The Power of Rhetoric and the Art of Persuasion

Understanding the Art of Rhetoric

Rhetoric is the art of persuasion: the attempt to influence another with words. We usually think of rhetoric in terms of formal oratory—the public speeches you see politicians make on TV or the ones CEOs make at shareholders' meetings—but that is only one part.

• Rhetoric helps to push our ideas.
• Rhetoric serves to get things.
• Rhetoric reaches its tentacles into every corner of daily life.
• Rhetoric is what makes some arguments prosper and others fail.

Rhetoric is language at play. It is what persuades and pleases, inspires and tricks, thrills and misdirects. It is made of:

• Words and linked pairs.
• Groups of three and repeated phrases.
• Clear truths and vital declarations.
• Half-truths, fine-sounding meaninglessness, fake oppositions, and shaky inferences.

Why Some Arguments Prosper While Others Fail

During fifteen centuries, rhetoric was at the center of Western education. Today, it is a limited area of study—often viewed as just an academic subject used by speechwriters, professional speakers, and advertising professionals. Although we use it more now at the beginning of the 21st century, it is right there beneath the surface.

Understanding rhetoric makes us better able to appreciate its wonders, convince anyone, and sell anything. We do not use language only to pass on information to no purpose; we exchange information because it does something for us. We use language to impress.

Our commerce, politics, and cultural and social lives are all rhetorical to an extraordinary extent. The advertising industry, public relations, and marketing use a highly figural language. The Internet takes the whole process a step further. Persuasive communication is no longer the preserve of professionals, politicians, broadcasters of radio or TV, or advertising people. Thanks to the reach of new technologies, we live in the most argumentative age of history.

Even if it is everywhere around us, we often do not see it. But it reaches all venues of our daily life:

• Language happens because human beings are desiring machines.
• What links desire and language is rhetoric.
• Rhetoric, in its basic sense, is one person trying to persuade another.
• You can change the lives of people or transform the future of a brand.