VanDyck 1

Mia VanDyck

Professor Gardiakos

ENC 1102

20 January 2023

Reading Response 1

An example of when I have rhetorically read something is when I’m watching tv and I

get a commercial promoting a product trying to persuade me to buy it. Specifically, car

commercials use rhetoric by appealing to ethos, pathos, and logos. One way car commercials use

logos is when they show the low prices or when they have real customer testimonials. An

example of this is when Subaru brings in customers to tell consumers how amazing their cars

are. Subaru does this in order to persuade their viewers with intellectual knowledge. Subaru also

appeals to pathos. In some of their advertisements they show car crashes of young teenagers,

followed by a scene of worried parents. The parents are then quickly relieved when they

remember their kid drives a Subaru. This tells the audience their cars are safe and as a parent you

don’t need to be scared for your child if they drive a Subaru. Another example of pathos is used

when Volvo shows the fun adventures the viewer could have if they bought their car, they even

use the slogan “Adventure that knows no limits”. Finally, ethos, many car companies use

celebrity endorsements to make the car seem cooler, more relevant, and sometimes to build trust

with the viewer. Nissan does this when they hired Brie Larson to promote their car, Hyundai

used Tom Holland, and Dodge used Vin Diesel. Companies also use ethos when showing off

awards they have won, like when Jaguar added that they won the 2017 world car of the year

award at the end of their advertisement.

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An example of a research community would be a graphic design career with the intent to

creating advertisements that promotes a product. They would have to conduct research about

who their target audience is and how to appeal to them and what techniques work the best,

despite possible constraints. They could do this by creating focus groups or conducting surveys.

An example could be if someone was trying to create an Instagram advertisement for maternity

clothes, their target audience would be pregnant women. They could appeal to them by

showcasing how comfortable but stylish their product is all while making it standout enough to

attract people even though they are limited to an Instagram post. The graphic designers would

probably look at viewership/demographics periodically and adjust whether they are getting the

right viewers or enough viewers so the ad can stay on its intended track. To join this discourse

community, you would need to be able to read people, understand what appeals to them, and

have the artistic capabilities like knowledge of color theory and the principle and elements of

design and how to apply them to your advertisement. Knowing these techniques will allow you

to control the viewer’s eyes, as to where they would look first, how they would read it, and how

effective your ad is in catching the audience’s eye.

Research communities use rhetoric when collecting research, they would want to make

sure their research is coming from a creditable source, its discussed in “Creating, Using, and

Sharing Information in Research Communities” (Hemstrom and Anders, 190) that research

communities have experts that share information that they think is reliable. Research changes our

understanding about a topic by allowing the researchers to make new insights and be as

knowledgeable as possible. An example of this is shown when Cassie decides to make a podcast

in order to be successful, she needed to do research, so she knew what she was getting into. This

research included figuring out what materials to use, what audiences she’s trying to reach and
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how (Hemstrom and Anders, 192). I think people want to join research communities to become

more knowledgeable on subjects that they are interested in and/or to contribute knowledge they

already have.
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Work Cited

Carroll, Laura Bolin. “Backpacks vs. Briefcases: Steps Towards Rhetorical Analysis.” Writing

spaces, vol. 1, pp. 45-48.

Anders, Kathy and Cassie Hemstrom. “Creating, Using, and Sharing Information in Research

Communities.” Writing Spaces, vol. 4, no. 11, pp.184-198.