Descriptive Analysis/ Historical-Contextual Analysis/ Situational Analysis
Seven elements of descriptive analyis
1. Purpose (argumentative conclusions) 2. Persona (refers to role/s a rhetor takes on for strategic purposes and contributes to the rhetor's ethos or credibility) 3. Audience (what is actual audience is composed of?) 4. Tone (suggests the rhetor's attitude toward the audience and subject matter) 5. Structure (refers to the form of discourse and the method by which it unfolds) 6. Supporting materials (i.e. explanations, illustrations, statistics, etc.) 7. Other Strategies
Types of other strategies in descriptive analysis
1. Refutation (answering the arguments of opponents) 2. Fortiori argument (strategy or arguing that is something is true in one particular and unlikely case then its much more likely to be true in other cases) 3. Labeling or relabeling 4. Repetition of key phrase 5. Vivid depicition or desciption 6. Allusions to culturally familiar materials such as television programs, to prompt the audience to fill in details or to evoke powerful associations 7. Enthymemes (arguments constructed so that listeners partcipate in forming conclusion by providing from their own experience and memory additional evidence)
Stages of historical-contextual analysis
1. Rhetor/author 2. Audience (at this stage critics are concerned with discovering as much information as possible about the audience) 3. Competing persuasive forces (time to discover what groups are in conflict and in association with the rhetor's position) 4. Supporting materials (appropriate time for critics to test the validity, adequacy and credibility of the supporting evidence)
Descriptive analysis
First stage of of rhetorical criticism; entirely intrinsic and organic; intended to focus attention on the rhetorical act itself
Elements of situational analysis
Exigence (the situation) Audience (public(s) are fluid) Constraints (is this a fitting response?)
Historical-Contextual analysis
Second stage of rhetorical criticism; examines elements extrinsic to the discourse (the context and occasion)
