1. The Rhetorical Triangle
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The Rhetorical Triangle
AP English Language & Composition

2. What is Rhetoric? What is said (message) Who is saying it (speaker)
Who is listening (audience)
Where / when it is being said (context, appeals)
Why it is being said (purpose)
How it is being said (tone, style)

3. What is the Rhetorical Triangle?
Shows the relationship between speaker, audience, message, style, purpose, tone
Understanding these rhetorical elements makes both writing and analysis much clearer

4. The Rhetorical Triangle
Message
Pathos
Tone
Style
Ethos
Logos
Speaker
Audience
Purpose

5. The Author / Speaker
Gender / racial / geographical/ socioeconomic/ political orientation of author
Author Bias / hidden agenda
Other important biographical information may affect text

6. The Audience Are they friend or foe? (hostile or sympathetic)
How will they receive the message?
How will they affect tone? style?
Who is the intentional audience?
Who is the unintentional audience?
Over time, does the message/effect of the message change as the audience changes?

7. The Message
What is the main point being made? In other words, what is the writer’s / speaker’s thesis?
Look at the message as an argument / position being sold to the audience. What is the author trying to convince the audience of?

8. The Message Consider this when trying to identify the exact message:
What is the topic (1-2 words) about which the piece is written?
What is the most important aspect or perspective about that topic that the author wants you to understand?
What, exactly, does the author want the reader to think/do/feel/say?
What is the “no” on the other side of the author’s “yes?” (And vice versa)

9. The Message
Read the excerpt from The Grapes of Wrath. What, exactly, do you think best restates Steinbeck’s thesis? Which quotes from the text best reveal that thesis, that purpose? “You gonna see in people’s face how they hate you. An’-I’ll tell you somepin. They hate you ‘cause they’re scairt. They know a hungry fella gonna get food even if he got to take it. They know that fallow lan’s a sin an’ somebody’ gonna take it. What the he**! You never been called ‘Okie’ yet.”

10. “Well, Okie use’ta mean you was from Oklahoma
“Well, Okie use’ta mean you was from Oklahoma. Now it means you’re a dirty *****. Okie means you’re scum. Don’t mean nothing itself, it’s the way they say it. But I can’t tell you nothin’. You got to go there. I hear there’s three hunderd thousan’ of our people there-an livin’ like hogs,’cause ever’thing in California is owned. They ain’t nothin’ left. An’ them people that owns it is gonna hang on to it if they got ta kill every’body in the worl’ to do it. An’ they’re scairt, an’ that makes ‘em mad” (280).

11. The Tone
What is the author’s attitude about his / her subject / message?
What words in the message let you know the tone?
How does the selection of the tone affect the audience’s reception of the message? Is it appropriate for the occasion/subject matter?

12. The Tone
Very often, tone words will vary in meaning only in the degree of intensity, in the “positiveness” or “negativeness.”Take a look at the TONE words on the following slide. Can you categorize these words into groups (positive/ negative, specific degrees of emotion)?

13. The Tone
Read the excerpt again. Which of the words capture Steinbeck’s tone?

14. The Tone
“You gonna see in people’s face how they hate you. An’-I’ll tell you somepin. They hate you ‘cause they’re scairt. They know a hungry fella gonna get food even if he got to take it. They know that fallow lan’s a sin an’ somebody’ gonna take it. What the he**! You never been called ‘Okie’ yet.” “Well, Okie use’ta mean you was from Oklahoma. Now it means you’re a dirty *****. Okie means you’re scum. Don’t mean nothing itself, it’s the way they say it. But I can’t tell you nothin’. You got to go there. I hear there’s three hunderd thousan’ of our people there-an livin’ like hogs,’cause ever’thing in California is owned. They ain’t nothin’ left. An’ them people that owns it is gonna hang on to it if they got ta kill every’body in the worl’ to do it. An’ they’re scairt, an’ that makes ‘em mad” (280).

15. The Style
What strategies does the author employ in order to get his / her message across?
These strategies may include: organization; diction (word choice); syntax; figurative language; grammatical structure; selection of details; imagery, etc.

16. The Rhetorical Purpose
Under what circumstances is the author addressing his/her audience?
In other words, what is going on in the world at the time this text was composed, and how do those events affect the text?

17. The Rhetorical Purpose
There are four main “purposes” for argumentation:
To Assert
To Inquire
To Dominate
To Negotiate/Reconcile

18. The Rhetorical Purpose
Arguments to Assert:
“Traditionally, argument has been understood as a formal attempt to state a position on an issue (your thesis), offer acceptable reasons for that position, provide evidence in support of those reasons, and anticipate objections. Indeed, to write an effective argument of any kind requires you make a clear assertion and support it adequately…” (IA, pp )

19. The Rhetorical Purpose
Arguments to Inquire:
Inquiry is the nature of almost all academic writing – i.e., “I’m interested in this…I will research the available data on the subject and then write…”
Inquiry is “arguing to learn and understand” (IA, pg13)
“These arguments, then, are exploratory in two ways; (a) they encourage the writer to explore a topic in order to arrive at a reasonable position; and (b) they invite writers to engage in exploring that topic as well” (IA, pg.16)

20. The Rhetorical Purpose
Arguments to Dominate (Aristotelian):
Arguments that dominate are used in “win-lose” situations and are particularly applicable in situations involving the law.
“Being able to recognize the complexity of…situations will help you identify argument to dominate is that you can make informed decisions about them.” (IA, 17-18)
“Examples provided in your text note that sometimes truth is not what is emphasized as much as what is morally or ethically relevant.

21. The Rhetorical Purpose
Arguments to Negotiate/Reconcile (Rogerian):
These arguments negotiate differences and lead to compromise.
“Writer practicing Rogerian argument (from Carl Rogers) negotiate differences by “restat[ing] what others have said before offering their own views” (IA,19).
This style of argumentation “rests on the assumption that language can be completely neutral—an idea that has been seriously questioned by modern linguists and philosophers” (IA,19).

22. Final Questions: Is language ever neutral?
Is listening to the other side of an issue always effective?
How could the each purpose of argumentation be useful to you?

23. Summary
Remember – it is not one of these elements of the rhetorical triangle that can be used to analyze a text; it is the relationships between these rhetorical elements that composes the meaning we get from a text!
True analysis is not only the what, but also the why and the how!