Richard Anson was asked to read an outside selection critically and then write a brief rhetorical analysis to identify the reading’s audience and its writer’s logical, emotional, and ethical appeals to that audience. Because his class was analyzing the 2012 presidential election campaign, Anson found an essay with a historical perspective on the involvement of young adults in current events.
Richard Anson Student Rhetorical Analysis
Young Americans and Media News
1
In a world where young adults may be more interested in American Idol than in who is running for president, it is critical to take a step back and look at the factors involved prior to the presidential elections of 2008 and 2012. Stephen Earl Bennett has done just that in “Young Americans’ Indifference to Media Coverage of Public Affairs,” an essay that appeared in PS: Political Science & Politics, a journal that focuses on contemporary politics and the teaching thereof. Being featured in this journal, as well as being a Fellow of the Center for the Study of Democratic Citizenship at the University of Cincinnati, easily establishes Bennett’s trustworthy character or ethos.
2
Given where the article was published, it is safe to say that he is trying to reach an audience of professors in the field of political science and possibly policy makers as well. With this assumption, however, Bennett makes an error. His essay focuses solely on facts and numbers and not at all on the audience’s emotions. A reader would be hard-pressed to find any appeals to emotion (pathos) in his essay at all and could liken it to an instruction manual on American youth’s indifference to current events. Professors may be more likely to respond to the logical appeal (logos) of facts and numbers than some other readers, but they are still human, and few humans enjoy reading instruction manuals for fun. For example, Bennett starts off with “Although young Americans are normally less engaged in politics than their elders (Converse with Niemi 1971), today’s youth are more withdrawn from public affairs than earlier birth cohorts were when they were young (Bennett 1997)” (Bennett 1). In this first sentence alone, Bennett is citing from two other sources, one of which happens to be his own. There is nothing wrong with jumping right in, but this is a little over the top and very dry for an introduction.
3
The idea that more people vote for American Idol than their own president in the leading democratic nation in the world is just pathetic. There’s no other way to describe it. On this point, Bennett agrees with other readings discussed in class. He also agrees that current affairs and news need to be more widely taught in schools across the nation and that something needs to be done to attract American youth to the news. The Bennett article was published in 1998, and maybe the interest of young voters in the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections shows that Americans have started listening.
Works Cited
Bennett, Stephen Earl. “Young Americans’ Indifference to Media Coverage of Public Affairs.” PS: Political Science & Politics 31.3 (1998): 535–41. General OneFile. Web. 15 Nov. 2012.
Questions to Start You Thinking
Meaning
Writing Strategies