Rhetorical Analysis

Small writing groups are one of the most valuable structures I’ve built into my AP Language class. They’re peer feedback, but more formalized and consistent than the typical “trade papers with a neighbor” version. I first experienced something like this in a college creative writing workshop, and the relationships within that small, consistent group made […]

After my students have worked through all five pieces of rhetorical situation, most recently exigence, I move into their first rhetorical analysis of a full text: an excerpt from Malala Yousafzai’s speech to the United Nations, the one that closes with “one book, one pen, one child can change the world.” It’s worth checking whether

Exigence is the last part of rhetorical situation I introduce to students, after speaker and purpose and audience and context. The formal definition is the specific issue, event, or need that directly prompts a speaker to feel the need to speak. Exigence is time sensitive; it captures why now, specifically, is the moment for this

After speaker and purpose, the next two parts of rhetorical situation I teach are audience and context. For audience, I make sure students understand it’s not just who the speaker is addressing, it’s what about them the speaker is trying to connect with: their beliefs, their needs, their backgrounds, or maybe some preconceived idea the

When I start rhetorical situation with my AP Language students, I begin with two of the five SPACECAT elements: speaker and purpose. I hand out a notes packet that’s already partially filled in, and I project the same slides so we can fill in the rest together as a class. Speaker is usually pretty intuitive

How I use a box of cereal to teach rhetorical analysis on day one of AP Lang, before students even know what the term means.