Discuss Aristotelian analysis and metaphor analysis.

The most basic definition of rhetoric was given by Aristotle. Aristotle wrote: “Rhetoric is the art of persuasion.” By studying rhetoric, we learn how to use rhetorical strategies to convince others. Knowing how to persuade others will be important in your future careers, even if your careers have nothing to do with politics. Rhetoric is a constructive force in society because we must convince and motivate each other to work toward common goals. We have also seen, however, that rhetoric has a dark side. Rhetoric can be used for good or evil. It can be used to motivate us toward our best impulses, or it can manipulate our basest instincts. We hope that you do not choose to use the dark side of rhetoric. Instead, we hope that being aware of rhetoric will help immunize you to its insidious intents. This is particularly important in a democracy. Knowing when you are being unfairly manipulated makes you a more informed and critical citizen. By looking closely, and often, at how political ads work, we free ourselves from their persuasive sway and are better able to consider issues dispassionately. In our final assignment, we are going to use all the rhetorical analysis skills we have acquired. To start, choose any political ad. Below are links to two good archives (or you may find the ad anywhere on the internet as long as you can provide a link): • Stanford University Communications Lab: Political Campaigns • The Living Room Candidate: Presidential Campaign Commercials 1952-2016 Your task is to write a rhetorical analysis of a political advertisement. In our class, we covered two types of rhetorical analysis: Aristotelian analysis and metaphor analysis.