This week I found it very interesting to discuss the different parts of an argument and how they, when put together successfully, can be persuasive for the author. I had never looked at an argument this way and thought about how a persuasive argument is persuasive because of each individual part, not just the idea on its own. Aristotle’s “Canon’s of Rhetoric” work together to produce a successful argument. The canon I believe is most important is arrangement. An argument cannot be persuasive if it is scattered and poorly ordered. The organization of an argument is essential to whether or not it is successful in persuading the audience to agree with the author’s argument.
Whenever I used to think of an argument, I usually thought of a debate between two people, but Aristotle’s “Canon’s of Rhetoric” applies to any kind of argument, including visuals. While discussing the different arrangements of an argument I thought of all of the ads I had seen that used these methods to argue their products. While I had noticed different arrangements in ads, I didn’t understand just how imperative they were to the author’s argument. So many different companies advertise their products using the “cause and effect” or “problem and solution” methods. Rhetoric has been all around me my whole life but so far this course and this lesson in particular have helped me to see how the images work to argue the author’s perspective.
I also found the Toulmin model helpful because it simplified the argument into three simple parts. I believe it will be helpful in writing my visual rhetorical analysis. I never really thought about the idea that grounds and claims were only held together by an assumption, not actual fact. This underlying assumption is also somewhat confusing because it may be so obvious that we don’t even think about it at all.
Whenever I used to think of an argument, I usually thought of a debate between two people, but Aristotle’s “Canon’s of Rhetoric” applies to any kind of argument, including visuals. While discussing the different arrangements of an argument I thought of all of the ads I had seen that used these methods to argue their products. While I had noticed different arrangements in ads, I didn’t understand just how imperative they were to the author’s argument. So many different companies advertise their products using the “cause and effect” or “problem and solution” methods. Rhetoric has been all around me my whole life but so far this course and this lesson in particular have helped me to see how the images work to argue the author’s perspective.
I also found the Toulmin model helpful because it simplified the argument into three simple parts. I believe it will be helpful in writing my visual rhetorical analysis. I never really thought about the idea that grounds and claims were only held together by an assumption, not actual fact. This underlying assumption is also somewhat confusing because it may be so obvious that we don’t even think about it at all.