Aristotle was a tower of knowledge, and among his teachings was rhetoric. Aristotelian rhetoric is the background of many rhetoric teachings. In his teachings about persuasion, Aristotle states that a speech has three elements:
The speaker.
The listener.
The subject of the speech.
He bases his argument that technical persuasion can only be affected by the speaker's character, the emotional state of the listener, and the argument (logic). The three must amalgamate for one to achieve a perceivable conviction in another. Persuasion is critical today, just as it was in the years of Aristotle, for its use in education, business, politics, leadership, among other forums. This synthesis will discuss the three essential elements of rhetoric and relate them to advertising.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Rhetoric and Advertising
Ethos, pathos, and logos are the essential elements of rhetoric. While back in the times of Aristotle, the speech was the primary vehicle of choice in convincing others, today, advertising uses speech, sound, and imagery to convince. Metaphors and repetitions of elements of speech, images, and sounds helm make impressions long-lasting. Advertisements still have a basic structure that originates from Aristotle's rhetoric.
Ethos, as the first element of rhetoric, represents the credentials of the speaker. The question in an audience is whether to trust an individual before they even begin to convince or speak. According to (Rapp), a speaker has to display practical intelligence, a virtuous character, and goodwill. No matter how right a solution is, to effectively sell it, a person's speech must have all three incorporated. Without goodwill, a display of practical intelligence could be feared and avoided at best. It is not necessary that a speaker possesses the traits, but rather, he displays them in his speech to sway his audience's rationality.
Today, advertisements are pegged on ethos. Sometimes a product needs to be credible and therefore relies on the validation of a celebrity figure. A personality who is already successful in the eyes of the public, such as an athlete, a CEO, or a successful pop star singer. The audience then believes in the credibility of the advertisement and will more likely buy such a product.
Pathos, on the other hand, has to do with the emotions of the audience. Aristotle believes that convincing a person in a sad emotional state is not the same as convincing a jovial person (Rapp). A speaker is responsible for arousing emotions in his audience that will act as fertile grounds for convincing to occur. By defining emotions to the primitive level, for example, anger is desire, accompanied by pain.
Stories evoke emotion in an audience; thus, the most relatable stories are the best in convincing another person or audience. Advertisements tend to tell relatable stories when selling a product. Examples are stories of frustration, anger, and even love (Gallo, 2019). These are then used to bind to the selling point of a product. Advertisements today have sound and music in them that bring about or trigger a certain emotional state in the targeted audience. Emotional images such as seductive images and cheerful, optimistic music make the audience happy with a product offering and are thus more likely to accept it (Vu, 2017).
Logos is logic. Every argument has to have logic; otherwise, it is invalid. A speaker demonstrates that something is what it is or that something is true and should be believed. Aristotle defines logic as either induction or deduction. Induction is described as the proceeding from one particular to the universal, and a deduction is an argument that has certain assumptions that are already known to be true (Rapp). Induction is like an example, which is followed by similar examples or, as Aristotle states, come from a similar genus. The deductive argument is the enthymeme which is a word for the burden of proof in an argument.
The logos in advertisements is the "how" factor of a product. If one sells a money-making idea to an audience, the logos is how much and how the money will be made (Gallo, 2019). At this point, supporting data and facts are necessary to convince an audience. A pitch followed by a clear statement of steps will convince the mind of an audience.
A logical arrangement of figures, events, and the most prominent qualities drive the consumer in the advertisement's direction (Vu, 2017). An example is a bikini advertisement that uses images of seductive models will convince an audience they will be in the same state of happiness and thus more likely to consume the product.
Conclusion
It is fascinating that the ideas born over 2000 years ago are still relevant and adapted today. It could imply that despite the evolution of technology and intelligence, human beings are still convinced in a certain fundamental way that is always the same. Aristotle saw a lot of value in it and therefore wanted everyone to have knowledge of rhetoric. Rhetoric was then hidden from the masses for its power, and therefore, Aristotle's acts were perceived as a threat by the political class (Gallo, 2019).
References
Gallo, C. (2019). The art of persuasion hasn't changed in 2000 years. Harvard Business Review .
Rapp, Christof, "Aristotle's Rhetoric," The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2010 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.) https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2010/entries/aristotle-rhetoric
Vu, D. (2017). Rhetoric in advertising. VNU Journal of Science: Policy and Management Studies , 33 (2).
