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The Rhetoric Purpose

The rhetoric purposes are written to specifically persuade, explain or convey feelings. Rhetoric features are the characteristics that assist in convincing the audience of certain points of view (Raimes and Miller-Cochran 8). A writer uses these features as strategies to help in the construction of texts. Effective use of rhetoric features leads to logical order and appeals the target audience.

Rhetorical features include logos, ethos and pathos, word play, form and organization and the use of figurative language.

Logos, Ethos pathos

The logos, ethos and pathos are also called the rhetorical triangle. The three aspects interweave to generate persuasive essays. Logo’s majorly centralizes on content, structure and reasoning of the text. Pathos centralizes on the reader’s sympathy towards particular perspectives. Ethos centers on the writer’s ability to put in writing issues on authoritative subjects. These aspects are creatively incorporated with proper organization, word play and figurative language for persuasive essays.

Word play

These are used at sentence and phrases level. Examples of word play are parallelism, Anaphoria, alliteration and chiasmus. In his speech, Martin Luther King Jnr., “I Have dream” maximally utilizes word play.

Here is an extract of a passage from the speech

“Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee! Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi! From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

The repetitive use of the statement “Let freedom ring” exhibits the use of anaphora while alliteration occurs words such as “molehill, Mississippi and mountainside. Chiasmus is shown by the inversion of syntactic structure in “from (a location) to “Let freedom ring.”

Figurative language

Figurative language goes beyond the literal sense. This feature can be used at the sentence and composition level. Figurative language includes figures of comparison like metaphors, similes and analogy, figures that help expressing associations like metonymy and synecdone and figures of irony like dramatic and situational drama. For instance, in Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare uses figurative language. This is seen when Juliet connoted that the aspects of Romeo and the rose flower do not have any connection with their names. This was in the statement “What's in a name? That which we call a rose/by any other name would smell as sweet”

Form and organization

The textual forms and organization affect the logos, pathos and ethos of a text. All writers adopt a form and organization that suits the purpose of their writing. For example, an official letter varies in form and organization from an unofficial letter. This is because the targeted reader might be too busy to read the entire letter. Thus, the persuasive and the strong points of the message will be put in a short communication. This should be done in a way that affects the reader (pathos) and establishes the authority (ethos) in the correct manner.

If the target audience has enough time to go through the text, the writer can maximize on writing from the least to the most crucial points. This will have a lasting effect on the reader as one is likely to easily remember the points that were read last.

Use of rhetoric in social acts and values

The rhetorical position comprises of three aspects when used in social acts. These are exigence, an audience and a set of constraints. Exigence refers to the predicament that is usually a deficiency or an obstacle. It is usually urgent and waits to be completed or handled. The audiences are the objects ht are constrained by the decision and actions that arise in the course of a discourse. The set of constraints comprises of persons, vents, objects as well as relations that form a section of situation. It is worth pointing out that the set of constraints have the power to restrain a decision in a bid to modify the constraint.

Horner, Min-Zhan, and Paul argued that writers aim at achieving specific interests that represent their set values and identities. This makes the texts to be structured in a meaningful manner in order to highlight the intended social acts. The texts that are written are not bound to a certain situation or context. Therefore, the writers’ texts and discourses keep on changing depending on the prevailing circumstances. The author should be able to convince the audience in a way that unites them. Tindale cited that the quality of the texts could be judged on its efficacy alone but also on the audience on which it is efficacious (65).

Works cited

Horner, Bruce, Min-Zhan Lu, and Paul K. Matsuda. Cross-language Relations in Composition. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2010. Internet resource.

Raimes, Ann and Miller-Cochran, Susan. Keys for writers with Assignment guides. Cengage Learning publishers. 2015. Print.

Tindale, Christopher. The Philosophy of Argument and Audience Reception. Cambridge University Press. 2015. Print.