Rhetoric is a way with words which allows a writer or a speaker to persuade an audience to his or her view point. A recent topic in which many public figures and writers alike have come out to voice their opinions is, the Academy awards for the second year in a row having no people of color getting a nomination. This argument has people split between those who are outraged and those who honestly couldn’t care less. On January 28th 2016 Larry Elder wrote an article called, “#OscarsSoWhite -- Biggest Fraud Since 'Hands Up, Don't Shoot'” on the controversy for the creator syndicate. He is a bestselling author, lawyer, has had a radio talk show and a television show. Elder’s opinion on the subject is does it matter so what if a person …show more content…
As mentioned before he includes how the Oscars nominations work and gives facts on how many speaking roles blacks have gotten within a seven year span. In addition Elder does incorporate another fact into his writing when he says, “Blacks watch, on average, two hours more of television per day than whites, according to Nielsen ratings, and blacks purchase more movie tickets than do whites, according to the Motion Picture Association of America”. This attributes to the tone being informative because Elder is giving the reader statistics to further understand his point of view. The article is coursing with facts and statics that only a person with his level of experience could ever use to flow into his …show more content…
One device he uses is an allusion in which he mentions Jim Crow and segregation. Even the use of this allusion is factual due to the nature of Elder’s style. He uses Jim Crow to set a time period in history because after this allusion he goes on to list a number of famous racists. Another rhetoric device used is a rhetorical question. This is when he directly asks any the Oscar nominees reading his article, “Which ones did not deserve it? Did they break into the homes of Academy members, carrying guns and disguised with ski masks to make the members vote the way they did?”. Elder uses this device in way that still is true to the nature of his writing because of the way it was sarcastic it made sense and down played the seriousness of the Oscars debacle. Elder also uses an anecdote in which he says, a black actor/director friend of his answers the question to why blacks need to get recognition in film is that the self-esteem of the black children. Elder once again refers to facts and statics about how black children are more confident than white ones there by debunking the line of reason his friend
A Rhetorical Analysis of Lockdown by Evans D. Hopkins. According to the Webster Dictionary, rhetoric is defined as the art of speaking or writing effectively. Rhetoric is made up of three separate appeals that can be used individually or collectively in an attempt to persuade a reader. Ethos is the credibility and qualifications of the speaker or author.
A dominant rhetorical strategy presented by the author was his use of formal tone which made his article more official. The author explains his point of view in how banning words in music such as hip-hop and rap would be beneficial using strict arguments. Also, the author detached himself from the article and did not use the first or second point of view. In addition, in paragraph 9 the author wrote “it would” as an alternative of “It’d”, in paragraph 10 “that is” as a replacement for “that’s”, and in paragraph 11 “it is” rather than “it’s”, which concludes that he used full words and did not simplify or use contractions in most of his words. He also spelled out the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People when he wrote
In “The Help, A Feel-Good Movie That Feels Kind of Icky”, Dana Stevens discloses her thoughts on a movie that focuses on the civil rights movement. Stevens has a lot to say about the movie, good and bad, however the focal point of it is that in the media industry we like to sugarcoat the truth about times in history. This movie is about black-white relations in America and happens to end up being mostly about a white character and her journey to enlightenment. Stevens points out that in media it seems that we address issues but always have a dominant white character. The movie offers insight into what life was like during the civil rights movement but “the catharsis it offers feels glib and insufficient,” reinforcing Stevens statement about the media and it diminishing the ugly truth about race relations in America (Stevens 776). She also goes on to say that media does this to allow the viewer to not feel so guilty about racism in the past and to try while at the same time putting the viewer’s mind to rest about present day racism. Stevens believes that the movie is somewhat of a blurred line between what actually happened in the past and it being a feel good movie. For it to be historically accurate, Stevens would say it
Portraying to the emotions is important to his overall argument because it relates the reader with the black community by providing situations of struggle and hardship, triggering the typical
Rhetoric is innate in nature because there is always some form of persuasion in communication. Rhetoric is essentially persuasion over value, which can be communicated through any type of discourse written, verbal, or nonverbal. If something is significant enough to be argued or even stated, it must have some degree of importance. Because rhetoric is everything, understanding how it influences us, helps us better understand how we work.
I chose this video because it raised my awareness by questioning the difference between positive role models, such as The Cosby Show, and positive images for all African-Americans. The issues discussed and comments made by the cast piqued my interest and helped change my perspective on the history of African-American representation in the media, especially in the realm of television. Color Adjustment contains more than just endless ‘talking heads’ – it has elements of fact, history, and professional opinion all blended together in an engaging format. It was extremely exciting to hear the TV producers like Hal Kanter and David Wolper talk about their own productions in retrospect. Most importantly to me, Color Adjustment changed my perspective on African-American representation in the media by challenging me to think about images...
...After giving the presentation there were many different views coming from the audience which were not expected. The audience did not hold the same views presented to them. The point addressed was about how Will Smith was the buffoon on The Fresh Prince of Bel Air. They did not feel Will Smith was acting buffoonish, they thought he just brought comedy to the show. The audience seemed to focus on black people acting white rather than black people acting ignorant. They brought up the character Carlton, and how he acted white. When asked the question how they knew he was acting white they said he went to an all white school and was influenced by the way they acted. The audience also said Will criticized Carlton for acting white. They excused Will's buffoonish actions by saying white people were also made fun of through Carlton's character. This brings up the question how do we know what is characterized as acting "black" or acting "white", and what makes a show a "black" show or a "white" show. Again these questions revert back to the fact television shows have embedded stereotypes in our society. This makes people believe there must be a typical "black" person and "white" person.
The genre of this article is an editorial. When the audience reads an editorial, they know there is going to be strong opinions and most likely some bias. With the genre of an editorial, though, readers are going to observe phrases and opinions authors would not use in other genres. An example of this is where The Editorial Board says “They are not asserting that black lives are more precious than white lives. They are underlining an indisputable fact — that the lives of black citizens in this country historically have not mattered, and have been discounted and devalued.” (Editorial Board, screen 4) Throughout the article, The Editorial Board included ethos, logos, and pathos in various ways. The Editorial Board represents itself very well and seems to have impeccable credentials and authority. The Editorial Board seems very trustworthy because of the members’ credentials and how publicized The Editorial Board’s editorials are. In the article, facts and evidence are found periodically, meaning that the article is factual to an extent. The Editorial Board presents more facts and evidence that are in support of African Americans than Caucasians, meaning that there is some bias in this article. There are some direct observations included in the logos also. The Editorial Board attempts to invoke an emotional response by saying “The movement sought a cross-racial appeal, but at every step of the way used
In The Marrow of Tradition, author Charles W. Chesnutt illustrates examples that signify the thoughts that whites had of and used against blacks, which are still very much prevalent in public opinion and contemporary media. Chesnutt writes, “Confine the negro to that inferior condition for which nature had evidently designed for him (Chesnutt, 533).” Although significant strides have been made toward equality, the media, in many instances, continues to project blacks as inferior to whites through examples observed in television shows, music videos, films and newscasts.
Rhetoric is the art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing, and its uses the figures of speech and other compositional techniques. It’s designed to have a persuasive or impressive effect on its audience.
In I Am Not Your Negro, Raoul Peck directs the movie to follow the texts written by James Baldwin. Originally, James Baldwin had the idea of using his writing to create his final book, Remember This House, about the life and death of three famous activists, Malcolm X, Medgar Evers, and Martin Luther King, Jr. The film focuses on the issues of the mistreatment of African Americans in film and in society. The use of montage allows Raoul Peck to compare past injustices towards African Americans with present inequalities. Raoul Peck creation of this film wasn’t meant to be a Civil War documentary, but instead, he wanted people of all races to understand the truth about the nation's racism. I believe that I Am Not Your Negro, shows that there
In the story, What is Rhetoric by William Covino and David Jolliffe, there are a wide variety of topics discussed that are inextricably interwoven with the concept “rhetoric.” Rhetoric, as defined by the authors, is “the study and practice of shaping content.” Consequently, my first thought was: Ok, this is a rather broad and opaque description; my successive thought, however, was one of astonishment, inasmuch as the authors went on to further elucidated this jargon. In doing so, the authors distilled the most crucial elements of what is rhetoric— the prevalence of discourse community, and how appealing language is often a precursor to persuasion.
From the article, Davis’s main argument is that the mainstream society has developed the perception the black men are to blame for the
Clark (2016) suggests that rhetoric isn’t limited to oral communication, but currently has a permanent foothold in written works: magazine or newspaper excerpts, novels, and scientific reports. Not only written
Rhetoric is the art of effective speaking or writing, and persuasion. Most people use rhetoric numerous of times in their everyday life without their concern or knowing.