introduction to rhetorical techniques “the duty and office of rhetoric is to apply reason to...
TRANSCRIPT
Introduction to Rhetorical Techniques
“The duty and office of rhetoric is to apply reason to imagination for the better moving of the will.” – Francis Bacon
Devices of Repetition
Anaphora: repetition at the beginning of a series of clauses or sentences.
“ …a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant,and a time to pluck up that which is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up…” –Ecclesiastes
Can you think of other famous examples?
Devices of Repetition
Epistrophe: repetition at the end of multiple clauses or sentences.
“In old age we laugh at our past, sigh for our past, cry out over our past.”
Devices of Repetition
Anadiplosis: takes the last word of a sentence or phrase and repeats it near the beginning of the next sentence or phrase.
“In education we find the measure of our own ignorance; in ignorance we find the beginning of wisdom.”
? Devices of Questioning ?
Rhetorical Question: a question whose answer is implied
“For what can war but endless war breed?”
--John Milton
Devices of Questioning
Anthypophora: the technique of asking a question, then proceeding to answer it.
“You may well ask: ‘Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches and so forth? Isn’t negotiation a better path?’ Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action.”
-- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
= Devices of Comparison =
Metaphor, Simile, Allusion
Antithesis: makes use of a contrast in language to bring out a contrast in ideas.
That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” –Neil Armstrong
“I am not interested in punishing banks, I'm interested in protecting our economy.”
– President Obama
Devices of Syntax
Parallelism: using the same general structure for multiple parts of a sentence in order to link them all.
“The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessing; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.” –Winston Churchill
Devices of Syntax
Telegraphic Sentence: 6 words or fewer
Asyndeton: leaves out conjunctions in a list or between clauses
Polysyndeton: inclusion of grammatically unnecessary conjunctions in a list or between clauses.
“America’s main streets and malls now boast the same Pizza Huts and Taco Bells, Gaps and Banana Republics, Starbucks and Jiffy-Lubes, Foot Lockers, Snip N’Clips, Sunglass Huts, and Hobbytown USAs.”
– Eric Schlosser