Rhetorical Analysis Of The Earth Is Precious

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The Earth is precious” is a piece of writing that has become well known and worth studying. It is by Chief Seattle who was the chief of the Squamish tribe long time ago. These Native American people were considered barbaric by the Washington Government in 1845 and the “Great White Chief” wanted to buy their lands promising a reservation for them in exchange. Chief Seattle’s reply is a very well written speech about the environment and the importance of the land that includes many literary devices that make it interesting and convincing. First, at the very beginning of the piece of writing, readers can notice the use of rhetorical questions that, on purpose or not, manage to make the person who reads start thinking about the topic of the speech by involving them in the situation: “How can you buy or sell the sky…?” These questions make people reflect upon the situation and also generate intrigue and invite them to continue reading. Secondly, the use of personification is employed so as to depict the strong relationship between the people and their lands. It succeeds in letting the readers know how significant they are for them and why they cannot imagine what selling them would be like. In fact, it can be said that conceding the lands would be for them like giving up a part of their …show more content…

Since these people was considered savage, the employing of this device appears to be rather on purpose so as to represent the way in which they were treated or named by people form the city just because they lived in a very different way with dissimilar conceptions or philosophies of life. It also demonstrates the incapacity of the white man to comprehend the fact that these people do not consider the lands as something material and so, Chief Seattle concludes that: “…perhaps it is because the red man is a savage and does not understand”. He resorts to irony since he knows very well who the one that does not accept the reality

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