• Strongest argument to weakest to strongest:

(self-explanatory)• Enumeration: reasons why or why not +

writer’s position• Compare/contrast + writer’s position• Problem/solution

Research Terms

• Primary source: Primary sources provide first-hand testimony or direct evidence concerning a topic under investigation. They are created by witnesses or recorders who experienced the events or conditions being documented. Often these sources are created at the time when the events or conditions are occurring, but primary sources can also include autobiographies, memoirs, and oral histories recorded later. (may include letters, speeches, diaries, surveys, field work, or personal interviews)

• Secondary source: A secondary source interprets and analyzes primary sources. These sources are one or more steps removed from the event. Secondary sources may have pictures, quotes or graphics of primary sources in them.

Secondary or Primary?

• 1. A magazine article that reviews the life of President Obama (written by a reporter that has gained knowledge of President Obama through other released publications).

• 2. A blog written about the War in Iraq by a journalist who traveled with American troops throughout their time there.

Objective and Subjective

• Objective: Factual (or at least as close to the truth as we can get); something able to be observed; unbiased

• Subjective: Opinionated; contains a belief, assumption, or generalization