Check list

INTRODUCTORY PARAGRAPH

Identify the Community and Its Purpose

Describe what the community is about, i.e., what is its main purpose, who is part of this community: age ranges, genders, ethnicities, geographic areas, educational backgrounds, socio-economic backgrounds (class), nationalities, languages, particular knowledges or expertise, and so on. Is this a highly organized community or a more relaxed flexible community where members join and leave continuously? What does the community DO? What activities do they engage in? What various kinds of language conventions and forms of communication do they use? Is there a hierarchy of some people who are perceived to have more experience, or expertise, or are given particular “leadership” roles in the community. Who’s in charge? Who is in power? Who has authority? Who establishes conventions that others follow?

ETHOS (multiple paragraphs): What is the “ethos” of the community, in general, as viewed from within the community, and as viewed from outside the community? Remember that ethos is about “credibility” or “believability.”

Outsider Perceptions of Community’s Ethos: Ask yourself, ask yourself how outsider might PERCEIVE the community and its members? Is it perceived as a serious and important community? Is it perceived as not relevant or even a community that is discriminatory? Is it highly valued by outsiders? Is it dismissed by outsiders? Is the community perceived to contribute something important to the larger community? Is it perceived as a destructive element? Do outsiders “trust” or “believe” in the value of this community?

Insider Perceptions of Community’s Ethos: How do members/insiders in the community perceive the community? Are there some members that are more valued or highly regarded than others? Why? Do members think of this as collaborative community or a competitive community? How do different members perceive the ways in which the kinds of language used, the means and media of communication, the organization of activities, the activities themselves, the “leadership” or hierarchy of the community, the “rules” or “conventions” of the community? Are members proud of being part of this community? Do they tell others about its importance in their lives? Do they think of the community as just one small facet of their lives and don’t tell others about it? In other words, HOW do various members FEEL about and PERCEIVE their own membership and participation in the community?

LOGOS (multiple paragraphs): In what ways does the community value factual information, statistics, logical reasoning? In other words, factual information and logical reasoning an essential part of the community’s identity? Does the community emphasize this in particular ways? Does the community focus more on “intellectual” pursuits, such as exploring knowledge of some kind, or debating current issues, or learning in some aspect or other? Or does the community focus more on other aspects, such as creating and maintain social connections that are more centered on emotional and/or physical activities? What role does reasoning and information play in this community?

Outsider Perceptions of Community’s Logos: How do outsiders perceive the ways in which intellectual or logical reasoning or information are used in this community? Do outsiders perceive this community as engaging in intellectual activities, or do outsiders consider this community “frivolous” (silly, of little importance)? Is the community considered by outsiders as “valuable” in terms of how it might positively impact members’ ability to think clearly and/or understand factual information and/or contribute to the intellectual “health” of the larger community?

Insider Perceptions of Community’s Logos: How do members/insiders think about the role of activities related to logical reasoning and/or factual information? Are members interested in the “intellectual” aspects of the community or are they interested in more social or physical activities? Do members think of this community as contributing in some way to the intellectual “health” of the larger community? Or do members consider their community to focus more on social engagement or physical activities and health?

PATHOS (multiple paragraphs): What is the “pathos” of the community? In other words, what role does emotion and values play in this community? Remember that emotions and values can play a central role in many communities’ purpose and activities. Alternatively, emotion and/or values could be of secondary concern to the purpose of the community. So, you’ll need to analyze what role various emotions and values play in this community and whether emotions and values are central to the community’s purpose. You’ll also want to consider how outsiders feel about the community.

Outsider Perceptions of Community’s Pathos: How do outsiders feel about the community and its purpose and functions? Do outsiders respect or feel accepting of the community? Do outsiders place high value on the community’s activities as supporting positive emotional development of its members? Or do outsiders have a negative perception of the emotional impact of the community on both its members and the larger community? What are some of the various emotions and values that outsiders connect to this community?

Insider Perceptions of Community’s Pathos: How do members/insiders feel about the community? What particular emotions and/or values do they associate with this community? How do individual members feel about each other? Are they supportive of each other? Competitive? Supportive and competitive? Are there emotional tensions among various members of the community? What causes these tensions? Do some members deliberately or unconsciously provoke negative emotions within the community? Do some members focus on creating a positive emotional “space” or “environment” in the community? What role do various emotions and values play for this community? Are emotions and values central to the community’s purpose?

CONCLUDING PARAGRAPH(S): What does your rhetorical analysis of this community tell us? What TENTATIVE conclusions have you reached based on your analysis? Remember that the purpose of your rhetorical analysis is to help you and your audience understand how language is central to identity and culture. Particular communities can be said to have an “identity” and also be considered even a potential “subculture.” So, what meaning about these larger concepts of identity and culture do we get from your analysis of this particular community? How can your analysis help us understand how the various communities that we are part of shape our own identities and cultural connections?

IMPORTANT ASPECTS OF YOUR RHETORICAL ANALYSIS

Examples: In each section and even in each paragraph, you’ll need to provide specific examples of ethos (credibility, believability), logos (logical reasoning, intellectual engagement, factual information), and pathos (emotions and values) that will SHOW us how the community functions and how outsiders perceive the community.

Language examples: how do outsiders and insiders use particular language to talk about the community? How does the community communicate AND the ways in which their specific language (word choice, terminology, phrases, etc.) impacts others’ language choices, behaviors, attitudes, etc.?How do particular language practices create, maintain, or change the community? How do the language practices encourage, challenge, modify, punish, change, impact members’ attitudes, behaviors, etc.? How do the various language – textual, oral, visual – work to maintain the community? How do the particular language practices and values of the community create an “exclusive” space in which other people are outsiders?

Artifact examples: What objects are central to the community? What objects do they need? What objects do they use? What objects “symbolize” the community? Remember that an artifact can range from an Xbox to a museum pamphlet to a university catalog to a coffee mug to a thermometer to . . . all of these specific objects have particular uses and may symbolize particular values of the community that you could analyze through the lenses of ethos, pathos, and logos.