Rhetorical analysis on a film (documentary) of your choice. Cannot have your opinion in it. Only the audiences view feelings, questions sounds connections etc. Cannot use first person.

WHAT IS IN A RHETORICAL ANALYSIS PAPER?

A rhetorical (critical) analysis is an essay that evaluates another piece of writing, speech, film, etc. When you evaluate, you are analyzing how well the components of an argument work together to persuade or move and audience. How well or how poorly did the writer/speaker communicate his/her point(s)?

    • Think about the rhetorical triangle:
        • What is the purpose of the argument?
        • Who is making the argument – not just the creator, but also sources used?
        • Identify the intended audience and critically think about how the argument is appealing to this audience. 
    • What rhetorical appeals were used to appeal to the audience?
        • Assess the strengths and/or the weaknesses (fallacies) of the appeals.
    • You should NOT see yourself as part of the audience. 
        • DO NOT talk about the topic itself and your opinion about it!
        • You should stand apart as an observer analyzing what the author/speaker is doing in order to affect the minds of the audience.
        • You should NOT be using first person in any part of this paper. You are an objective observer. 

 

THE PAPER TOPIC 

    • You will be analyzing the rhetorical devices used in a documentary. 
        • You get to pick the documentary of your choice! It must be a full length documentary (usually they run close to an hour or two in length), NOT an episode of a show, mini-series, etc
        • Here is a website that defines a documentary really well. If you don’t have a documentary in mind, you can do a Google search for recent, great, or popular documentaries. Some may be available through Netflix, Hulu, or even YouTube.

 

PAPER ORGANIZATION

Introduction
  • State the name of the film that you’re analyzing and give a little bit of information concerning what it was about.
  • Inform your readers of the rhetorical situation:
      • Who created the documentary, who starred in it, etc. 
      • Identify purpose – what is the intended outcome of this documentary? Usually it’s a change in behavior from the intended audience. 
      • Who is the intended audience?
  • The THESIS (your claim) 
      • This is a one sentencestatement where you claim whether or not the documentary successful with the use of its rhetorical appeals to reach the purpose? 
Body Paragraphs
  • The body paragraphs are where you go into detail with analysis and prove your claim. 
  • You should be following the progression of the documentary.
      • Start from the beginning and work your way through the changing rhetorical appeals used.
      • The last paragraph of your paper should be the final rhetorical appeal used. 
      • DO NOT organize your paper based on rhetorical strategies!
  • The subject of the documentary, what the people used in it are feeling, what your opinions are on the subject of the documentary are irrelevant. 
  • The paper should be focused on the audience and how they are being affected by the rhetorical devices being used to persuade them.
      • If you are analyzing pathos, you should be analyzing the emotional impact the pathos appeal is having on the audience and why they are reacting the way they are based on the ethics, morals, and perspective of the intended audience.
      • If you are analyzing ethos, your focus should be on why the intended audience would trust the director, producer, or people presenting. 
      • If you are analyzing logos, you should be justifying why the logic used (numbers, statistics, testimonies, etc.) make sense to the intended audience. 
  • You must use information from the film as support for your claim.
      • Put this information in quotes and properly cite it. You have a work cited page (the documentary is your only source), so you should have in-text citations where necessary.
Conclusion

Simply end the paper by analyzing the writer’s final rhetorical appeal. Analyze how the argument comes to a conclusion. What does the writer/speaker leave his/her audience hanging with?

 

PAPER REQUIREMENTS

    • This paper should be 3-5 pages, MLA formatted, and free of errors.
    • Only use third person in your paper. 
    • Make sure you do the self-review, peer review, utilize the embedded online tutor, Grammarly, and/or make an appointment with me to do an instructor review through ZOOM because the final draft does not have re-submissions. 
    • There should be a works cited page and in-text citations from the source(s) listed on the works cited page. In the case of this paper, there is only ONE source – the documentary.
      • If you do not have in-text citations, your paper will be considered plagiarized.  
      • Look at Purdue OWL for the differences in formatting expectations for the documentary. 

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