How Social Isolation Is Killing Us Rhetorical Analysis

Dhruv Khullar’s article “How Social Isolation is Killing Us,” published by the New York Times, addresses the public about the dangers of the growing epidemic. Utilizing various sources, studies, and even his own stories, Dr. Khullar discusses the health effects and mental effects on a person who is considered socially isolated. He improves the article by discussing how treating social isolation is hard and gives examples of programs that help those who feel alone. The article “How Social Isolation is Killing Us” is a thorough and well-constructed argument that clearly explains dangers of social isolation through the author’s use of logos, pathos, and ethos. Logos is “a strategy in which a writer uses facts, evidence, and reason to convince audience members to accept a claim” (Lunsford). Dr. Khullar utilizes this aspect of writing by primarily using statistics. One

The very beginning of the article, Dr. Khullar appeals to the emotions of a reader, reminiscing about an interaction between himself and a dying patient. He explains how the patient had no one to call and would die alone, causing himself to think that “the sadness of his death was surpassed only by the sadness of his solitude” (Khullar). The feeling of sadness and loneliness is continued using other scenarios that one likely is familiar with, such as “a young man abandoned by friends as he struggles with opioid addiction” or “an older woman getting by on tea and toast, living in filth, no longer able to clean her cluttered apartment” (Khullar). Dr. Khullar also uses this strategy through the use of various phrases such as “barren rooms devoid of family or friends,” or a quote from a senior: “Your world dies before you do” (Khullar). These scenarios and terminology evoke a feeling within a reader that results in acknowledgement of the material and what is being