Rhetoric Round 2 - Underdog vs. the Champion

Rhetoric is a tricky word to describe. It is not in everyday vocabulary. Only the select few who truly understand the word know how to incorporate it within the sentences they speak. Before this class, I only had a vague idea of what rhetoric was. Now, however, I understand the word completely. Throughout this English class, each of us has had the wonderful experience of using rhetoric by the vocab, fight clubs, and the papers we typed.

One of the biggest impacts of rhetoric on me was the three Greek words: logos, pathos, and ethos. Previously in my schooling, I knew what each stood for but I never added them to the papers I wrote most of the time. But for the final paper for this English class, I made sure to include all three of these ideas. Each different meaning of the word added to my paper by being logical, ethical, or emotional. Foe my proposal paper, I made sure to use examples which reflected the definition of these words. By doing so, the paper had a stronger presence among a wider audience. For example, if I only used logic examples, certain people would understand and some would not. However, by also incorporating ethical and emotional examples within the text, the same people who did not understand the logical approach would rather see the ethical or emotional approach instead. These Greek words make up a big part of what rhetoric is.

Another aspect of rhetoric is being able to catch the use of it within movies, newspaper articles, and music. For example, in class, we depicted the differences between two versions of the song Bad Blood. In Taylor Swift's version, she seems mad and hateful. On the other hand, Ryan Adam's rendition sounded laid back and peaceful. This is only one example of how rhetoric is within the world, who knows how many songs contain rhetoric?

English 1900 has helped me learn the deeper meaning of rhetoric. As I mentioned before, by using rhetoric every day in the class by the vocab, fight clubs, and blog posts, my intellect towards rhetoric has been increased. Since this class has ended, I will make sure to continue to use rhetoric within my future papers and arguments. Rhetoric is not a simple word with a simple definition, one has to research to grasp the meaning behind such the elaborate, unique vocab word. During my time is this class, knowledge has grown to new proportions with the help of rhetoric.