ENG 103:01 Fall 2019

A new series on HBO, The Newsroom, rose to fame as “the most honest three and a half minutes of television ever,” with a combined one million hits on YouTube. The three-minute video shows protagonist and anchorman, Jeff Daniels, sitting before an auditorium of young adults when asked to say why he thinks America is the best. Daniels then gives a speech about why he believes America isn’t the best based off of statistics in education, freedom, etc. He concludes by saying “The first step in solving any problem is to recognize there is one. America is not the greatest country in the world anymore.” The video makes you step back and take a second look at the country we live in and if it is really great and if not how do we fix it?  Daniels points out that if you look at the facts American isn’t the best in all of the categories like education. In the video, Daniels says that the U.S is ranked 7th in literacy, 27th in math, 22nd in science. That statement isn’t too far from the t...

In the past few weeks climate change protests have begun to spring up all around the world. One of the big events to spur from these protests is Greta Thunberg's speech to the UN about her and the youth's thoughts on climate change and some nations refusing to make a change. Greta used an emotional approach in her speech to sway people's opinions on the issue which combined with the rhetoric of her speech she made a very effective argument against politicians and their stance on climate change. This speech that Greta made is a perfect example of using Pathos or emotion in rhetoric and shows how effective and powerful it can make someones position.

Believe it or not, rhetoric is in practically everything that we read, hear, or write. Though, in order to "see" the rhetoric, one has to know how to look for it and know what it is essentially. In class, to further dive into the power rhetoric has on an audience, we watched a video where a news reporter was suspicious of a lobbyist that kept on avoiding what the reporter was looking for. In my opinion, it was kind of funny to watch him turn the subject so many times and so smoothly. Throughout the video, I caught myself thinking "how do people believe him?" Well, I thought about it and realized that people who do this as their jobs are good at what they do, otherwise they would not have their job. I also think that since through this class we have learned how to point out what and how the lobbyists are spinning their stories to confuse the audience. It was quite interesting and amusing watching him do what he does to make sure that it doesn't look like he is ly...

In chapter 4 in Thank You for Arguing, Heinrichs talks about the 3 different tools of persuasion; argument by character, logic, and emotion. He uses the example of his son wanting to wear shorts to school in the winter. He first tried to persaude him by using a stern fatherly act by saying "you have to because I told you so" and that tool did not work. Furthermore, he uses logic by telling his son that he will get chapped if he wears short out in the winter and that tool did not work. So he finally tried emotion by aking a deal with his son. This step finally got the situation settled. Heinrichs also lays out Artistole 's Big Three which are ethos, pathos, and logos. You can use these three tools of persuasion to get your way in a conversation. 

After seeing the three primary forms of rhetoric broken down in chapter four of Jay Heinrich's Thank You for Arguing , it is interesting to analyze how they're used in any given advertisement. Heinrich's example of how ethos, logos, and pathos can be used was a conversation with his son. He explained each of the three argument's could be applied and their purpose. After reading that, I couldn't help but look for these persuasive tools in any given advertisement. It almost makes English feel like a science. With the right formula, you get a product that is perfectly tailored to your audience. And, there's almost always a way to persuade any given audience. Although, if your rhetorical tools are misused, you're left with a botched product.

Ethos, pathos, and logos are 3 main persuasive tools discussed in class and by Heinrich in chapter 4 in "Thank You For Arguing". These are described as Aristotle's Big Three, ethos or argument by character employs your credibility and knowledge. Logos is an argument by logic or evidence and reasoning to use what your thinking, while pathos appeals towards emotion, beliefs, or conviction.  Heinrich applies these persuasive tools to try and convince his son to not wear shorts during winter. However, his son disagrees with him, and Heinrich begins using ethos to persuade his son by using a "stern father act" but fails miserably. Then he applies logos into the mix by pulling up his pant legs and acting silly in front of his son and still ends up losing. Finally, Heinrich uses pathos and makes a deal with his son, they both come out happy. These three tools are embedded in our day to day lives and are used to appeal towards our audience's emotion and logic whil...

     After watching the clip in class from the Newsroom it made me think based off stats what is the best country? I looked for a good source to see how they augured the point to perused their readers. I came across an article from NBC written by Zameea Mejia. In her article the way she ranks the nations was by having 21,000 people to evaluate 80 nations based on 65 attributes with the main ones being economic influence, power, citizenship, and quality of life. Based off the results she presents in her top five that Japan was fifth followed by the UK then Germany at three Canada at two and Switzerland as the best nation. She claims this because they are the most business friendly, have a high cultural influence, and have a high quality of life. After reading the article it made me think that is possible to rank these just off of 21,000 people comprehension of statics? With there being over 7 billion on the planet how could 21,000 people answer this huge question. This led...

In chapter 2 of Thank You for Arguing, Heinrichs compares the difference between and argument and a fight. You succeed in an argument when you persuade your audience, but you win a fight when you dominate the enemy. An example that was used is how are couples relationships based on how they approach arguments. Couples who stay married approach an argument by using their disputes to solve problems and work out differences. Couples who end up divorced solve problems by using arguments to attack each other. You fight to win, and you argue to achieve agreement. If you want to solve conflict, the best way is to argue your point.

Today September 20th,2019 Children from New York are protesting against climate change. Places around the world have taken influence and started to protest. It even sparked a climate change protest at the home of Ball State. Today at the scramble light on Bsu campus, students came to protest. They held signs and were yelling in rebellion for a difference.

"What is Argument?", that question has been up in the air for a long time. People from all different walks of life have different definitions of argument. From the academic stand point, Argument is more than just contradictions. People who argue should have three specific goals, 1) Change moods, 2)Change minds, and 3)Be able to get people to do something. Argument is supposed to be consensual on both sides. You can't correctly argue something if you don't understand it. Manipulation happens when someone doesn't understand the situation. When you understand what is happening, you become a willing participant and are less likely to be manipulated. Most people don't use argument correctly. Only people who have studied the art for a long time can truly argue correctly. If you are able to do so, a few amazing things might happen. 1)Ideas will be tested 2)Advocacy will be assisted 3)Power will be distributed 4)Facts will be discovered 5)Knowledge will be s...

In chapter 4 of Thank You for Arguing it starts with the authors son insisting on wearing shorts to school in the winter. His dad uses different strategies to get him to wear pants to school, which includes character, logic, and emotion. He was able to use character by trying to be a stern father and telling him he is wearing pants and that was final. This strategy did not work out for him so he moved onto logic. He tried telling his son he needed to wear pants or his legs would get chapped, this is the form of logic on his argument. This then still proceeded not to work which then led the father to emotion. He asks his son if he would look stupid going to work in shorts and when his son agrees at this he concludes to ask his son why he would wear them then. These three strategies can help an argument if you are able to put them into use.

In this chapter of Thank You for Arguing the author states that Aristotle says there are 3 elements to persuading. Those are character which is ethos, logic by logos, and emotion by pathos. He then goes into a story about how George Heinrichs when he was a kid, he wanted to wear shorts in the winter time, and he used logos and ethos to convince not to. He eventually comes to a compromise to let him wear shorts to school but with pants over them.

Jeanine Pirro is a Fox News Anchor. She was told by a person who called in from Texas on live TV that her rhetoric had a part in the baby in El Paso, Texas being orphaned. The caller was referring to the way the people he mentions spread anti-immigrant hate. The caller spoke of the rhetoric of her, Fox News, and even Donald Trump that are spreading hate in America with the words they are using. I think that this man believes that the rhetoric they use is manipulating people who are unsuspecting and are unfamiliar in the topic. Like what we talked about in class today, politicians sometimes use their rhetoric to persuade people who are poorly educated on the subject in question. I saw this video on twitter the other day, before this class I would not have noticed the word rhetoric as much as I did when I watched the video the first time. Before this class I would not have even known what rhetoric meant, but now that I do and now that we have discussed it in class I feel I have a bet...

I recently read an article on TED-Ed about the use of rhetoric. In the article it talks about Aristotle two thousand years ago and his attempt to explain how to get what you want just using your words. In other words how to use rhetoric and the art of persuasion. Giving that Aristotle is clearly not living today, it was Camille A. Langston describing the fundamentals of deliberative rhetoric and she shared some tips for appealing to an audience’s ethos, logos, and pathos in your next speech. The article talked about how today rhetoric is used in all forms of communication. Although, Aristotle focused on talking and he described different types of persuasive speech. Forensic, epideictic, and deliberative are the three types of rhetoric he focused on. Forensic is facts and judgments about the past, sort of similar to detectives at a crime scene. Epideictic is a proclamation about the present situation, as in wedding speeches. Lastly, deliberative focuses on the future, this is like p...

The peer workshop activity we do in class is an excellent experience in my opinion. My first experience with this assignment was a success I believe. I really enjoyed the feedback I got back from my group explaining what I did good and what I didn't and I hope they felt the same way. In the future I hope this in-class activity continues to help so I can become a better writer and for any others that needs it as well. I was a little nervous about getting feedback but the conversations my group and I had were very nice and not argumentative at all towards the subject of critique. I appreciate all the feedback I had got back that was helpful. Knowing that someone else can give you tips and notes on what you might have missed on the final writing project was very helpful and beneficial to us all. I don't think having a little feedback from someone else's perspective hurts. The only thing I don't like about peer workshop is we are all in one room where you can hear others ...

The peer workshop in class today went very well. I feel as if this is a great idea to do before all writing projects in class. My group mates and I helped each other out significantly, and had very good conversation over our papers. This process helped my group mates and I better our papers in ways we wouldn't have if we didn't do a peer workshop. We each had very good feedback that we all took as helpful and didn't turn it into an argument. Each of us were lacking some sort of structure or didn't reference the movie Thank You for Smoking.  Each of us will most likely receive better scores due to the workshop, which could mean a lot in the long run. I feel like if we did a peer workshop before every writing project, the entire class will benefit and receive better scores because of it. As you write a paper on your own. you tend to forget some key details sometimes. That problem is most likely eliminated when three other students listen to your essay, as they can give yo...

In the book "Thank You for Arguing" I believe that Heinrich used rhetoric as a tool to argue with his kid in a way to teach him a lesson. He argued with his kid just to prove him that he was wrong, and to teach his son how easily it was for him to win the argument by his son thinking he won the argument. Every argument Heinrich had with his son eventually reached a clear resolution. I believe that every argument no matter what it's about or who's involved in the argument, there's always an end to it. Heinrich was never a fan of arguing and didn't want to argue with his son, but he did it to persuade and to get his son to use the toothpaste. This is the job of many parents trying to get their kids to do something by either bribing them or telling them how cool or important it would be for them to do whatever their parents are wanting them to do.

In the movie Thank You for Smoking, Nick Naylor has a job that requires him to go out and advertise that cigarettes are in fact good for your health, which is far from the truth. He would spend days going to children's schools and promote the use of cigarettes. Naylor used his job and the money that came from it to potentially risk the lives of other people by giving out false information. I believe that in no circumstance is it ok to deceive innocent people, and to make them think what you are telling them is the truth. Nick might have been good at his job, but that doesn't change the fact that he could be the reason children start smoking. He confessed that he was doing it to "pay the mortgage", but in my opinion he could have done that in many other ways or just realized what he was doing wasn't the right way to do it.

Personally, I thought " Thank You for Smoking" was a very interesting movie. I have not seen very many movies that are strictly fact based. I found that the cigarette industry knows what their products can do, but still sell it and promote it. Cigarettes take the lives of 1,200 people a day. My question is why would they promote something that can take the lives of so many people? It's all about the money. People who have become addicted to these products. Some buyers are buying and using a pack a day. A pack a day smoker spends approximately $2,282 a year according to an article written by Alaya Linton. Not only is smoking harming people. It is putting a huge damper on the financial aspect of their lives. The tobacco industry made around 35 billion dollars last year alone. This number shows the answer to why tobacco companies promote something that can take the lives of so many people.

The question, "What is Rhetoric?", has been asked many times in the classroom. This topic has been controversial because of the many definitions that come with the word "rhetoric". People often say that this is based on the art of persuasion and they are correct, but there is so much more that contributes to a good definition. When sitting in the middle of the discussion, I kept questioning whether my statement was correct. There are so many ideas that could be thought of and rhetoric can even be a manipulative power that can be used towards convincing individuals their arguments are wrong. Using this in society is how humans function in daily life. With these thoughts in my mind, I began to wonder what life would be like without rhetoric.

In the movie "Thank You For Smoking" the main character Nick claims he does what he does "To pay the mortgage". Obviously what he does questions his morals, and it is a controversial job any way you look at it. Personally I can't quite see eye to eye with him on what he does and nobody should try and influence teenagers to pick up smoking. Of course he had a choice, he could have taken a job elsewhere doing something else. However, Nick is good at what he does, and it seems he is heavily invested in what he does. What Nick does is very questionable without a doubt, but he's simply doing it to pay the mortgage.

By far one of the most interesting movies that I have watched "Thank you for smoking". This movie starred a lobbyist named nick and his job was to in some way twist the truth to convince people that about how Nick is attempting to trick the public into smoking because at the end of the day all they wanted was money. Throughout the movie you can see Nick change when he starts thinking about his son, he wants to be a good role model for his son but he also wants to do his job at the same time. I always question Nick Naylor's decisions because he always knew what the right thing to do was, but he fell back and continued to twist the truth. Why did he always go back to defending the company? Yes he did it for a paycheck, but doing a job where your whole job is convince the public to smoke there just seems hes trying to fill something in his life. Maybe I just don't understand, but it seems like there is more to the picture when you are trying to convincing millions to c...