I grew up in Jamaica, where weed though illegal is very
prevalent and English is strictly for the upper class people. The others bask in
the nation’s dialect. My parents decided to come to America to provide a better
opportunity for us. When I first came here, my English was terrible but as time
went by I slowly assimilated. I struggled with writing throughout middle school
and the very beginning of high school. In 10th grade, my teacher
decided to stay after school to help me with my writing, as a result, I received
higher grades on my English papers. I also think this is one of the reasons that
my English ACT score was the highest. Because of this I placed into English
1020. I read about this class and the professor on ratemyprofessor.com, and I
thought that this class would require some effort but not much.
At the beginning of the semester when I first encountered
rhetoric, I thought it was a boring way to portray one’s ideas. This was a
different approach from the writing in high school. However, as time went by and
we developed our rhetorical tools, I became familiar with it and started to feel
comfortable. In fact, I will definitely keep writing using rhetoric because it
is a sufficient way to disperse one’s ideas because it serves as a guiding tool.
It allowed me to write about issues that I considered pressing and needed
attention. As a result, I was able to express my ideas. Before this class, I did
not know that Wikipedia is just as good a site source as with many other blogs.
The freedom in writing that this class invited was very helpful. The first
projects came off a little rough, but I think that could be attributed to the
fact that I did not quite get the concept of rhetoric. For the following
projects, I sought feedback which proved very helpful. When
time came project 4/5, I decided to write about something I considered a
pressing issue. Illegal immigration to the U.S. is very common in my country,
so I felt the need to shed some light on this area.
The U.S. embassy plays an important role in deciding who gets to
experience the American freedom. I did not get a yes on my first go, it took
three times. I know a lot of people that gave up after their first try. Because
of this I felt that people should see the other side that is often avoided. The
rhetorical tools helped me to develop my writing in this project. I started off
this paper by asking myself why this is important (exigency). My exigency was
that illegal immigrants are put in a worse position when deported. After I
developed an exigency, I came up with a discourse community. I learned that
discourse communities are the people I would like to make a claim to. My
discourse community is made up of people living near the borders of the country,
since illegal immigrants are more prevalent in these parts. Another discourse
community is government officials, particularly Republicans since they seemed
to be the driving force behind deportation. After this I developed a criterion.
This becomes a guide for me to write my body paragraphs. My body paragraphs
supported my claim according to the criterion presented in the introduction.
The thing I liked most about this evaluation is that it gave us an edge to be
creative by allowing us to organize the paper in our own style. It
takes a lot of persuasion to convince people that there is a good side to
illegal immigration, and that it can help the American society. In the past the
U.S. government spent a lot of money and time to filter the immigration system,
but what it did not realize was that families risked everything they had to come
to the U.S. In recent times, President Obama has come up with the idea to grant
amnesty to those who came here illegally. I thought this was a brilliant idea,
so I wrote a proposal about granting amnesty. The approach I used was to
research some claims and expand them. I found some great claims from news
websites, and other blogs. These ideas were interesting, and offered different
perspectives. I presented the proposals then went on to support each claim.
Aristotle, the famous philosopher, often used rhetoric. Perhaps
this is the reason he got so many people to really focus in on what he was
saying. Even a brain dead person can use rhetoric to convince anyone that the
topic being discussed is important and deserves some attention. The art of
rhetoric is developed skill especially important for people with jobs that
require persuasion. In fact, the most common users of this art are lawyers. The
job demands good persuasive skills. According to Sandler, “There is gold to be
mined in Rhetoric, that dusty work of Aristotle’s, along with the speeches of
Demosthenes and the works of their Roman heirs. Although these classical
rhetoricians lived centuries ago, their understanding of what makes a winning
argument is timeless. Their techniques and steadfast belief in the rule of law
are continually instructive and inspiring for modern trial lawyers.” Trial
lawyers are often faced with cases that seem to contradict everything that
society believes, but with the use of rhetoric one can get the audiences support
easily. Some common tools used by these lawyers are ethos, fallacies, and
developing research questions based on the jury audience. However, much like
anything else, rhetoric can be used for good and bad, but that just makes the
art even more interesting.
It is interesting how much need for the art of rhetoric we use
in our daily lives. I learned a lot in English 1020: rhetorical
tools, discourse communities, fallacies, and construction of an effective
thesis. This will definitely help me in my life because I intend to become a
doctor, and just like lawyers, doctors need a persuasive edge.
Works Cited
Sandler, Paul. (Oct 2010). Web. (12/10/11).
<http://www.americanbar.org/newsletter/publications/gp_solo_magazine_home/gp_solo_magazine_index/solo_lawyer_trial_rhetoric_persuasion_argument_artistotle_demosthenes_cicero_quintilian.html
> .
prevalent and English is strictly for the upper class people. The others bask in
the nation’s dialect. My parents decided to come to America to provide a better
opportunity for us. When I first came here, my English was terrible but as time
went by I slowly assimilated. I struggled with writing throughout middle school
and the very beginning of high school. In 10th grade, my teacher
decided to stay after school to help me with my writing, as a result, I received
higher grades on my English papers. I also think this is one of the reasons that
my English ACT score was the highest. Because of this I placed into English
1020. I read about this class and the professor on ratemyprofessor.com, and I
thought that this class would require some effort but not much.
At the beginning of the semester when I first encountered
rhetoric, I thought it was a boring way to portray one’s ideas. This was a
different approach from the writing in high school. However, as time went by and
we developed our rhetorical tools, I became familiar with it and started to feel
comfortable. In fact, I will definitely keep writing using rhetoric because it
is a sufficient way to disperse one’s ideas because it serves as a guiding tool.
It allowed me to write about issues that I considered pressing and needed
attention. As a result, I was able to express my ideas. Before this class, I did
not know that Wikipedia is just as good a site source as with many other blogs.
The freedom in writing that this class invited was very helpful. The first
projects came off a little rough, but I think that could be attributed to the
fact that I did not quite get the concept of rhetoric. For the following
projects, I sought feedback which proved very helpful. When
time came project 4/5, I decided to write about something I considered a
pressing issue. Illegal immigration to the U.S. is very common in my country,
so I felt the need to shed some light on this area.
The U.S. embassy plays an important role in deciding who gets to
experience the American freedom. I did not get a yes on my first go, it took
three times. I know a lot of people that gave up after their first try. Because
of this I felt that people should see the other side that is often avoided. The
rhetorical tools helped me to develop my writing in this project. I started off
this paper by asking myself why this is important (exigency). My exigency was
that illegal immigrants are put in a worse position when deported. After I
developed an exigency, I came up with a discourse community. I learned that
discourse communities are the people I would like to make a claim to. My
discourse community is made up of people living near the borders of the country,
since illegal immigrants are more prevalent in these parts. Another discourse
community is government officials, particularly Republicans since they seemed
to be the driving force behind deportation. After this I developed a criterion.
This becomes a guide for me to write my body paragraphs. My body paragraphs
supported my claim according to the criterion presented in the introduction.
The thing I liked most about this evaluation is that it gave us an edge to be
creative by allowing us to organize the paper in our own style. It
takes a lot of persuasion to convince people that there is a good side to
illegal immigration, and that it can help the American society. In the past the
U.S. government spent a lot of money and time to filter the immigration system,
but what it did not realize was that families risked everything they had to come
to the U.S. In recent times, President Obama has come up with the idea to grant
amnesty to those who came here illegally. I thought this was a brilliant idea,
so I wrote a proposal about granting amnesty. The approach I used was to
research some claims and expand them. I found some great claims from news
websites, and other blogs. These ideas were interesting, and offered different
perspectives. I presented the proposals then went on to support each claim.
Aristotle, the famous philosopher, often used rhetoric. Perhaps
this is the reason he got so many people to really focus in on what he was
saying. Even a brain dead person can use rhetoric to convince anyone that the
topic being discussed is important and deserves some attention. The art of
rhetoric is developed skill especially important for people with jobs that
require persuasion. In fact, the most common users of this art are lawyers. The
job demands good persuasive skills. According to Sandler, “There is gold to be
mined in Rhetoric, that dusty work of Aristotle’s, along with the speeches of
Demosthenes and the works of their Roman heirs. Although these classical
rhetoricians lived centuries ago, their understanding of what makes a winning
argument is timeless. Their techniques and steadfast belief in the rule of law
are continually instructive and inspiring for modern trial lawyers.” Trial
lawyers are often faced with cases that seem to contradict everything that
society believes, but with the use of rhetoric one can get the audiences support
easily. Some common tools used by these lawyers are ethos, fallacies, and
developing research questions based on the jury audience. However, much like
anything else, rhetoric can be used for good and bad, but that just makes the
art even more interesting.
It is interesting how much need for the art of rhetoric we use
in our daily lives. I learned a lot in English 1020: rhetorical
tools, discourse communities, fallacies, and construction of an effective
thesis. This will definitely help me in my life because I intend to become a
doctor, and just like lawyers, doctors need a persuasive edge.
Works Cited
Sandler, Paul. (Oct 2010). Web. (12/10/11).
<http://www.americanbar.org/newsletter/publications/gp_solo_magazine_home/gp_solo_magazine_index/solo_lawyer_trial_rhetoric_persuasion_argument_artistotle_demosthenes_cicero_quintilian.html
> .