The Importance Of Rhetoric In Writing

I have heard of rhetoric before, but, I was never sure of what it was and to this point I am still iffy of what exactly it is. However, after reading Naming What We Know I feel a little more familiar with it. By what I understood rhetoric is the correct use of language in order to communicate across to an audience effectively. It isn’t about what is written, but how it is written. It’s like the example you, Sam, gave us in class about the proper way to let your neighbor know you killed their dog. We cared about what we wrote the information on and what we wrote, because “writing…is always an attempt to address the needs of an audience,” (Roozen 91). In that example our audience was the neighbor and what he needed was to hear that his dog had …show more content…
For example, someone would write in a journal differently then they would write an English paper or a to-do list. This is because not everyone has the same purpose or the same audience. When we write we have to be careful to do so in a way that won’t confuse our audience, thus “writing can require careful framing,” (Dryer 108). One wouldn’t write their personal statement the same way they would write a birthday card to a friend or use the same terms in a scientific research paper as in a text message. We always have to make sure we understand exactly what we are writing and why, so that we can write in a way that is effective.
Rhetoric is not only used in writing but in everyday communication as well. It is used in speech, boy language, commercials, ads, etc. Writing a letter to your neighbor about killing the dog wasn’t the only way to communicate to him what happened. You could also speak to him directly, but even this is part of rhetoric because you have to decide in what way you will tell the neighbor the dog was killed. Will you say it in a careless tone or in regretful tone, will you be smiling or frowning, what words will you use? It all comes down to what is more effective, because that is what rhetoric