Blog Post #8: Rhetorical Terms

In writing there are many tools we can use to grab our audiences. We refer to these tools with many terms that include but are not limited to narrative, gazes, point-by-point versus subject-by-subject formats, the objective and subjective views, and comparison and contrast.

A narrative is simply a story of an event of experience whether fictional or non-fictional. It allows the audience to be brought into the rhetor's view and mindset in an attempt to have the reader understand the rhetor's point of view throughout the article.

Gazes consist of 3 subsections which include familial, national, and consumeral gazes. A familial gaze is something that can trigger thoughts of a specific small group or person. While a familial gaze targets a more intimate group a national gaze is more well known for example the Purple Heart award in the military or the American flag which reminds many people of a central idea or thing. A consumeral gaze on the other hand is aimed to remind people of a specific thing in an attempt to have them purchase a product or a service.

The point-by-point and subject-by-subject formats are used in a comparison and contrast of two things. In the event of a point by point you would have two very similar things that you can take multiple similar points or arguments and compare each one at a time to see what may be better, correct, etc. Subject-by-subject takes two things that could be similar or very different and describes all points or arguments for one subject and compares the two subjects to each other once all the points or arguments are revealed.

While describing a scene there are two portions the first is the objective which is everything you can see without any background information about the actual action or experience taking place. The second portion is the subjective which brings in prior knowledge of the scene that someone picking up a picture or seeing a video could not infer without any assistance.

Finally, the last tool we will talk about is the comparison and contrast. The comparison takes two things and finds the similarities in them. While, the contrast takes the two things and finds how they differ and by how much they actually do differ.