Rhetorical Style

Question 1

Rhetorical style

Answer 1

• That which is distinctive about the language of a rhetorical act
• The way the speaker uses language (word choice, sentence construction, and figurative devices)

Question 2

Classical Perspectives on Style: Crassus

Answer 2

• Believed that style was akin to natural talent (you were born with it) and related to the body as a whole
• Tongue-tied, sound/ pitch of voice, social status etc. are important factors

Question 3

Classical Perspectives on Style: Sophists

Answer 3

• Earliest thinkers in rhetoric
• Group of traveling teachers of rhetoric in Greece
• Believed rhetoric was only available to few
• Believed rhetoric can be learned, is about hard work
• Challenged elitism of Crassus

Question 4

Classical Perspectives on Style: Demosthenes

Answer 4

• Sophist
• Born without no natural ability as an orator
• Made living as professional speech writer and lawyer
• Strange style: long sentences and formal arguments
• Speech impediment as a child
• Spoke with rocks in his mouth to practice
• Believed delivery is important
• Had powerful intellect
• Reluctant to speak extemporaneously (impromptu)

Question 5

Language Strategies: description

Answer 5

providing detail that makes a character come alive before your eyes

Question 6

Language Strategies: repetition

Answer 6

strategic repeating of words and phrases- used to build power, momentum, and emphasis

Question 7

Language Strategies: metaphor

Answer 7

comparison between seemingly unlike things

Question 8

Language Strategies: personification

Answer 8

giving humanlike characteristics to an abstract concept, object, or non-human thing

Question 9

Language Strategies: abstraction

Answer 9

ambiguity, strategically leaving details out

Question 10

Language Strategies: labeling

Answer 10

• Placing a label on a person or thing in order to change your relationship to it
• Can be evaluative or descriptive

Question 11

Language Strategies: allusion

Answer 11

• A reference to an audience with shared cultural knowledge

- Used to build relationship with historical events etc.

Question 12

Language Strategies: synecdoche

Answer 12

• Using the part to describe the whole

- Ex: ‘Get behind the wheel.’

Question 13

Language Strategies: paradox

Answer 13

• Statement that seems absurd and untrue on the surface but is full of meaning
• Ex: We are born with a foot in the grave.
• Or a statement or proposition, despite sounding reasoning from acceptable premises, leads to a conclusion that seems senseless, logically an unacceptable, or self-contradictory

Question 14

Language Strategies: oxymoron

Answer 14

seemingly contradictory statement in 2 words

- ‘thundering silence’

Question 15

Sound Devices: alliteration

Answer 15

occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words

Question 16

Sound Devices: assonance

Answer 16

repetition of vowel sounds in the middle of a word

Question 17

Sound Devices: onomatopoeia

Answer 17

imitate sound expressed

Question 18

Sound Devices: consonance

Answer 18

repetition of consonant clusters at the beginning or end of words

Question 19

Rhetorical Style: Analysis (Tone)

Answer 19

atitude toward audience and topic

Question 20

Rhetorical Style: Analysis (Diction)

Answer 20

• Specific words used

- Level of formality of language

Question 21

Rhetorical Style: (Texture)

Answer 21

• The way the speaker uses sound value to effectively move the audience
• How stylistic elements are deployed