Tutorial Question: Before coming to class, bring a print advertisement that you believe persuades the reader rhetorically. Explain your case using the concepts learnt this week.
First and foremost, what is rhetoric? Rhetoric was introduced by a Greek philosopher, Aristotle who believed that the idea of rhetoric is a normal human behavior where in general all men for certain attempts during a discussion of a statement will maintain them by defending themselves. (Aristotle, Ross, Roberts, 2010) This idea of "defend" is called the arts of persuasion, where its purpose is to make people believe. In other words, according to Scott, (1994) rhetoric is an interpretive theory that frames a message as an interested party's attempt to influence an audience. These messages can be in form of written, sound, and in this case visual advertising. The interest and purpose of the party (advertisers), is to persuade the society to buy, follow, and even change on how they should think.
The key to persuading an audience is by understanding the concepts of enthymemes, propositional arguments, and non-rhetorical persuasion. The concept enthymemes is defined as the participation in completing the construction of the argument an so in its own persuasion. (Hill, Helmers, 2004) In other words, this participation will persuade the audience unconsciously thus leads those who are watching to believe the participant's experience.
The Colgate commercial is a good example of enthymemes for the Malaysian viewers of ASTRO. The audience who are watching this advertisement will be persuaded without argument due to the sense of trust and this is the art of persuasion. The trust is formed when the audience is able to believe that a normal Malaysian individual is able to get good relief from the toothpaste. Therefore, this tactic will increase the number of sales and will advantage the company.
There is also the propositional argument which is divided into two parts: the deductive and the inductive argument. The deductive propositional argument is when the conclusion of the persuasion is from the logical results and the reasoning of the propositional premises. Using Govier's (2009) example, the first premise is: If global warning continues, parts of the polar ice cap will melt, second premise is: global warming will continue, therefore, the conclusion would be "global warming is causing the ice cap to melt." As for the inductive argument is when the propositional premise is given evidences therefore it is true. Using Fitelson's (n.d) example, there is a man in Cleveland that is 100 years and 11-months old in good health. The conclusion would be it is possible to be 100 years old in good health. These proposition arguments are concluded by the logic and facts given, therefore individuals are unquestionably persuaded.
And lastly, the non-rhetoric arguments as Chris Woo taught us is persuasion with force. Force is a strong persuasion, especially in the form of threat. A person will not have the time to think or argue with a threat, for example when someone threats you at the ATM for money the only logic thing to do is to give the robber the money.
There is also the propositional argument which is divided into two parts: the deductive and the inductive argument. The deductive propositional argument is when the conclusion of the persuasion is from the logical results and the reasoning of the propositional premises. Using Govier's (2009) example, the first premise is: If global warning continues, parts of the polar ice cap will melt, second premise is: global warming will continue, therefore, the conclusion would be "global warming is causing the ice cap to melt." As for the inductive argument is when the propositional premise is given evidences therefore it is true. Using Fitelson's (n.d) example, there is a man in Cleveland that is 100 years and 11-months old in good health. The conclusion would be it is possible to be 100 years old in good health. These proposition arguments are concluded by the logic and facts given, therefore individuals are unquestionably persuaded.
And lastly, the non-rhetoric arguments as Chris Woo taught us is persuasion with force. Force is a strong persuasion, especially in the form of threat. A person will not have the time to think or argue with a threat, for example when someone threats you at the ATM for money the only logic thing to do is to give the robber the money.
With all of this explained, this leads to answering the main question:
How does this advertisement use the arts of rhetoric?
This environmental advertisement uses the inductive propositional argument, using facts to persuade the audience like "fight against global warming" and "hundreds of thousands of trees to make disposable tissue products" these two sentences will grab the attention of the audience and consider the argument. The sentence "Tell Kimberly-Clark that you want it to stop destroying the Canada's Boreal forest" is a non-rhetoric argument, where the audience is ordered to do so in order for them to save the Boreal forest. In conclusion, using these two art of persuasion in this advertisement is successful in grabbing the audiences' attention by using the persuasion of words, facts, and visual images to win and defend the argument.
References:
Aristotle, Ross, W. D., Roberts, R. W. (2010) The Work of Aristotle: Rhetoric (9th ed.) New York, USA.
Fitelson, B. (n.d) Inductive Logic. Berkeley, USA.
Fitelson, B. (n.d) Inductive Logic. Berkeley, USA.
Govier, T. (2009) A Practical Study of Argument. Belment, USA.
Hill, C. A., Helmers, M. (2004) Defining Visual Rhetoric. Mahwah, New Jersey.
Scott, L. M., (1994) Images in Advertising: The Need of a Theory of Visual Rhetoric. The Journal of Consumer Research. Chicago Press.
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