English 2 Honors ethos, pathos and logos definitions

organizational reasons

(claim support) relate to any associations with organizations or groups of people

moral reasons

(claim support) relate to morality, or what is considered right or wrong

religious / historical reasons

(claim support) relate to religious or historical people, places, things or events

universal theme

a message that can be found throughout the literature of all time periods

counterpoint

a point that refutes or challenges what someone is trying to argue, used in logos

anecdote

a story from one's own personal experience

repetition

a technique in which a sound, word, phrase or line is repeated for emphasis or unity. repetition often helps to reinforce meaning and create an appealing rhythm. this term includes specific devices associated with both prose and poetry, such as alliteration and parallelism

author's point of view / author's perspective

a unique combination of ideas, values, feelings and beliefs that influences the way the writer looks at a topic (often revealed through tone)

denotation

a word's literal / dictionary meaning

author's purpose

a writer usually writes for one or more of these purposes; to express thoughts or feelings, to inform or explain, to persuade or to entertain. more specific purposes can be identified within these general categories

counterclaim / counterargument

an argument made to answer an opposing argument

connotation

an attitude or feeling associated with a word, in contrast to a word's denotation

allusion

an indirect reference to a famous person, place, event or literary work

logos

appeal to logic, means to convince an audience by the use of logic or reason. to use this would be to cite facts and statistics, historical and literal analogies and citing certain authorities on a subject. greek word for 'word', though the true definition can be most closely described as 'the word or that by which the inward thought is expressed', the word 'logic' is derived from this. appealing to logic. a writer or speaker is drawing on this when they use 'if...then' statements to attempt to make a logical argument, to use statistics in their writing, to use anecdotes to back up their points, if they use examples from history, current events or personal anecdotes, posit logical, hard-to-refute statements, use concessions to address questions and counterpoints, cite learned people, authoritative studies or proven statistics or use rhetorical questions to develop a point.

emotional appeals

can also be referred to as pathos, messages designed to persuade an audience by creating strong feelings, rather than by providing facts and evidence. writers often use tone, imagery and figurative language to make these types of this term - fear, pity and vanity

pathos

emotional appeal, means to persuade an audience by appealing to their emotions. authors use this to invoke sympathy from an audience; to make the audience feel what the author wants them to feel. a common use of this would be to draw pity from an audience, another use of this would be to inspire anger from an audience, perhaps in order to prompt action. greek word for both 'suffering' and 'experience'. the words 'empathy' and 'pathetic' are derived from this. can also be referred to as emotional appeals. appealing to emotions. a writer or speaker is drawing on this when they paint an emotionally charged image, use 'emotive' words, imply that you should feel a certain way or depict consequences that could result in the reaction of the puppy-dog face or guilt. subcategories of this include fear, pity and vanity

ethos

ethical appeal, means to convince an audience of the author's credibility or character (morality). an author would use this to show to his audience that he is a credible source and is worth listening to, greek word for 'character'. the word 'ethic' is derived from this word. someone's character, credibility or identity. a writer is establishing this when they list their credentials, talk about their experiences, talk about their behavior or appeal to a person's sense of identity. has two more specific types; explicit and implicit

implicit ethos

ethos that the writer or speaker does not directly talk about, ex. if a doctor wears a white coat, they don't say to their patients, "let me clarify, this white coat means I'm a doctor."

explicit ethos

ethos that the writer or speaker verbally tells you of, ex. credentials listed, experiences mentioned

mood

intended to shape the reader's emotional response

appeal to vanity

subcategory of pathos, relies on people's desire to feel good about themselves

appeal to pity

subcategory of pathos, takes advantage of people's sympathy and compassion for others

appeal to fear

subcategory of pathos, taps into people's fear of losing their safety or security

rhetorical strategy / strategies / devices

techniques writers use to enhance their arguments and communicate more effectively, these can include analogy, parallelism, rhetorical questions and repetition

rhetoric

the art of using language to persuade

tone

the attitude a writer takes toward a subject, unlike mood, reflects the feelings of the writer, the writer communicates tone through choice of words and details

text structure

the manner in which information is organized and presented in a text, common text structures include chronological, sequence, cause and effect, problem and solution and compare and contrast

parallel structure / parallelism

the use of similar grammatical constructions to express ideas that are related or equal in importance

claim / author's position

the writer's position on an issue or problem

concession

when a writer acknowledges a counterpoint or question that their audience has in order to address that counterpoint, used in logos