[This can be used as a handout for students; you can find a Google Doc version here. You may choose to introduce the following set of questions early on to help students learn the rhetorical situation and rhetorical analysis, but these questions can be returned to throughout the course.]

Understanding and applying rhetorical analysis can help writers design effective texts. When we do rhetorical analysis, we take context into consideration and note the strategies used to create a text with its goals in mind.

Before beginning your rhetorical analysis, you should read (or watch!) a text at least twice. Make sure you have a strong understanding of the content of the message and be prepared to support your answers to the following questions with specific textual moments.

Question #1: What is the content of the message?

• Can you summarize the main idea?
• Describe the principal lines of reasoning or kinds of arguments used (e.g., definition, cause and effect, compare and contrast, testimony, narrative, statistical)? How do the types of reasoning used affect the audience? Are you persuaded?
• What appeals does the author use?
  • Pathos: appeal to emotion. Does the author use examples or language that is designed to connect with or incite feelings of compassion, fear, anger, desire, empathy, etc. in the audience?
  • Logos: appeal to logic. Does the author make use of facts and figures, the testimony of witnesses or experts, or some other logic-based argument?
  • Ethos: appeal to author’s credibility. Is the author someone who knows their stuff? Does he or she associate with other experts or authorities on the subject? Does the author have authority in their own right? How do they turn this to their advantage?

Question #2: What is the context?

• Is the writer or creator part of a larger debate, discussion, or controversy that is already taking place? What do you need to know to understand the message?
• Where does this piece come from? Was it in a magazine or journal? On the Web? What kind of magazine or website? How does that affect your reading?
• How is this information communicated? Is this information stated directly or implied? Why might the author have done that? How does this information affect your understanding of the text?
• What is at stake? For the writer? For you? For society or a group?

Question #3: Who is the Author/Speaker?

• What do you know about the writer’s background, credibility, knowledge of the topic, beliefs, and social allegiances?
• Has the writer produced other texts? How do these contribute to your understanding of the current project?

Question #4: What is their intention in speaking?

• What is the author’s purpose? Who do they hope to persuade? What do they hope to accomplish? Is there a sense of urgency involved?
• To attack, defend, or collaborate?
• To exhort, encourage, or dissuade from certain action(s)?
• To praise or blame?
• To teach, inform, delight or persuade?
• What is the author’s tone—angry, friendly, bitter, passionate, annoyed, etc.? How does the tone fit the author’s purpose?

Question #5: Who is the author’s intended audience?

• Who is the primary audience? Are there secondary audiences?
• What values does the intended audience hold, and how is the author appealing to or challenging these values?
• What language and stylistic choices does the writer make in order to appeal to this audience? For example, do they use specialized language or vernacular expressions?
• What kind of relationship does the author try and establish with the audience? What assumptions are made about this audience?
• How does the author manage strong opinions (if any) without alienating the audience? How might people who agree with the author interpret that tone? What about people who disagree?

Question #6: What form does the text take?

• What form does the message take? How does the form affect the content of the message?
• What are the generic features of the form being used? What else do you notice?
• How does the author use language? Is the language casual or formal? Does the author use “big words” or everyday language? Why?
• Are there anecdotes? Quotes or dialogue? Personal narrative? Where and why are these things used?

Based on your answers to all of these questions, it is up to you to determine whether or not the text you are analyzing is rhetorically effective. In order for something to be rhetorically effective, it should be capable of a) persuading its intended audience and b) be an appropriate response to the rhetorical situation at hand.

Adapted from an assignment designed by Jacqueline Preston; “Basic Questions for Rhetorical Analysis,” on Silva Rhetoric and The Call to Write, by John Trimbur; and a handout by Becca Tarsa.