analysis of speech definition

Speech Analysis

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Doroteo T. Toledano 3 ,
Daniel Ramos 3 ,
Javier Gonzalez-Dominguez 3 &
Joaquín González-Rodríguez 3

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Speech parametrization

The analysis of speech signals can be defined as the process of extracting relevant information from the speech signal (i.e., from a recording). This process is mainly based on the speech production mechanism, whose study involves multiple disciplines from linguistics and articulatory phonetics to signal processing and source coding. In this article, a short overview is given about how the speech signal is produced and typical models of the speech production system, focusing on the different sources of individuality that will be present in the final uttered speech. In this way, the speaker who produced the speech with those individual features is then recognizable both for humans and for machines.

Although speech production is felt by humans as a very natural and simple mechanism, it is a very complex process that involves the coordinated participation of several physiological structures that evolution has developed over the years. For a...

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Huang, X., Acero, A., Hon, H.W.: Spoken Language Processing. Prentice Hall PTR, Upper Saddle River, NJ (2001)

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Rabiner, L., Schafer, R.: Digital Processing of Speech Signals. Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ (1978)

Deller, J., Hansen, J., Proakis, J.: Discrete-Time Processing of Speech Signals, 2nd edn. Wiley, New York (1999)

Chu, W.C.: Speech Coding Algorithms. Foundation and Evolution of Standardized Coders. Wiley, New York (2003)

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Oppenheim, A., Schafer, R., Buck, J.: Discrete-Time Signal Processing. 2nd ed. Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ (1999)

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ATVS – Biometric Recognition Group. Escuela Politecnica Superior, Universidad Autonoma de Madrid, , Spain

Doroteo T. Toledano, Daniel Ramos, Javier Gonzalez-Dominguez & Joaquín González-Rodríguez

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Center for Biometrics and Security Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

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Toledano, D., Ramos, D., Gonzalez-Dominguez, J., González-Rodríguez, J. (2009). Speech Analysis. In: Li, S.Z., Jain, A. (eds) Encyclopedia of Biometrics. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-73003-5_200

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Speech Analysis #1: How to Study and Critique a Speech

The Speech Analysis Series is a series of articles examining different aspects of presentation analysis. You will learn how to study a speech and how to deliver an effective speech evaluation. Later articles will examine Toastmasters evaluation contests and speech evaluation forms and resources.

How to Study and Critique a Speech
The Art of Delivering Evaluations
Modified Sandwich Technique for Evaluations
Evaluation Forms, Tools, and Resources
Toastmasters Evaluation Contests

The first in the series, this article outlines questions to ask yourself when assessing a presentation . Ask these questions whether you attend the presentation, or whether you view a video or read the speech text. These questions also apply when you conduct a self evaluation of your own speeches .

The Most Important Thing to Analyze: The Speech Objectives

Knowing the speaker’s objective is critical to analyzing the speech, and should certainly influence how you study it.

What is the speaker’s goal? Is it to educate , to motivate , to persuade , or to entertain ?
What is the primary message being delivered?
Why is this person delivering this speech ? Are they the right person?
Was the objective achieved ?

The Audience and Context for the Speech

A speaker will need to use different techniques to connect with an audience of 1500 than they would with an audience of 15. Similarly, different techniques will be applied when communicating with teenagers as opposed to communicating with corporate leaders.

Where and when is the speech being delivered?
What are the key demographic features of the audience ? Technical? Students? Elderly? Athletes? Business leaders?
How large is the audience?
In addition to the live audience, is there an external target audience ? (e.g. on the Internet or mass media)

Speech Content and Structure

The content of the speech should be selected and organized to achieve the primary speech objective. Focus is important — extraneous information can weaken an otherwise effective argument.

Before the Speech

Were there other speakers before this one ? Were their messages similar, opposed, or unrelated?
How was the speaker introduced ? Was it appropriate?
Did the introduction establish why the audience should listen to this speaker with this topic at this time ?
What body language was demonstrated by the speaker as they approached the speaking area? Body language at this moment will often indicate their level of confidence .

The Speech Opening

Due to the primacy effect , words, body language, and visuals in the speech opening are all critical to speaking success.

Was a hook used effectively to draw the audience into the speech? Or did the speaker open with a dry “ It’s great to be here today. “
Did the speech open with a story ? A joke ? A startling statistic ? A controversial statement ? A powerful visual ?
Did the speech opening clearly establish the intent of the presentation?
Was the opening memorable ?

The Speech Body

Was the presentation focused ? i.e. Did all arguments, stories, anecdotes relate back to the primary objective?
Were examples or statistics provided to support the arguments ?
Were metaphors and symbolism use to improve understanding?
Was the speech organized logically ? Was it easy to follow?
Did the speaker transition smoothly from one part of the presentation to the next?

The Speech Conclusion

Like the opening, the words, body language, and visuals in the speech conclusion are all critical to speaking success. This is due to the recency effect .

Was the conclusion concise ?
Was the conclusion memorable ?
If appropriate, was there a call-to-action ?

Delivery Skills and Techniques

Delivery skills are like a gigantic toolbox — the best speakers know precisely when to use every tool and for what purpose.

Enthusiasm and Connection to the Audience

Was the speaker enthusiastic ? How can you tell?
Was there audience interaction ? Was it effective?
Was the message you – and we-focused , or was it I- and me-focused ?
Was humor used?
Was it safe and appropriate given the audience?
Were appropriate pauses used before and after the punch lines, phrases, or words?
Was it relevant to the speech ?

Visual Aids

Were they designed effectively?
Did they complement speech arguments ?
Was the use of visual aids timed well with the speaker’s words?
Did they add energy to the presentation or remove it?
Were they simple and easy to understand ?
Were they easy to see ? e.g. large enough
Would an additional visual aid help to convey the message?

Use of Stage Area

Did the speaker make appropriate use of the speaking area?

Physical – Gestures and Eye Contact

Did the speaker’s posture display confidence and poise?
Were gestures natural, timely, and complementary ?
Were gestures easy to see ?
Does the speaker have any distracting mannerisms ?
Was eye contact effective in connecting the speaker to the whole audience?

Vocal Variety

Was the speaker easy to hear ?
Were loud and soft variations used appropriately?
Was the speaking pace varied? Was it slow enough overall to be understandable?
Were pauses used to aid understanding, heighten excitement, or provide drama?
Was the language appropriate for the audience?
Did the speaker articulate clearly?
Were sentences short and easy to understand?
Was technical jargon or unnecessarily complex language used?
What rhetorical devices were used? e.g. repetition, alliteration, the rule of three , etc.

Intangibles

Sometimes, a technically sound speech can still miss the mark. Likewise, technical deficiencies can sometimes be overcome to produce a must-see presentation. The intangibles are impossible to list, but here are a few questions to consider:

How did the speech make you feel ?
Were you convinced ?
Would you want to listen to this speaker again?
Were there any original ideas or techniques?

Next in the Speech Analysis Series

The next article in this series – The Art of Delivering Evaluations – examines how best to utilize speech evaluation skills as a teaching tool.

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40 comments.

I absolutely loved this article. It gave me a major idea of what to write on my speech critique. Great information, organized, and detailed!

Great post. I have to say, it was when I started to do exactly what you say that my skills took off.

If anyone wants to go farther, just teach a class on public speaking. You do not need a degree to teach continuing ed. It will help you, as some of my students who went on to teach to improve even more. This is because not only are you observing your students for these points. You are actually teaching them how to attain some of these skills.

oh my god….thank you!! i had no idea where to even start my speech analysis!

Excellent article. Will refer members of my club to it.

Dear Eugenia You refer to “members of your club” and I wanted to know an online public speaking club. Does this exist. Regards Berty

Your article is very informative. Hope you post more tips on writing a speech and how to analyse it!! 😎

Thanks for providing this information. I am writing an essay critiquing my own speech in third person. A tough task, but these pointers made it easier. Thank you.

i loved this information very much.now i am preparing for my examination and i think this article will help me to get good mark. thanks

Great summary/overview on basic things to evaluate while listening to a speech. Will be very much helpful when i have to do evaluations for speech class!

Thank you sooooo much for this article!! This is helping me soooo much for my speech analysis!

Thank you so so much! You are awesome and very helpful plus amazing too!

Great job once again! I liked the clarity with which these concepts were explained. Self explanatory and useful for both novice and advanced speakers. Keep it up!

Such a great article, thank you! It truly helped

I have to look at this for a class project and really learned some new tips from this.

This helped immensely; thank you so much!

thank you, you helped me a lot

Best article I found for speech critique and analysis. Definitely a place to come back for speech resource.

Thank you Andrew, great articles and valuable information. I recently joined a Toastmaster’s group and this will really help. Once I figure out how to “tweet” I will be “tweeting” this site to Kwantlen University Students and Alumni.

I absolutely loved this article it gave me a major idea of what to write on my speech critique great information, organized, and detailed!

Fantastic article. For someone that is new to Taostmasters this gives me at least an idea of how I should approach giving an evaluation…frigthening me more than giving a speech!! Thanks!

hi Andrew, this is a great article for someone who is a beginner to evaluate a speech. thanks a lot. -Venkat

very informative article will certainly help me to develop my speech technique.

Thus really helpful…we always read text resurfacely I gained alot from this article. now I know where to start when I want to present information through speech to the public

thank you this helped me vey much.

thanks a lot this just help me with my paper. you explain it better than my teacher

I am a toastmaster who loves to compete. I believe these articles will help me help other to deliver their speeches and both of us can grow.

Hi Andrew Dlugan, i am really happy to come across your site as new trainee in the public speaking and writing profession. i am programmer but i have passion for writing especially poems.Do you have any advice or resources to help me survive in the world of speaking and writing.

Thank You, Best Regards, Lawal Abdulateef Olawle

I came here looking for a speech review but reading this article helped me a lot in my opening speech. I hope many people who are having trouble in analysing there speech they should really open this website. Thank you

This is a helpful source to me. Thanks a lot

Great article. I am preparing to critique a public speaking competition this weekend and I found this article quite helpful Thanks a lot

Hi Andrew, May I use your article in our club newsletter? It is particularly timely as we approach the contest season in Toastmasters. I will source it to your web site and also include a link under the Articles about speaking of our club website.

John Sleigh Rockhampton, Queensland, Australia

Amazing breakdown of how to not only analysis a speech but to also push yourself that inch further to get more scope for marks. I really recommend this webpage. Thank you

Thank you for this amazing information, your 6 minutes guide is great and I am learning so much with it.

Really GREAT JOB! thanks so much! Best! Rasha

I really love this and would want more of this

This information was very informative and knowledgeable.Thank you.

Your articles are very thorough. I really enjoyed reading the first one.

Can you give me some examples of relevant puns used in speeches?

One more treasure trove on the internet. Thanks for sharing DLugan.

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7 Blog Links

Evaluation Contest Resources | World Champion Evaluator — Mar 3rd, 2010

Evaluation Contest Resources | World Champion Evaluator « Brinker Toastmasters — Mar 3rd, 2010

ToastMASTERY » Evaluation Contest Resources | World Champion Evaluator — Mar 3rd, 2010

The 25 Essential Presentation Skills for Public Speaking | David Edgerton Jr — May 6th, 2010

State of the Union 2012 « E-126 — Jan 31st, 2012

Speech Evaluations | Plantation Toastmasters — May 27th, 2012

Fall 2012 Club Contest | — Aug 6th, 2012

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Delivery Techniques →

How to Conduct a Speech Analysis and Present It Like a Pro

Who doesn't dream of delivering the perfect speech? Every person who speaks in front of a crowd wants to leave them moved. However, not everyone can do that.

Even the greatest speakers have worked for years to master the art of public speaking . Although we may not know their secret, we can learn a lot from their work. That's where speech analysis helps. Let's find out what it is and how to benefit from it.

What Is Speech Analysis?

You probably know the standard definition already – it is a process of studying a speech's good, bad, and pain points. However, what does it have to offer to you?

In essence, speech analysis means understanding the useful information in the speech and setting it aside from what isn't handy. For instance, a renowned speaker comes on stage to deliver a speech , and you have to perform a speech analysis – what will you look for?

You will observe the speaker's gestures, body language , confidence, usage of terms, sentence structure, quality of speech, proper delivery of the message, and much more.

This plethora of factors contributes to a single word called speech analysis. Now that you know what it is, let's have a comprehensive look into these factors.

How Does Speech Analysis Work?

For analyzing a speech, the first thing you need is information.

You need to know the perfect way to begin the speech , convey the message and give an immediate call to action.

You also must identify where the speaker is wrong and what was lacking in the speech.

For instance, if the targeted audience is teenagers, you should be able to tell if the humor and jokes used were appropriate. Was the speech engaging or lackluster? Did the audience understand the message?

Let's see what these aspects entail below.

Introduction of the Speech Analysis

First thing's first, add an introduction. It usually begins with a hook, something to entice the reader. Then it mentions the time and place of the speech, followed by an overview of the address.

Next, you need to mention the speaker, the topic, and the key points of the speech.

Body of the Analysis

Once done with the analysis, you need to begin crafting the body. This includes some special and some general details of the content and delivery, and writing them in a critique manner.

Usually, this begins with a certain action of the speaker, like tone, gesture , or emotion.

The description of some of the common factors is given below.

Identify the Objective of Speech

The purpose plays the most important part here as it is the deciding factor of the nature of the speech.

Is it an entertainment speech with a few jokes and funny lines here and there or an educational speech delivering quality information?

Was it a script written to motivate the audience for a bigger cause? Was it delivered in a manner to promote a product among the audience?

What is the message being conveyed? If it promotes peace and equality and focuses on making the world a better place, your analysis should consider that.

Similarly, identify if the person delivering the speech is the right person for the job. He must deliver the speech perfectly or at least achieve the purpose set.

Once you get your head around these points, making an analysis becomes easy.

Be Mindful of the Target Audience

A good speaker knows that a speaking style used for 50 cannot be used for 2000 people. Similarly, the tone or technique used with business leaders cannot be used with homemakers.

You need to see how well the topic resonates with the audience and how engaged they are.

Say a spokesperson delivers a speech about leading SEO strategies in 2022. The audience will comprise people familiar with digital marketing or those who want to learn it.

It will include related terms, anecdotes, stories , facts, and stats that will bind the audience to the topic.

For the speech analysis, you must also consider if the speech is being broadcasted to an external audience on streaming platforms.

Bring in the Juicy Part: Content of the Speech

The heading says it all.

We cannot stress enough. The content of the speech is by far the most vital part of the script. It can make or break the overall mood.

The Opening: Pay special attention to the opening of the speech. Usually, a hook, controversial statement, or question is used to garner the audience's attention.

An interactive, intuitive opening is much preferred to a dry opening, saying, "Hello everyone, thank you for having me."

The Main Body: Once you write all this down, move on to the body of the content. You need to deduce if the topic was authoritative. Did it include a particular focus on the subject matter? Did it have stories and facts that connected back to the issue?

How did the speaker transition from point to point ?

Speech analysis also requires you to check if statistics or visuals were used to support the arguments. It is better to use graphics to convey the message better, and you need to study if they did the work. You must analyze how well the speech was constructed and organized efficiently.

The Ending Words: Lastly, determine how valuable, memorable, and well defined the ending of the speech was.

Was it concise? Did the review do justice to the speech? Did it list the good and bad parts of the speech? These points will make up for a strong conclusion influencing the reader's mind that you have a strong hold on the subject here.

These were the main three points of speech content; the opening, body, and conclusion. This is an easy approach to follow and can help you with speech analysis quickly.

Observe Style and Delivery Manner

In scripting and speaking, the delivery style and techniques are the best tools, provided you know when and how to use them.

When analyzing a speech, you must view the speech from a critic's perspective. Observe the mood and vibe of the audience during the speech.

Were people bored or engaged ? Was the session interactive? Did it teach you something you didn't know?

These questions will tell you the experience of the audience. Try putting yourself in the audience's shoes, and you will understand how useful it was for them.

Next, observe the speaker.

Was he nervous ? Did he know what he was saying? Often at such times, the body language communicates the confidence of the speaker .

You may also notice the stage area used by the speaker. Did he pace around the stage or stand in one place? All these factors determine the speaker's delivery style and make a significant portion of the analysis.

Determine Correct Usage of Visuals

Yet another critical factor of speech analysis; determining the proper use of visuals. This adds so much life and energy to the speech. The experience becomes more realistic.

According to research, more than 67% of people feel more inclined and engaged in speeches that include visuals.

This is generally true too. An average person would enjoy a speech with infographics, charts, images, short clips, and figures rather than a dull, verbal presentation.

You need to see if the speaker used sufficient visual aids and whether they were succinct in delivering the message.

Did the visuals complement the speech? Were they fun and easy to understand? Did the audience like and engage with them?

Observing these during the speech will make the analysis quick and condensed.

Consider Language and Choice of Words

Since language and words are the modes of communication for the speaker here, it is essential to know how he uses them.

Say the topic is about the best places to buy Bitcoin. You now need to see if the speaker uses the proper terms to address the topic.

Does he explain the concept of Crypto and how it works? Does he tell how Bitcoin reached fame and all its background?

That makes for the comprehensiveness of the topic.

Next, inspect the use of language. Is it appropriate for the audience? Does it use slang words, or is it too bland? Are the terms difficult to understand?

A fine point to make in your speech analysis would be the flow of the speech. In this, you can mention how fast or slow the speaker was.

His articulation of words , the length of sentences, and their ease of understanding. You can also mention the uniqueness or repetitiveness of words, sentences, ideas, or rhetorical devices in the speech .

The only way you can do justice to a speech analysis is by mentioning every good and bad point of the speaker.

Sound Experience

You might wonder why this is important – truth be told, this is an essential factor in crafting a speech analysis. How you hear something tells your mind how to perceive it.

For example, you purchase an online course.

As soon as you hear the tutor's voice, you feel annoyed and request a refund. Why?

Because the first thing your brain captured was the voice of the video playing in your mind, it might have been too sharp, distorted, or garbled for you to hear.

The same is the case with a speech; what you hear and how you hear influence your willingness to listen to the script .

So, you must include how well the speakers worked in your speech analysis. The pitch of the sound, how easy it was to hear and discern the words of the speaker.

This section in the analysis could also use the speaking pace of the reader. Additionally, talk about how the speaker paused after regular intervals to create suspense, arouse excitement, express grief, make a remark or add value to his words.

You will feel special if someone looks you in the eye while you speak – so does the audience. Being a critic and speech analyst, you must observe how the speaker makes eye contact with the audience.

Does he shy away? Does he smile while making direct contact? Or does he keep looking elsewhere, avoiding the audience?

Adding all these points to your analysis will give it leverage over the others.

Gestures also include the movements and timings of the speaker. Did he use his hand to add energy and influence to his words? Were the gestures natural or forced? Were they distracting?

This part won't take up as much space or information but can help identify the right person.

Conclusion of the Speech Analysis

The conclusion is the final part of the analysis, where you summarize the speech and write an ending note.

Say you heard a speech about a woman who lost her husband to the DEA agents. She told with extreme pain and grief how they encountered him and shot him at point blank.

Now here's how you can write its conclusion:

"Samantha's speech engulfed me and the entire audience the moment she began her story. It hooked me, and I could feel her pain moving like waves in the hall and the audience.

However, I believe that the tone and pace should have been slightly lighter for my liking. Otherwise, the unfortunate incident with her husband didn’t allow her to control her emotions."

This will be your judgment and remarks that you acquired throughout the speech analysis. That makes up for a satisfactory conclusion to your speech analysis.

Final Verdict

You might find it challenging to analyze a speech at first, but once you learn the pain points, it's a child's game. Use the above factors to analyze your next speech and get an A+ on that assignment.

A good speech analysis manifests the intent, the audience, the content, the delivery style, visuals, and much more. Now that you know how speech analysis works, you're well versed with all the points.

That brings us to the end of this post. Happy Speaking!

Related: How to Give a Speech Evaluation in Toastmasters

Chapter 6: Thinking and Analyzing Rhetorically

6.3 What is Rhetorical Analysis?

Rhetoric: The art of persuasion

Analysis: Breaking down the whole into pieces for the purpose of examination

Unlike summary, a rhetorical analysis does not only require a restatement of ideas; instead, you must recognize rhetorical moves that an author is making in an attempt to persuade his or her audience to do or to think something. In the 21st century’s abundance of information, it can sometimes be difficult to discern what is a rhetorical strategy and what is simple manipulation; however, an understanding of rhetoric and rhetorical moves will help you become more savvy with the information surrounding you on a day-to-day basis. In other words, rhetorical moves can be a form of manipulation, but if one can recognize those moves, then one can be a more critical consumer of information rather than blindly accepting whatever one reads, sees, hears, etc.

The goal of a rhetorical analysis is to explain what is happening in the text, why the author might have chosen to use a particular move or set of rhetorical moves, and how those choices might affect the audience. The text you analyze might be explanatory, although there will be aspects of argument because you must negotiate with what the author is trying to do and what you think the author is doing. Edward P.J. Corbett observes, rhetorical analysis “is more interested in a literary work for what it does than for what it is” (qtd. in Nordqvist).

One of the elements of doing a rhetorical analysis is looking at a text’s rhetorical situation. The rhetorical situation is the context out of a which a text is created.

The questions that you can use to examine a text’s rhetorical situation are in Chapter 6.2 .

Another element of rhetorical analysis is simply reading and summarizing the text. You have to be able to describe the basics of the author’s thesis and main points before you can begin to analyze it.

The questions that you can use to summarize a text are in Chapter 5.1

A third element of rhetorical analysis requires you to connect the rhetorical situation to the text. You need to go beyond summarizing and look at how the author shapes his or her text based on its context. In developing your reading and analytical skills, allow yourself to think about what you’re reading, to question the text and your responses to it, as you read. Use the following questions to help you to take the text apart—dissecting it to see how it works:

Does the author successfully support the thesis or claim? Is the point held consistently throughout the text, or does it wander at any point?
Is the evidence the author used effective for the intended audience? How might the intended audience respond to the types of evidence that the author used to support the thesis/claim?
What rhetorical moves do you see the author making to help achieve his or her purpose? Are there word choices or content choices that seem to you to be clearly related to the author’s agenda for the text or that might appeal to the intended audience?
Describe the tone in the piece. Is it friendly? Authoritative? Does it lecture? Is it biting or sarcastic? Does the author use simple language, or is it full of jargon? Does the language feel positive or negative? Point to aspects of the text that create the tone; spend some time examining these and considering how and why they work. (Learn more about tone in Section 4.5 “ Tone, Voice, and Point of View . ”)
Is the author objective, or does he or she try to convince you to have a certain opinion? Why does the author try to persuade you to adopt this viewpoint? If the author is biased, does this interfere with the way you read and understand the text?
Do you feel like the author knows who you are? Does the text seem to be aimed at readers like you or at a different audience? What assumptions does the author make about their audience? Would most people find these reasonable, acceptable, or accurate?
Does the text’s flow make sense? Is the line of reasoning logical? Are there any gaps? Are there any spots where you feel the reasoning is flawed in some way?
Does the author try to appeal to your emotions? Does the author use any controversial words in the headline or the article? Do these affect your reading or your interest?
Do you believe the author? Do you accept their thoughts and ideas? Why or why not?

It is also a good idea to revisit Section 2.3 “How to Read Rhetorically.” This chapter will compliment the rhetorical questions listed above and help you clearly determine the text’s rhetorical situation.

Once you have done this basic, rhetorical, critical reading of your text, you are ready to think about how the rhetorical situation ( Section 6.2 ) – the context out of which the text arises – influences certain rhetorical appeals ( Section 6.4 ) that appear in it.

Attributions

This chapter contains material from “The Word on College Reading and Writing” by Monique Babin, Carol Burnell, Susan Pesznecker, Nicole Rosevear, Jaime Wood , OpenOregon Educational Resources , Higher Education Coordination Commission: Office of Community Colleges and Workforce Development is licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0

A Guide to Rhetoric, Genre, and Success in First-Year Writing by Melanie Gagich & Emilie Zickel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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The Oxford Handbook of Linguistic Analysis (2nd edn)

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22 Phonological Analysis

Mary Paster (BA Ohio State University; MA, PhD University of California, Berkeley) is Associate Professor and Chair of Linguistics and Cognitive Science at Pomona College in Claremont, California. She specializes in phonology and morphology and their interfaces, particularly in the study of tone systems, allomorphy, and affix ordering. Her primary focus is on West African languages, though she has worked on languages spoken all around the African continent and in other parts of the world.

Published: 09 July 2015
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Phonology is the study of speech sounds and how they pattern. This chapter lays out an approach to phonology that is generative and rule-based, and that incorporates autosegmental representations. The chapter includes discussion of representations in phonology including phonological features and their place in the autosegmental model, as well as representational units above the segment. It covers phonological processes (particularly the nature of autosegmental rules) and rule ordering. Finally, it provides some concrete advice as to how to do a basic phonological analysis of an unfamiliar language.

22.1 Introduction

Phonology is the study of speech sounds and how they pattern. In this chapter, I will lay out an approach to phonology that is generative and rule-based , and that incorporates autosegmental representations . This approach may be characterized as traditional in comparison with Optimality Theory (OT), a more recent model introduced in Chapter 21 of the first edition; Chapter 23 of this volume, which is based on constraints rather than rules. A practical advantage of the present model is that it makes it relatively straightforward to analyze most patterns in a way that reflects our analytical intuitions.

This chapter is structured as follows. In Section 22.2 , I discuss representations in phonology including phonological features and their place in the autosegmental model, as well as representational units above the segment. Section 22.3 covers phonological processes, particularly the nature of autosegmental rules, as well as rule ordering. In Section 22.4 , I provide some concrete advice on how to do a basic phonological analysis of a language using the model I will set out; the methodology I describe presupposes a rule-based approach to phonology, but it will also be of use to researchers who pursue OT-based analyses. Finally, Section 22.5 concludes the chapter.

The overarching goal of the theory presented here is to match, as closely as possible, the set of phonological systems that are possible within the theory to the set of phonological systems that exist or could exist in a human language. Of course we cannot observe and document all possible phonological systems. Some existed in languages long extinct, while others will exist in some language in the future; some exist in languages that are still spoken today but are not described well enough in the published literature for phonologists to know about them, and still others may never exist in any language, past, present, or future, but are still possible within the limits of Universal Grammar (UG). Therefore we must make our best educated guesses as to which phenomena are possible in the phonology of natural languages, based on as wide a range of linguistic data as we can access.

22.2 Representations

The central element of analysis in phonology is the phoneme . This is the basic underlying form of a segment (consonant or vowel) that is stored in the mental grammar. A phoneme may have a number of different allophones , which are surface realizations of a single phoneme—for example, the sounds [t h ], [?], [P], and (less interestingly) [t] corresponding to the phoneme /t/ in American English. Phonemes are represented in the form of a number of distinctive features , which are categories to which a sound is assigned. Typically these features have two values, so that, for example, with respect to the feature [±voice], a sound may be either [+voice] (voiced) or [–voice] (unvoiced). Every binary feature thus divides the set of all sounds into two categories. Some features have been argued to be privative , however, meaning that they are either present or absent for a given sound (see, e.g. Lombardi 1991 , 1995 ; Steriade 1995 ). For example, because orality (a lack of nasalization) rarely if ever behaves like an “active” feature in languages (we do not find sounds becoming [–nasal] via assimilation to adjacent [–nasal] sounds), it has been suggested (see, e.g. Ewen and van der Hulst 2001 : 55–9) that nasality be represented by a privative feature [nasal], rather than a bivalent feature [±nasal]. This move would mean that non-nasal sounds would not be statable as a natural class —that is, that there would be no direct way in the theory to refer to non-nasal sounds to the exclusion of other sounds for the purpose of describing a phonological process. If no process in any language ever refers exclusively to non-nasal sounds as a class, and if we believe that no process in any language ever could refer to such a class, then the inability of the feature set to refer to this class would be a positive attribute of a feature theory that lacks the value [–nasal]. This is because, as mentioned earlier, the goal of our theory (including our theory of features) is to match the set of phonological systems that are possible within the theory to the set of possible phonological systems; we do not want our theory to be able to state (i.e. to predict the possible existence of) impossible systems.

Often, though not always, distinctive features have some articulatory and/or acoustic phonetic correlate(s), such as lip rounding for [+round], or a high tongue position and a low first formant value for [+high]. Other features are defined in terms of the function of a sound, such as [+syllabic] for a segment that forms the nucleus of a syllable. Still others are more abstract, having been proposed simply in order to define a class of sounds that frequently pattern together, such as [+consonantal] (though see Hume and Odden 1996 for arguments against the existence of [±consonantal]). The reason why not all features have a phonetic correlate is that the basis for our theory of features is not phonetic groupings, but rather observations about sets of sounds that pattern together phonologically in different languages, whether for the purposes of a phonotactic restriction (e.g. within a syllable onset, a plosive may not be preceded by any [+sonorant] sound), or in the form of a trigger or target of a phonological process (e.g. [–sonorant] sounds are devoiced at the end of a word). Ideally, the theory of features is a theory of the basic inventory of categories that a sound may belong to in any language. Thus, every feature is hypothesized to be universally present in UG, although no one language makes crucial use of every feature.

It is a matter of some controversy whether every sound in a language has a value for every feature. We have already discussed the possibility of privative features, whose existence would naturally entail that some sounds lack a value for some features (e.g. if [nasal] is privative, then an oral segment will have no value for that feature). In addition, there have been numerous proposals in the literature for various types of underspecification , whereby sounds have “zero” values even for some features that are bivalent. It is relatively uncontroversial (though not universally agreed upon) to assume that a sound will lack a value for a feature that is completely irrelevant to the general class of sounds to which it belongs, so that, for example, vowels have no value for the feature [±strident], which refers to the path of the airflow in a fricative or affricate. Less obvious is how to treat features that are relevant but not necessary to uniquely distinguish a sound from all others in the sound inventory of the language. For example, if a language does not have any voiceless sonorants, should only obstruents be underlyingly specified for the feature [±voice], with a context-free rule inserting [+voice] on all [+sonorant] segments by default? Or, in a language where all round vowels are back, and where there are no two sounds distinguished only by rounding, should the feature [±round] be left out of underlying representations entirely? There was considerable debate over these issues in the 1980s (see Kiparsky 1982 ; Archangeli 1984 , 1988 ; Steriade 1987 ; Pulleyblank 1988 ; see also Steriade 1995 for a general overview), with numerous competing proposals for algorithms that would determine how to underspecify phonemic inventories, and no consensus was reached. It is likely that any two working phonologists today have at least slightly different conceptions of the feature inventory and how (or whether) to underspecify. What is crucial, from a practical point of view, is that the researcher clearly state his/her assumptions when arguing for an analysis whose validity relies on the particular features and theory of underspecification being assumed.

The earliest formal models of phonology, particularly the Sound Pattern of English (SPE) model outlined by Chomsky and Halle (1968) , treated phonemes as unorganized bundles of features, which were listed in a feature matrix , as in (1).

The ordering of the features in the matrix was considered to be immaterial.

A major problem with this way of representing phonemes was identified in the 1970s and 1980s, particularly as researchers attempted to apply the SPE model to tone languages. 1 The problem stemmed from the fact that tone features were considered to be a property of vowels, and as such, were listed in the feature matrix alongside the vowel features. So, for example, a high-toned /á/ vowel might be represented as in (2).

The high (H) tone is represented by the feature [+H tone] in the feature matrix of the vowel. The problem arises when one considers how to represent a vowel with a contour tone, such as the vowel /â/ with a falling tone. It is not possible to simply insert a [–H tone] feature into the matrix in (2), for two reasons: First, if each binary feature divides sounds into two distinct groups with respect to the property in question, then the plus and minus values for a given feature are by definition incompatible with each other. Therefore a sound cannot be both [+H tone] and [–H tone]. Furthermore, even if we relax our definition of binary features to allow the plus and minus categories to overlap, recall that features in the matrix are unordered with respect with each other. Thus, a matrix with both [+H tone] and [–H tone] could represent either /â/ or /ă/, and the feature system would not be able to distinguish between the two. It would be undesirable to endow the feature matrix with ordering among the features in order to fix this problem, since this would predict that the ordering should crucially distinguish other types of sounds as well. Returning to our /f/ sound in (1), allowing for crucial orderings among the features would predict, for example, that in some language we should find /f/ distinguished minimally from some other segment in whose feature matrix [–voice] was listed after [+anterior] rather than before it. No natural language makes such a distinction.

The solution to the problem of contour tone representation (among numerous other problems in the analysis of tone systems), proposed by Goldsmith (1976) , was an autosegmental representation . The idea was to remove tone features from the feature matrix and to represent them on their own level or “tier,” with linkages (called “association lines”) between the tonal and segmental levels to indicate which vowel a tone would be realized on. This move allowed for relations between vowels and tones that are not one-to-one; for example, in autosegmental phonology, the vowel /â/ could be represented as in (3) (where “a” stands for all of the segmental features in the matrix for the vowel). 2

The vowel /ă/, on the other hand, is represented as in (4).

Notice that, just as feature matrices for individual segments have to be ordered from left to right in order to represent the sequential ordering of segments, the features on the tonal tier are ordered from left to right by the same convention. This allows us to represent the difference between the falling tone in (3) and the rising tone in (4).

Autosegmental theory has a number of other advantages for the analysis of tone languages. With respect to contour tones, another advantage is that it straightforwardly captures the fact that a contour behaves differently depending on whether a phonological process occurs to the right or the left of the contour. For instance, falling tones pattern with low (L) tones with respect to phenomena occurring to their right. An example is found in Hausa, where the “stabilizer” morphemes have a polar tone, meaning that they take on the tone opposite to the one that precedes them. As shown in (5a), both falling tones and L tones trigger a H tone on the stabilizer, while H tones trigger L on the stabilizer, as in (5b) ( Newman 2000 : 598; note that the examples are in Hausa orthography, so L tone is marked by a grave accent, H tone is unmarked, and a macron indicates vowel length).

On the other hand, when the left edge of the contour tones is considered, it is the rising tone that patterns with the L tone. In the Margi language of Nigeria ( Hoffman 1963 via Kenstowicz 1994 : 313), the present tense marker a is a polar morpheme. As shown in (6), it surfaces with L tone when followed by a H toned verb (a), but withH tone when followed by a verb with either aL or a rising tone (b).

The rising tone example in (b) also shows that the rise behaves like a H tone at its right edge, since gụ is also a polar morpheme, surfacing with the opposite of the tone that precedes it. This phenomenon, and the related pattern in Hausa discussed above, can be explained in the autosegmental model because it represents contour tones as sequences of two different tone features.

Apart from one-to-many relationships between vowels and tones, autosegmental representations also allow for one-to-many relationships between tones and vowels (tones realized on multiple vowels in successive syllables), vowels with no tones (i.e. toneless vowels, which receive their tones via assimilation or default tone insertion), and tones with no vowels (i.e. floating tones, which are realized only after associating to a vowel). 3 Each of these situations is robustly attested in tone languages; none of them could have been properly analyzed in the pre-autosegmental model.

Given the success of the autosegmental model in explaining tone systems, it is natural to wonder whether other features might also be suited to autosegmental representations. In fact, many segmental features do turn out to be amenable to autosegmental analysis. For example, if we treat [±voice] as an autosegment, we can model the output of the common process of voicing assimilation within a consonant cluster as a single [±voice] feature linked to two consonants, as in (7).

Thus, the assimilation process consists of the addition of an association line between the [–voice] feature and the target consonant (the advantages of autosegmental rules over SPE-type rewrite rules will be discussed in the next section). Putting [±voice] on its own tier in the representation also allows for (and predicts the existence of) floating [±voice] features, akin to floating tones. Such floating features have been argued to exist; for example, Itô and Mester (1986) analyzed rendaku voicing in Japanese (where an obstruent becomes voiced at the beginning of the second word in a compound) as resulting from a floating [+voice] morpheme that occurs between the two parts of the compound. See Akinlabi (2011) for an overview and discussion of a number of other cases of featural affixation.

Assuming that every feature is independent from the feature matrix (which ultimately entails doing away with the matrix altogether, in favor of a central node referred to as the ‘root node’ to which all features of a segment associate) allows us to model the independent behavior of individual features, which turns out to have positive effects for the analysis of all sorts of phonological processes, most notably vowel harmony, nasalization, and other assimilatory processes. However, in addition to behaving autonomously, it was observed that some features also group together for the purposes of some processes. For example, in a nasal place assimilation process, any and all place features from a consonant are associated to a preceding nasal. In some cases this involves multiple place features for a single place of articulation, depending on the feature inventory that one assumes. For instance, if velars have the place features [+anterior, –coronal], then a change from n to ŋ before a [+anterior, –coronal] sound would involve adding association lines between the nasal and both features, as in (8) (the newly added associations are indicated by dotted lines).

The theory of the organization of autosegmental features in a hierarchical tree structure is known as feature geometry .

The advent of feature geometry provided insight into relationships among other groups of features beyond the Place node. For example, it had been noted (by, e.g. Archangeli 1985 ; Mester 1986 ) that [±back] and [±round] pattern together in many languages for the purposes of vowel harmony rules. In feature geometry, this fact can be explained by grouping the two features under a single node in the representation ( Odden 1991 termed this the ‘[back]/[round]’ node; it was referred to in later work as the ‘Color’ node). The early goal was that we would ultimately arrive at a universal feature geometry for the arrangement of all phonological features (see Sagey 1986 and McCarthy 1988 for specific proposals). This idea never reached full fruition in the literature, possibly because it was too ambitious (i.e. perhaps the grouping of features is at least partly language-specific rather than being fixed in UG), and possibly because phonologists’ interest shifted towards Optimality Theory in the 1990s. There is nothing inherently contradictory between OT and feature geometry/autosegmental representations (see, e.g. Zoll 1996 ; Padgett 2002 ), but at least the earliest work in OT de-emphasized representations, so in practice the pursuit of OT may have put a damper on research in feature geometry.

In some languages, some coda consonants bear a mora while others do not. For example, it has been argued (see, e.g., Zec 1988 ) that in Lithuanian, only codas that are [+sonorant] have a mora. Evidence for the claim comes from multiple phonological processes in the language, including the assignment of rising tone accents, which can link to what is analyzed as a bimoraic syllable (one with a long vowel or sonorant coda) but not to a monomoraic syllable (one with a short vowel and either an obstruent coda or no coda). Another relevant process is ablaut, which lengthens the root vowels in the preterite and infinitive forms of verbs, as shown in (11) (data are reproduced from Zec (2011 : 1347); “CVO” refers to roots consisting of a consonant, vowel, and obstruent consonant, while “CVR” indicates roots consisting of a consonant, vowel, and sonorant consonant).

Notice that CVR syllables fail to undergo lengthening in the infinitive form. The generalization, stated in terms of moras, is that a syllable may not have more than two moras. Because sonorant codas are moraic while obstruent codas are not, the CVR syllable cannot be lengthened if the sonorant is syllabified as a coda to the syllable (which happens when the suffix that comes after it is consonant-initial, as in the infinitive). Thus, mora assignment to coda consonants appears to be language-specific rather than universal, even if the mora itself is a universally available symbolic unit.

Another important unit is the syllable. The syllable, represented by the σ symbol, is a grouping of a sequence of segments. Though abstract in the sense of not having a direct phonetic correlate, syllables are needed for the analysis of a number of different phonological and/or morphological phenomena including phonotactics (sequences of adjacent sounds that are permitted or not permitted), stress, truncation, reduplication, infix placement, word minimality constraints, and a wide range of phonological rules including vowel epenthesis, consonant cluster simplification, glide formation, vowel hiatus resolution, and many different kinds of processes relating to tone. Syllables are traditionally broken down into two main components, the onset and the rime , with the rime being composed of the nucleus and coda . Typically the nucleus is a vowel, the onset is any consonant or consonants before the vowel (within the same syllable), and the coda is any consonant or consonants after the vowel (within the same syllable). Based on these categories, a CVC syllable can be schematized as in (12).

Adapting the CVC syllable to moraic theory yields the new structures in (13). The structure in (a) represents a CVC syllable with a moraic coda, while the one in (b) represents a CVC syllable where the coda consonant does not bear a mora.

Notice that the structures in (12) and (13) make different predictions for possible phonological patterns. Apart from the analytical possibilities that arise from the mora, there is also a difference in terms of whether the rime exists as a linguistically significant unit. Under the traditional representation, the rime is expected to have some function in a phonological analysis, whereas using the moraic representation, there is no unit made up of the nucleus plus the coda, and therefore no direct way to refer to the rime. The existence of the rime as a meaningful unit is an empirical question; evidence has been adduced on both sides, but the rime seems to have been largely abandoned as a formal unit due to a lack of strong examples demonstrating a need for it. See Zec (2007) for a summary and discussion.

Above the syllable is the foot , which is a unit that represents the relative prominence of syllables ( Hayes 1980 ). The primary motivation for the existence of this unit comes from stress systems. It is observed that in languages with secondary stress, a common pattern is one in which syllables alternate between stressed and unstressed through-out the word, starting from one edge or the other. A well-known example comes from the Pintupi language of Australia, where primary stress (indicated by an acute accent) occurs on the initial syllable, and secondary stress (indicated by a grave accent) occurs on every odd-numbered syllable thereafter, except that the final syllable is never stressed. Examples are shown in (14) ( Hansen and Hansen 1969 : 163).

Patterns such as the one found in Pintupi can be analyzed by grouping every two syllables into a foot, starting from the left edge of the word, as in (15).

In this language, the feet are trochaic , meaning that they consist of a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable, and it is the initial foot in the word that gets primary stress. Stray syllables left at the right edge when a word has an uneven number of syllables are not assigned to a foot in this language, which is why they remain unstressed. In addition to their use in modeling stress systems, feet are also implicated in reduplication, word minimality restrictions, and infix placement ( McCarthy 1982 ).

A number of higher prosodic units above the foot have been proposed. For example, many phonological rules are said to apply within the “phrase,” which is generally used to refer to a group of words that may or may not correspond to a phrase in the syntactic sense (i.e. an XP). Other proposed units include the phonological word and clitic group (both below the phonological phrase) and the intonational phrase and utterance (above the phonological phrase). See Selkirk (1981 , 1984 , 1986 ), Nespor and Vogel (1983 , 1986 ), Hayes (1989 b ) for discussion and for evidence for the existence of each of these larger prosodic units.

22.3 Processes

In the SPE model, phonological processes were expressed as rewrite rules of the form A→B / C__D, where “A→B” represents the transformation, and “C__D” represents the context in which it applies (the underscore indicates the position of the segment that undergoes the transformation). One major problem with using rewrite rules to model phonological processes is that there is no limit on the degree or type of change that may apply. Nothing in the model requires B to have any similarity to A, nor for the change from A to B to have anything to do with a property of C or D. Therefore, in the SPE model it is easy to represent an absurd process, for example, one changing /b/ to [I] after /y/. If we want our theory to generate all and only the set of possible phonological systems, ideally the theory will have some way of excluding rules like this that are unattested and implausible.

Autosegmental theory, in contrast to rewrite rules, allows for a very limited number of formal processes capable of modeling a wide range of processes that are attested in human languages, while excluding many implausible processes that are not attested. In fact, there are essentially only two mechanisms for phonological rules in the autosegmental model—namely, insertion and deletion. “Insertion” includes insertion of an association line where none existed before; this type of insertion is known as “spreading” and accounts for assimilatory processes. “Deletion” also includes deletion of association lines, in which case it is referred to as “delinking” of one element from another to which it was previously associated. These two simple procedures account for nearly all phonological processes (the most notable “residue” being metathesis processes, which are difficult, though not impossible, to model solely via spreading and delinking). Furthermore, they avoid many of the problems associated with SPE; for example, the /b/ → [I] rule mentioned earlier would require delinking each of the undesired features of the /b/, inserting numerous vowel features to represent the [I] vowel, and inserting association lines between the relevant nodes and each of the newly inserted features. Each of these insertions and deletions would be a separate process, so the /b/ → [I] rule would really involve many different autosegmental rules applying to the same segment. The unnaturalness of the rule and its typological rarity (or nonexistence) correspond to the unlikelihood of all of these separate processes coexisting in a single language. A natural and common assimilatory process, on the other hand, relies only on the insertion of a single association line (in some cases accompanied by the deletion of one association line linking the segment to an incompatible feature).

One phenomenon for which autosegmental spreading works particularly well is vowel harmony. In the Asante Twi language spoken in Ghana, for example, prefix vowels harmonize with the root with respect to the Advanced Tongue Root feature, [±ATR], as seen in (16). 4

Using a rewrite rule, we could describe this process as in (17). 5

As with many rewrite rules, the rule in (17) contains a redundancy in that the feature that harmonizes has to be mentioned twice—once as the output of the rule and once as the trigger. The assimilatory nature of the process is not represented in the rule, so it is essentially a coincidence that the [+ATR] feature is present both in the statement of the process and in the environment where it applies. In addition, using this notation, it appears that the trigger and target of the rule are not adjacent to each other in any sense, because a consonant intervenes between the two. To the extent that phonological rules apply locally, it would be preferable to have some way of representing the transparency of consonants to vowel harmony.

Both of the problems described above are solved in an autosegmental version of the rule, shown in (18).

The harmonizing feature, [+ATR], needs to be mentioned only once. The assimilatory character of the process is captured straightforwardly by the fact that the triggering feature spreads onto the target vowel, rather than being copied. And the transparency of the consonant results from the fact that consonants do not bear a feature on the tier occupied by [±ATR]. This latter property of autosegmental rules relates well to the fact that typically when consonants block harmony, they can be argued to bear a vocalic feature on the same tier as the harmonizing feature; for example, palatalized consonants may interfere with backness harmony (see van der Hulst and van de Weijer 1995 : 526–30 for examples and discussion).

One property of autosegmental rule systems that is carried over from the SPE model is what is known as extrinsic ordering . This means that the sequential order in which the rules apply is arbitrary and must be stipulated in the grammar, rather than being determined by any inherent characteristics of the rules themselves. In principle, all of the rules in a language apply in some order. However, between any two rules, there will not necessarily be a crucial ordering. Crucial orderings arise only when the output of one rule affects whether (or how) another rule will apply, as when the two rules apply to the same target. A classic example involves devoicing and schwa epenthesis in English. The familiar data in (19) show how the regular plural suffix /-z/ surfaces as [əz] when the stem-final segment is a sibilant (a), as [s] when the stem-final segment is non-sibilant and voiceless (b), and as [z] elsewhere (c). 6

Two rules that can account for these data are given in (20).

Notice that a particular ordering is necessary for the analysis to work using these rules. If we consider a word like hƆɹ sə z ‘horses’, we see that if Devoicing applied first, the output would be * hƆɹ ss , which would fail to undergo Schwa Epenthesis. Therefore, Schwa Epenthesis must apply before Devoicing.

22.4 Methods of Phonological Analysis

The traditional method of analyzing the phonology of a language begins with primary fieldwork on the language, involving systematic elicitation of data from a native speaker. It is not common to begin work on a language about which absolutely nothing has been written, but for a variety of reasons it is sometimes best to approach a language as if this were the case. For some languages, the available materials consist mainly of wordlists collected by missionaries or anthropologists over one hundred years ago. These would likely not have been transcribed in a consistent way using a standard phonetic alphabet, making their interpretation difficult. Often some important aspects of pronunciation are omitted from older sources, particularly tone markings. Further, a language may undergo vast changes within a generation or two, making even well-transcribed older materials unreliable as a basis for analyzing a modern language (though the materials may be very valuable for other purposes such as studying historical changes in the language).

Relatively recent second-hand materials must be used with some caution as well. Depending on what the researcher was particularly interested in, some important details may be glossed over; for example, in a syntax paper, words may be transcribed using an orthography rather than a phonetic alphabet, thereby in some cases omitting important phonetic details. It is also, unfortunately, rather rare for a source to provide a large number of examples in support of a particular claim about a phonological pattern, nor to give sufficient data to rule out even the most obvious possible alternative analyses. More common is for a generalization to be stated and one form cited to exemplify it, or even for the generalization to be stated without any supporting examples at all. In this type of situation, the reader has no way to evaluate whether the generalization is truly robust and holds throughout the language. A solid description of a phonological system absolutely must include copious amounts of data in support of each and every claim, if it is to be useful to other phonologists now or in the future.

The next stage in the analysis is to determine what allophonic relationships exist among the sounds of the language. These can sometimes be discovered by looking for patterns in the words elicited at the earlier stage, but it is often much easier to find them in morphologically complex forms. Adding affixes to roots is what typically gives rise to alternations (multiple surface realizations of a single sound in different forms of the same morpheme), which provide direct evidence of allophonic relationships. For example, in looking at a large set of monomorphemic English words, we may notice that there do not seem to be any instances of /d/ after a voiceless consonant at the end of a word (e.g. we find words like [æd] ‘add’ and [ækt] ‘act’ but none like *[ækd]). After amassing a very large wordlist, we could feel confident using this negative distributional evidence to posit that if a /d/ were to occur word-finally after a voiced obstruent, it would be devoiced and realized as [t], perhaps proposing a general devoicing rule to account for the overall lack of voiced obstruents in this context. However, in the meantime, there are alternations that could be giving us much more direct, positive evidence for this same phonological rule—namely, voicing alternations in the past and participial /-d/ suffixes and the plural and 3sg agreement /-z/ suffixes. Alternations are thus extremely valuable in phonological analysis, 7 and for this reason the phonologist has to be somewhat of a morphologist as well.

At this stage in the research, some thought should be given to what types of words are likely to exhibit some morphology. If the language and/or its relatives are known to have a complex case marking system, then it would make sense to start with nouns. On the other hand, if the family is known for its rich tense/aspect system, then it may be wise to look first at verbs. Any time a morpheme (whether a root or an affix) exhibits different surface forms in different contexts, this is an opportunity to identify an allophonic relationship. In order to verify that the relation between two surface sounds is allophonic, it is necessary to determine that the sounds in question are in complementary distribution. Suppose a researcher posits, for example, that [f ] is an allophone of /p/ occurring intervocalically. To confirm this, in addition to scouring the data to verify that there are no instances of intervocalic /p/ within morphemes, he/she would also want to create morphological environments that would yield new (derived) intervocalic contexts for /p/. For example, one could identify a number of roots that end in a vowel followed by [p] in their citation (bare) forms, and then try adding vowel-initial suffixes to them in order to see whether the [p] alternates with [f ]. This type of data collection requires the researcher to construct examples carefully and systematically in advance of the elicitation session in order to ensure a good number of examples, and so as not to waste valuable time during a session combing through notebooks looking for roots ending in Vp . 8

A final step in the basic phonological analysis is to propose phonological rules and to determine what, if any, crucial orderings hold among those rules. Any time a rule or an ordering is proposed, it is essential to consider all logically possible alternatives to be sure to arrive at the best analysis. For example, suppose a language has only (C)V syllables, and suppose that [k] and [g] are in complementary distribution, such that [k] occurs word-initially and [g] occurs word-medially. Often when we find two sounds in complementary distribution, it is easy to determine that one of them is identical to the phoneme because it has a wider distribution than the other allophone. Sometimes the distribution of one of the allophones cannot be stated as a single generalization at all, in which case its distribution is stated as “elsewhere” with respect to the more restricted allophone; an “elsewhere” environment is a strong indicator that the allophone in question is identical to the phoneme. In our hypothetical k ~ g example, there is no clear “elsewhere” allophone, since each sound occurs in a natural class of environments that can be described in a single statement (“#__ ” for [k], or “V__V” for [g]). So, which sound is the phoneme, and is there a voicing rule or a devoicing rule?

Deciding between the two possibilities requires, first, that the researcher be aware of both. Depending on the researcher’s biases (whether based on orthography, or patterns he/she has seen in other languages, or perhaps something that a previous researcher wrote about the language), he/she may forget to consider all of the options. Once all the logical possibilities have been identified, it may turn out that there is some evidence in the language that can help the researcher decide between the options. For example, in our language with k ~ g , suppose that [b] and [d] occur in all environments, while [p] and [t] occur only in word-initial position. This would suggest that there is a devoicing rule, so [k] is an allophone of /g/, and the lack of word-initial [g] may be an accidental gap in the language. On the other hand, perhaps there is nothing in the data that can help with the decision. In such a case, the researcher might turn to typological patterns, using his/her intuitions about the relative crosslinguistic frequency of the two patterns to decide which analysis to pursue. The problem here is that the mental grammar does not have access to this kind of information, so we have no particular reason to expect that a language learner’s decision in the face of ambiguous data would mirror the typological pattern unless one of the possible rules is completely unnatural and not attested in any known language (in which case we might conclude that our theory should exclude that rule). Similarly, it is not advisable to simply choose the analysis that mirrors a historical change in the language (since speakers typically do not have access to ancient forms of their language) unless there is some specific reason to believe that modern speakers have some access to the older forms (e.g. from exposure to a neighboring dialect that did not undergo the change). A disturbing but real (and fascinating) possibility is that two speakers of the ‘same language’ might resolve the ambiguity in different ways, with one speaker’s mental grammar having /g/ and a devoicing rule, and the other having /k/ and a voicing rule. 9 In the case of a legitimate ambiguity like this, until the day when our research in linguistics links up sufficiently with neuroscience so that we can actually look at the brain to determine what is in an individual’s mental grammar, sometimes the best we can do is to make an arbitrary choice while acknowledging the alternatives.

In the case of a rule ordering, the way to establish a crucial ordering between two rules is to select an underlying form to which both rules could potentially apply, then run the underlying form through the rules in both possible orders and see which one yields the correct output. To show a crucial ordering, it is insufficient to show that one ordering produces the correct result; it must also be demonstrated that the other order does not work. To return to our earlier example of English Devoicing and Schwa Epenthesis, in order to demonstrate the crucial rule ordering, we would select a plural form whose root ends in a voiceless sibilant consonant and provide a sample derivation showing what the output would be under both possible orderings of the two rules, as in (21). An incorrect output is indicated with an asterisk.

Here, our sample derivations demonstrate that Schwa Epenthesis must precede Devoicing, since the opposite ordering gives an incorrect output. In some cases, it is not possible to demonstrate a crucial ordering based on the data because the two rules do not directly interact in any attested example. In some cases this may be remedied by gathering more data from a speaker in a targeted way in order to find examples where the rules in question interact; in other cases the rules will not interact in any example because they do not refer to any of the same phonological elements. However, it may be possible to infer the ordering from the ordering of each of the two rules in question with respect to some third rule. Rule ordering is considered to be transitive, so if rule A crucially precedes rule B, and rule B crucially precedes rule C, then rule A necessarily precedes rule C.

22.5 Conclusion

In this chapter I have provided a brief and necessarily incomplete overview of a derivational model of phonology incorporating autosegmental representations and rules. We have seen how this model has been used to analyze a number of different kinds of phonological phenomena, and I have given some guidance to the beginning phonologist as to how to start a phonological analysis of a language from scratch, based on primary fieldwork with a native speaker.

A look at the history of the field of phonology reveals many, many theories and versions of theories that have been proposed and have caught on in various circles. This chapter cannot possibly do justice to all of those theories, but it is to be hoped that the ideas presented here are of sufficient generality that they will be of some use regardless of the particular theoretical framework. Further, a main goal here has been to emphasize the critical importance of careful collection and presentation of primary linguistic data to any phonological analysis.

This section draws heavily on the discussion of Autosegmental Phonology in Odden (2005 : ch. 10).

More commonly, high and low tone autosegments are indicated by “H” and “L” respectively, rather than [+H tone] and [–H tone]. I am using the binary feature here to emphasize that the innovation of Autosegmental Theory vis-à-vis SPE is the segregation of the tone features from the segmental feature matrix, not a change in the feature used to describe tone. The issue of what the actual tone features are (i.e. what “H” and “L” stand for) is complicated and outside the scope of this chapter. See Yip (2002 : 39–64) for an overview and discussion of tone feature proposals in the literature.

For simplicity, I have been referring to tones being associated to “vowels.” However, it is more widely assumed that tones associate to some tone-bearing unit (TBU) that is not the vowel, but rather the mora or the syllable.

Data are from the dialect described in Paster (2010) . Note that in this dialect, the [+ATR] allophone of /a/ is [e]. Note also that in addition to the prefixes, some (but not all) suffixes also harmonize. I will not deal with the suffixes here.

The “+” symbol indicates a morpheme boundary, which accounts for the failure of ATR harmony within certain morphemes such as the 3pl subject prefix (as in, e.g. ´ɔmó-bìsá ‘they ask (hab.)’).

We know that the underlying form of the suffix is /-z/ rather than /-s/ because if it were /-s/, we would have to write a rule changing /s/ into [z] after a voiced segment, which would incorrectly apply to words like choice , impulse , horse , loss , etc. To avoid this problem one could write a special voicing rule that would apply only to the plural suffix, but then we would miss the generalization that the 3sg present tense suffix (as in wishes , walks , goes ) behaves identically to the plural suffix.

In fact, some phonologists view alternations as the only real function of the phonology, arguing that static distributional patterns of sounds in the lexicon are not actively managed by rules or constraints in the synchronic grammar (see especially Hale and Reiss 2008 ).

Some researchers choose to enter all their transcriptions into an electronic database using software such as Excel or Shoebox. Some of these programs create databases that are searchable in such a way that a researcher could find a root ending in Vp relatively quickly during a session. Regardless, it is still essential to plan phonological elicitation sessions in advance in as much detail as possible. Computers freeze, and even quick database searches can take up a non-trivial amount of time in a session when added together.

See Isac and Reiss (2008) for elucidating discussion of this point. Incidentally, this “same language/different grammars” problem provides a good argument for relying on data from a single speaker when describing a phonological system (even if the data are checked against other speakers to be sure that the primary consultant does not have some speech impediment or quirk that prevents him/her from being a good representative of the speech community). For the same reason, it is also best not to commingle one’s own elicited data from second-hand published data from a different speaker in the description of a single language—even if the speakers are of the same gender, age, and hometown.

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How to Analyse your Audience for a Speech

March 2, 2021 - Sophie Thompson

This article will teach you how to perform audience analysis for your speech or presentation and the different types of audience you might encounter. The type of audience affects the choice of language, humour, opening sentences, length and many more.

Here is a great overview from the University of Pittsburgh :

Audience analysis involves identifying the audience and adapting a speech to their interests, level of understanding, attitudes, and beliefs. Taking an audience-cantered approach is important because a speaker’s effectiveness will be improved if the presentation is created and delivered in an appropriate manner. Identifying the audience through extensive research is often difficult, so audience adaptation often relies on the healthy use of imagination.

Four types of audience

This audience does not want to be listening to you. This could be for many reasons, from not liking the organisation you are representing, to wanting to get home and watch their favourite TV show.

They can be openly hostile and disagree with you. If audience analysis shows that you’ll be faced with this audience (e.g. you have the last slot of a busy day of presentation), consider the following:

Work hard on developing trust and interest
Construct your presentation from an area of agreement or point of disagreement
Use plenty of references and data to back up your points
Challenge them, ask questions during your speech and engage them

Speaking to a hostile audience? Make sure you understand the type of audience you will be up against and build you speech accordingly.

2. Critical

Often at technical conferences, you get critical people who believe they are extremely intelligent and relish the thought of proving part of your presentation incorrect. Use the following techniques:

Use lots of evidence with strong references
Argue both sides of the case, clearly stating pros and cons of each
Try not to exaggerate, keep to the facts

3. Uninformed

This is the most common type of audience you will encounter. They might know a little about your presentation topic but certainly not in great detail.

Open up with questions so you can understand the level of knowledge on your topic
Spend a few slides going over the basics of your topic
Use simple language and avoid acronyms
Give basic facts and try to relate information to something people understand (e.g. if talking about space and using huge numbers, relate them to things people can comprehend)

4. Sympathetic

This audience is willing to listen and wants to be there. They can be interested in your topic, excited to see you talk (you might be a well-known figure in your speaking field), have an emotional attachment – these people are the easiest to persuade.

Use the state of this audience to ask for help / funding etc.
Trigger emotions which powerful stories

People checking their watches? Make sure you understand the situation your audience is in. If your presentation is the last of the day, you’ll most likely have a hostile audience. Take this into account and structure your speech accordingly.

Different personalities in a meeting

The following section discusses the four types of audience personalities and an audience analysis on them.

Scrupulous about preparation before and after meetings
Arrives on time, keeps to time and prevents drift
Takes very detailed minutes and listens intently
Reflects on discussion, makes considered contributions
Drives decision making and ensures time is not wasted
Cuts across distractions and leads meetings well
Manages difficult people assertively
Ensures the action plan is implemented
Builds rapport easily and connects people together
Remembers coffee, cake and connects people together
Averts conflict, when it threatens
Supports the team and leader fully
Entertains, engages when in the limelight
Challenges old way of thinking
Generates creative ideas and opens new possibilities
Tells the truth, brings on debate, breaks through niceties

Features of each personality:

Analytical – 100% accurate, chronology, don’t rush, focus on facts, internally focussed, distant from others, systematic, critical

Driver – 100% task, headlines, don’t waste time, focus on action, future focused, leading others, quick to decide, impatient

Amiable – 100% social, relationships, don’t intimidate, focus on feelings, present focused, asks questions, dislike conflict, support, kind

Expressive – 100% impulsive, vision & ideas, don’t limit, focus on themes, externally focused, makes statements, competitive & chaotic, unpredictable, energetic

How to gauge the audiences interest

Greet people before your speech.

This is a great way to perform early audience analysis. If possible, stand near the entrance and greet people as they come in. Ask them questions to gauge their level of knowledge and expectations. Example questions can be “what industry are working in?” and “how long they have been working at…”

Call and Response Technique

Ask carefully prepared questions at the beginning of you speech to understand the mood and experience of the audience. You could ask “Raise your hand if you have used a virtual reality headset before” for example.

Research the Event

Read up about the conference you are attending. Find out what the other presentations are about and how they might relate to your speech to give you a head start on audience analysis. This gives you an idea of how technical and prepared your audience might be.

For additional information on understanding your audience and audience analysis, read:

Know your Audience: What it Takes to Persuade, Inspire and Motivate them
Public Speaking: Know Your Audience

Key audience analysis factors

Audience expectations.

Different audiences can have completely different expectations about the topics and speaker. Ignoring these differences can have a negative effect on your speech. Imagine that you’re asked to speak at the memorial service for a close friend.

The audience will expect your speech to praise the life of the deceased. If you start talking about the flaws of the person, the audience is likely to react badly to it.

Knowledge of topic

You need to find out how much your audience already knows about your topic as an audiences knowledge can vary widely. Two ways to achieve this could be:

Research who else is speaking at the event and the topics they are presenting (if it’s been made public)
Gauge the type of people who will attend using the event website or social media profiles

Never overestimate the audience’s knowledge of a topic. If you start speaking about complex algorithms for robotics, but the listeners are not familiar with basic genetics, they’ll quickly lose interest and find something to distract themselves with.

On the other hand, drastically underestimating the audience’s knowledge may result in a speech that sounds condescending.

Presentation setting, such as what time you are presenting and style of the conference room, will influence audience’s ability and desire to listen.

Finding out ahead of time the different environment and situational factors. This will give you plenty of time to prepare for an audience of 1000 when you were expecting 50. You want to understand whether there will be a stage, where your slides will be shown, what technology is available to you, who is presenting before you and other factors.

Take into account the way that the setting will affect audience attention and participation. If you’re scheduled to speak at the end of the day, you’ll have to make the speech more entertaining and appear more enthusiasm to keep their attention.

Read more about how to speak to an unruly crowd if you’re stuck with an end of day presentation slot.

Audience size

Your speech will change depending on the size of the audience. In general, the larger the audience the more formal the presentation should be. Using everyday language when speaking to a group of 5 people is often appropriate.

However, you’ll need a well throughout structure and literary techniques when talking to 500 people. Large audiences often require that you use a microphone and speak from an elevated platform.

Attitude toward topic

Being able to understand the audiences attitudes about a topic will help you connect with them. Imagine you’re trying to convince people at a town hall to build a new college. You’ll be inclined to spend the majority of the speech giving reasons why a college would benefit the town.

If you find that the major worry was how much this would cost students, you can talk more about funding available to the students. The persuasive power of the speech is therefore directed at the most important obstacle to the building the college.

Demographics

The demographic factors of an audience include:

Ethnic background
Job or Career

These categories often underpin the individuals experiences and beliefs, so you should tailor your speech accordingly. Presenting at a conference in London will be a very different experience to presenting in Shanghai. The structure of your speech and words you use will probably be very different.

Using demographic factors to guide speech-making does not mean changing the goal of the speech for every different audience; rather, consider what pieces of information will be most important for members of different demographic groups.

Voluntariness

Audiences are either hostile, critical, uninformed or sympathetic. Knowing the difference will assist in establishing the content of your speech. It’s very hard to generate and maintain interest with a hostile audience. You’ll definitely want to know if you’re up against this so you can plan ahead for it.

Egocentrism

Most audience members are interested in things that directly affect them or their company. An effective speaker must be able to show their audience why the topic they are speaking on should be important to them.

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Conversation analysis.

Jack Sidnell Jack Sidnell University of Toronto
https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199384655.013.40
Published online: 03 March 2016

Conversation analysis is an approach to the study of social interaction and talk-in-interaction that, although rooted in the sociological study of everyday life, has exerted significant influence across the humanities and social sciences including linguistics. Drawing on recordings (both audio and video) naturalistic interaction (unscripted, non-elicited, etc.) conversation analysts attempt to describe the stable practices and underlying normative organizations of interaction by moving back and forth between the close study of singular instances and the analysis of patterns exhibited across collections of cases. Four important domains of research within conversation analysis are turn-taking, repair, action formation and ascription, and action sequencing.

conversation
interaction
turn-taking
speech acts

Introduction

Conversation analysis (CA) is an approach to the study of social interaction that emerged through the collaborative research of Harvey Sacks, Emanuel Schegloff, Gail Jefferson, and their students in the 1960s and early 1970s. In 1974 , Sacks, Schegloff, and Jefferson published a landmark paper in Language titled, “A Simplest Systematics for the Organization of Turn-Taking for Conversation.” Not only did this paper lay out an account of turn-taking in conversation and provide a detailed exemplification of the conversation analytic method, it also articulated with concerns in linguistics and brought CA to the attention of linguists and others engaged in the scientific study of language. The paper remains the most cited and the most downloaded paper ever published in the history of the journal (Joseph, 2003 , see also Google citation index ). Since the publication of the turn-taking paper, researchers in this area have continued to identify ways in which the study of conversation and social interaction relates to the concerns of linguistic science.

Interaction as the Home of Language

An underlying, guiding assumption of research in conversation analysis is that the home environment of language is co-present interaction and that its structure is in some basic ways adapted to that environment. This distinguishes CA from much of linguistic science, which generally understands language to have its home in the human mind and to reflect in its structure the organization of mind. For the most part these can be seen as complementary rather than opposed perspectives (depending, perhaps on the model of mind involved). Language is both a cognitive and an interactional phenomenon, and its organization must certainly reflect this fact.

What do we mean by interaction or co-present interaction? Goffman (who supervised the PhD studies of both Sacks and Schegloff) described interaction as a normatively organized structure of attention (see inter alia 1957 , 1964 )—when people interact they are, however fleetingly, attending to one another’s attention. While drawing on these and other ideas from Goffman, conversation analysts tend to emphasize the fact that interaction is the arena for human action. In order to accomplish the business of everyday life—for instance checking to see that a neighbor received the newspaper, updating a friend about a recent event, asking for a ride to work—we interact with one another. Conversation analysis seeks to discover and describe (formally and in a rigorous, generalizable way) the underlying norms and practices that make interaction the orderly thing that it is. For instance, one fundamental aspect of the orderliness of interaction has to do with the distribution of opportunities to participate in it. How, that is, does a participant determine when it is her turn to speak, or her turn to listen? Another aspect of orderliness concerns the apparatus for addressing problems of hearing, speaking, or understanding. How, that is, do participants in conversation remedy problems that inevitably arise in the course of interaction and how do they do this in an effective yet efficient way, such that they are able to resume whatever activity they were engaged before the trouble arose? A third aspect of orderliness has to do with the way in which speakers produce, and recipients understand, stretches of talk so as constitute them as actions by which they can achieve their interactional goals. A final aspect of the orderliness of interaction has to do with the way these actions are organized into sequences in such a way as to construct an architecture of intersubjectivity—a basis for mutual understanding in conversation. Each of these four domains of conversational organization will be briefly sketched out and ways in which research in each area connects with the concerns of linguists and other scholars of language will be highlighted.

Turn-Taking

We can begin by noting, as the authors of Sacks et al. ( 1974 ) do, that there are various ways in which turn-taking for conversation (and indeed the distribution of opportunities to participate in interaction more generally) could be organized. For instance, turns could be pre-allocated so that every potential participant was entitled to talk for two minutes and the order of speakers was decided in advance (by their age, gender, status, first initial, height, weight, etc.). There are speech exchange systems (as Sacks et al., 1974 calls them) that operate more or less in this way, such as debate. But there are reasons that such a system would not work for conversation. If, for instance, we imagine that in such a system participants A, B, C, D each get an opportunity to talk and in that order, what will happen if B asks A a question? B now has to wait for C and D to speak before A can answer. But what if C and D also ask A a question? Or what if D does not hear the question that B has asked and so on? Of course, although this kind of pre-allocated system obviously won’t work for conversation, there are many other ways in which turn-taking might be organized (and, indeed, is organized for activities other than conversation). We need not review all the possibilities here. We can already see, in light of these considerations and common sense, that turn-taking for conversation must be organized locally , by the participants themselves. As Sacks et al. ( 1974 ) puts it, turn-taking in conversation is “locally managed, party-administered, interactionally controlled.”

The model these authors describe has two components and a set of “rules” that coordinate their operation. The “turn constructional component” determines the shape and extent of possible turns by specifying a sharply delimited set of units from which turns can be composed. Specifically, in English, turn constructional units (TCUs) can be lexical items, phrases, clauses, and sentences. In the following case, Shelley’s declaratively formatted question at line 01, “you were at the Halloween thing.” is a sentential TCU while her “the Halloween party” at line 03 is a phrasal TCU. Debbie’s turns at lines 02 and 04 are lexical TCUs.

(1) Debbie & Shelley

Instances of these TCUs “allow a projection of the unit-type under way, and what, roughly, it will take for an instance of that unit-type to be completed” (Sacks et al., 1974 , p. 702). This feature of projectability allows a recipient to anticipate possible completion of the current TCU and to target this “point of possible completion” as a place to begin his or her own talk. We can see how this works in example (1). Debbie is able to position her talk at line 02 so that it begins just as Shelley reaches possible completion and, in the case of line 04, just before Shelley reaches possible completion. As Sacks et al. write “we find sequentially appropriate starts by next speakers after turns composed of single-word, single-phrase, or single-clause constructions, with no gap—i.e., with no waiting for possible sentence completion” (Sacks et al., 1974 , p. 702). The precise timing of these starts thus provides evidence for the projectability of possible completion of a TCU. At the same time the fact that participants target these points as appropriate places to begin their own talk indicates that such points are treated as transition-relevant. Points of possible completion constitute transition relevance places (TRPs), which are, as Schegloff ( 1992 , p. 116) puts it, “discrete places in the developing course of a speaker’s talk ( . . . ) at which ending the turn or continuing it, transfer of the turn or its retention become relevant.”

The “turn allocation component” specifies techniques by which turns are allocated among parties to a conversation. For current purposes the most important of these techniques are those by which a current speaker selects a next speaker. A basic technique in this respect involves combining an address term (or other method of address such as directed gaze) with a sequence-initiating action such as a question, request, invitation, complaint, and so on. Consider (2), in which Michael and Nancy are guests for dinner at the home of Shane and Vivian. In the fragment below, Michael addresses his talk to Nancy by using her name (or a short from of it) and produces a question that is also a request. In this way he selects her to speak next, which she does at line 03.

(2) Chicken Dinner p. 3 (Address term)

According to Sacks et al. ( 1974 ), a set of rules coordinates the use of the turn constructional and turn allocation component. These rules apply at the first transition relevance place of any turn.

Rule 1 C= current speaker, N= next speaker (a) If C selects N in current turn, then C must stop speaking, and N must speak next, transition occurring at the first possible completion after N-selection. (b) If C does not select N, then any party (other than C) may self-select at a first point of possible completion, first speaker gaining rights to the next turn. (c) If C has not selected N, and no other party self-selects under option (b), then C may (but need not) continue (i.e., claim rights to a further TCU).

Rule 2 applies at all subsequent TRPs: When Rule 1(c) has been applied by C, then at the next TRP Rules 1 (a)–(c) apply, and recursively at the next TRP, until speaker change is effected.

This “simplest systematics” allows us to see how turn-taking in ordinary conversation is accomplished in such a way as to minimize both gap and overlap. It also allows us to see why (and to predict where) many cases of overlap occur. Consider (3).

Here Tourist’s turn at line 01, being formatted as a polar interrogative, selects some other party who is knowledgeable about the park. Parky is the first to respond and his answer is precision timed to begin at just the point where Tourist’s turn reaches completion. Parky’s turn does not select a next speaker and, after a delay of one second, Old man self-selects, elaborating the answer that Parky has provided. Parky apparently means to agree with this elaboration and produces a turn (line 06) that is, again, precisely timed to begin at just the point that Old man reaches possible completion with no gap and no overlap. However, we can see that the talk at line 06 is in fact Parky’s third attempt to articulate the agreement. What is important to see for present purposes is that the first two attempts to self-select actually target points of possible, though not actual, completion within the emerging course of Old man’s turn. That is to say, “Th’ Fun fair changed it” is in fact a possibly complete turn in this context, as is “Th’ Fun fair changed it’n ahful lot.” This example, which is in no way unusual, provides clear evidence that Parky is able to parse the talk as it emerges so as to project points of possible completion within it and thus be prepared to begin his own turn at just these places. Overlap of the kind produced here provides further evidence of the projectability of possible completion and, moreover, of the fact that participants orient to such possible completion as transition relevant.

Two implications of what has so far been said are first, the turn-taking system for conversation operates over only two turn constructional units at a time: current and next. Second, a current speaker is initially entitled to produce only one TCU and at the first point of possible completion transition to a next speaker becomes a relevant possibility. Thus, if a current speaker is to talk for more than one TCU, some effort to secure additional opportunity will have to be made. One set of practices involves foreclosing the possibility of another self-selecting at possible completion by, for instance, reducing the extent and recognizability of that point of possible completion. Another practice involves issuing a bid to produce a longer stretch of talk. If the other participants buy in and provide a go-ahead response to such a bid, the result is to effectively suspend the association between possible completion and transition relevance for the duration of the telling. So, for example, when speakers produce stories they often begin with a short sequence in which a bid is made with “Guess what happened to me today?” and a recipient responds with “What.” etc. (see Sidnell, 2010 ). Another implication of the foregoing discussion is that the turn-taking mechanism for ordinary conversation is, as Goodwin ( 1979 ) writes, “coercive” rather than “permissive.” A number of other models of turn-taking propose that speakers employ “turn-ending signals” or “completion cues,” and that a listener must wait to hear one of these cues before beginning his or her own talk. Such a system would be “permissive” in that it would allow a current speaker to continue talk as long he or she wished. But the system described by Sacks et al. ( 1974 ) is not like this. Rather it is “spring-loaded” with a number of pressures encouraging shorter turns, most important the fact that a current a speaker is initially entitled to produce only a single TCU.

This analysis of turn-taking draws upon basic ideas about language structure. For instance, in their description of the turn-constructional component, the authors of Sacks et al. ( 1974 ) suggest that grammar plays a key role in determining what can count as a possible TCU—these are lexical items, phrases, clauses, sentences. Subsequent researchers have developed these ideas and have sought to determine the relative role of intonation, prosody, grammar, and pragmatics in shaping possible completion (see Ford, Fox, & Thompson, 1996 ). Other research has addressed the question of whether the turn-taking system described by Sacks et al. ( 1974 ) applies to English only or, rather, applies generally to all languages (see, e.g., Sidnell, 2001 ). Stivers et al. ( 2009 ) draws on a sample of 10 languages, showing that there was clear evidence in all of them for a general avoidance of overlapping talk and a minimization of silence between conversational turns. Focusing on transitions between Yes-No (or polar) questions and their responses, Stivers et al. provides evidence that in all the languages they compared the same factors account for the variation in speed of response. Answers were produced with significantly less delay than non-answer responses. Within the set of answers, those that were confirmations were delivered with less delay than those that were disconfirmations. When a response included a visible (nonverbal) component this was produced with less delay than those responses without. Finally, in 9 of the 10 languages studied, responses were delivered faster if the speaker was looking at the recipient while asking the question. This study then also provides strong evidence that turn-taking for conversation is organized in ways that are independent of the language being spoken.

A second important area of research within conversation analysis concerns the systematically organized set of practices of “repair” that participants use to address troubles of speaking, hearing, and understanding. Episodes of repair are composed of parts (Schegloff, 1997 ; Schegloff, Jefferson, & Sacks, 1977 ). A repair initiation marks a “possible disjunction with the immediately preceding talk,” while a repair outcome results either in a “solution or abandonment of the problem” (Schegloff, 2000 , p. 207). That problem, the particular segment of talk to which the repair is addressed, is termed the “trouble source” or “repairable.”

Repair can be initiated either by the speaker of the repairable item or by some other participant (e.g., the recipient). Likewise the repair itself can be done either by the speaker of the trouble source or someone else. In describing the organization of repair it is usual to use the term “self” for the speaker of the trouble source and “other” for any other participant. Thus we can identify cases of self-initiated, self-repair (see [4]), other-initiated, self-repair (see [5]) and self-initiated, other-repair, etc. In these examples, the arrow labeled (a) indicates the position of the repairable item or “trouble source,” the arrow labeled (b) indicates the position of the repair initiator, and the arrow labeled (c) indicates the position of the repair or correction.

(4) XTR (1.2)

We can immediately see that the components of the repair episode (a, b, c) cluster in one turn in (4), whereas in (5) they are distributed across a sequence of three turns. In (4) we see that B initiates repair with a cut-off on “Fri:-” and then subsequently provides the repair by replacing what was presumably going to be “on Friday” with “on Sunday.” Several other observations are that the word to be replaced is framed by repeated material (“on”), and that the problem is pre-monitored by delay (“ah” in line 02). In (5) when Guy asks for the first time “Is Cliff dow:n by any chance?=do you know?” Jon responds not with an answer to the question (which it can be observed he knows) but rather with “↑Ha:h?” thereby indicating trouble with some aspect of what Guy has said and initiating repair of the prior turn. In response, Guy re-asks the question, hesitating slightly before substituting “Brown” for “Cliff” (a surname for a first name). At line 06 Jon answers the question, affirmatively, saying “Yeah he’s down.” (“down” here refers to being at the beach rather than in town).

When repair is initiated by a participant other than the speaker of the trouble source, this is typically done in the turn subsequent to that which contains the trouble-source by one of the available next-turn-repair-initiators (NTRI). The various NTRIs “have a natural ordering, based on their relative strength or power on such parameters as their capacity to locate a repairable.” (Schegloff et al., 1977 , p. 369). At one end of the scale, NTRIs such as what? and huh? indicate only that a recipient has detected some trouble in the previous turn; they do not locate any particular repairable component within that turn. Question words such as who , where , when are more specific in that they indicate what part of speech is repairable (e.g., who —a person referring noun phrase, etc.). The power of such question words to locate trouble in a previous turn is increased when appended to a partial repeat. Repair may also be initiated by a partial repeat without any question word.

Recent research has sought to describe the linguistic practices and resources used in initiating repair from a cross-linguistic, comparative perspective. Fox, Hayashi, and Jasperson ( 1996 ) notes differences between self-repair in English and Japanese and links these to the different “syntactic practices” of the two languages. The authors of Hayashi and Hayano ( 2013 ) describe a particular format used in Japanese conversation, which they term “proferring an insertable element” (PIE), in which a next speaker articulates a candidate understanding of the prior utterance, but does so with an item that is understood to be inserted into rather than appended onto the preceding turn. In a comparison of a diverse set of languages, Dingemanse, Blythe, and Dirksmeyer ( 2014 ) describes various formats for other to initiate repair, suggesting that, “different languages make available a wide but remarkably similar range of linguistic resources for this function,” noting that repair initiation formats are adapted to deal with different contingencies of trouble in interaction. Specifically, repair initiation formats respond to the problems of characterizing the trouble encountered, managing responsibility for the trouble and displaying their speaker’s understanding of the distribution of knowledge. Thus a form such as “huh?” indicates trouble but does not characterize it, includes no on-record position with respect to responsibility for the trouble, and also claims no knowledge of what has been said. In contrast, a repair initiation format such as “you mean the one around the corner?” locates (e.g., the expression “the coffee stand”) and characterizes (as a problem of reference or understanding) the trouble. Although such a format again includes no explicit indication of which participant is responsible for the trouble, it nevertheless suggests that the one initiating repair takes responsibility for finding a solution. And, finally, by displaying an understanding (candidate) of what has been said, it thereby shows that its speaker is knowledgeable in this respect (and has heard what was said).

Action in Interaction

A basic question addressed by research within linguistic pragmatics concerns how saying something can count as doing something. Much of the work in this area has drawn on the ideas of John Searle and others who have argued for a solution to the problem based on a theory of speech acts. While there are different versions of the theory, some common assumptions seem to be that actions are relatively discrete and can therefore be classified or categorized. Applied to interaction, the theory suggests that recipients listen for cues (or clues) that allow for the identification of whatever act the talk is meant to be doing (e.g., greeting, complaining, requesting, inviting). Moreover, the theory seems to presume a closed set or inventory of actions that are cued by a delimited range of linguistic devices. On this formulation, the basic problem to be accounted for by scholars of interaction is how participants are able to recognize so quickly what action is being done (see Levinson, 2012 ). As we have already seen, participants in interaction are able to respond to prior turns with no waiting, no gap, and so on (indeed they routinely respond in overlap). Operating with the standard assumptions of psycholinguistics (i.e., that speech recognition and language comprehension requires “processing time,” that speech production requires “planning time,” and so on), this creates something of a mystery—how are participants able not only to parse the turn at talk into TCUs (and thereby anticipate points of possible completion), but also to recognize what action is being done in and through those TCUs, and somehow be prepared to respond to that action with little or no latency (indeed, in cases of overlapped response, with less than zero latency).

Sidnell and Enfield ( 2014 ) offers a critique of the underlying assumptions of speech act theory applied to action in interaction describing it as a “binning” approach,

in which the central problem is taken to involve recipients of talk (or other participants) sorting the stream of interactional conduct into the appropriate categories or bins. . . . These accounts appear to involve a presumption about the psychological reality of action types that is somewhat akin to the psychological reality of phonemes. . . . That is, for the binning account to be correct, there must be an inventory of actions just as there is a set of phonemes in a language. Each token bit of conduct would be put into an appropriate pre-existing action-type category. The binning approach thus also suggests that it would be reasonable to ask how many actions there are. But we think that to ask how many actions there are is more like asking how many sentences there are.

An alternative account treats “action” as, always, a formulation or a construal of some configuration of practices in interaction. For the most part, formulations are not required to ensure the orderly flow of interaction. Participants respond on the fly and infer what a speaker is doing from a broad range of evidence. However, on occasion (such as in some cases of reported speech and in some cases of third position repair), a speaker formulates, using the vernacular metalinguistic terms available to her, the action that she or another participant is understood to have accomplished (e.g., “I requested that he get off the table!,” “I’m not asking you to come down, I’m just saying you’re welcome if you want,” etc.). And, of course, in various kinds of post hoc reporting contexts and in scholarly analysis, persons outside of an interaction routinely formulate the actions that were done within it. So an alternative to the binning or speech act account is one in which producing an “action” (in quotation marks to indicate that this is merely a heuristic use of the word) involves putting together, configuring, or orchestrating a range of distinct practices of conduct to allow for the inference that the speaker is doing “x” or “y” where “x” or “y” are possible formulations or descriptions.

It is often suggested by conversation analysts that there is no necessary “one-to-one mapping” between a given practice of speaking (e.g., “do you want me to come over and get her?”) and some specific action (such as “an offer”), and this is usually taken to imply a many-to-one relation running in both directions; that is, there are multiple practices available to accomplish any given action, and any given practice can, in context, be understood to accomplish a range of different actions (see, e.g., Schegloff, 1997 ; Sidnell, 2010 ). But, while this is no doubt true (insofar as the terms in which it formulates the problem are adequate, e.g., “context,” “an action,” etc.), matters are a good deal more complicated than this, because any determination of “what a speaker is doing” is an inference from a complex putting together of distinct practices of composition and positioning.

Levinson ( 2012 ), puzzled as to how recipients are seemingly able to determine what action is being done so early on in the production of a turn and somehow able to respond without delay, distinguishes two major types of information that can be gleaned from a turn-at-talk. On the one hand there is the “front-loaded” information of prosody (e.g., pitch reset), gaze, and turn-initial tokens (such as “oh,” “look,” “well,” and so on) that can potentially tip off the recipient as to what is being done. On the other hand there is the detailed linguistic information that is revealed only as the turn-at-talk unfolds. This includes much of the information available through grammatical formatting (e.g., morphological cues, syntactic inversion, imperative forms, etc.), as well as through richly informative linguistic formulations (e.g., “the deal,” “my boss,” “stupid trial thing,” etc.). While Levinson thus recognizes that the passage from a turn-at-talk to “action” involves a recipient putting together various strands of evidence, he argues that the solution must involve a delimited inventory of actions, recognition of which these practices, solely or in combination, are able to trigger. Alternatively, Sidnell and Enfield ( 2014 ) argue that a model involving inference from a complex set of features implies an inevitable degree of indeterminacy in action ascription, which is always merely an inference from evidence. For the most part, participants in interaction get along just fine, such inference-based action ascriptions are good enough for all practical purposes and, because no formulation is typically required, problems typically do not arise.

It is well established in CA that one can look to subsequent turns in order to ground an analysis of previous ones—this is called the “next turn proof procedure” (Sacks et al., 1974 ). In the analysis of single cases we can ground our analysis of some turn as, for instance, an “accusation” by looking to see how the recipient responds to it (e.g., with an excuse or justification). Sacks et al. ( 1974 ) proposes along these lines that:

while understandings of other turns’ talk are displayed to co-participants, they are available as well to professional analysts, who are thereby afforded a proof criterion . . . for the analysis of what a turn’s talk is occupied with. Since it is the parties’ understandings of prior turns’ talk that is relevant to their construction of next turns, it is their understandings that are wanted for analysis. The display of those understandings in the talk of subsequent turns affords both a resource for the analysis of prior turns and a proof procedure for professional analyses of prior turns—resources intrinsic to the data themselves.

This “data-internal evidence” is used, for instance, to ground the claim that when Debbie says “what is the deal” in line 15 of example (6), which comes from the opening of a telephone call, she is not simply asking a question but is, in doing so, accusing Shelley of wrong-doing:

(6) Debbie and Shelley

“What is the deal” is hearable as an accusation, as conveying that Shelley has done or is otherwise responsible for something that Debbie is unhappy about. What aspects of the talk convey that? First, the positioning of the question, pre-empting “how are you” type inquiries, provides for a hearing of this as “abrupt” and in some sense interruptive of the usual niceties with which a call’s opening is typically occupied (e.g., “how are you?”). Second, by posing a question that requires Shelley to figure out what is meant by “the deal,” Debbie thereby suggests that Shelley should already know what she is talking about and thus that there is something in the “common ground,” something to which both Debbie and Shelley are already attending (have “on their minds”). Third, by selecting the idiom “the deal” Debbie reveals her stance toward what she is talking about as “a problem” or as something that she is not happy about. Fourth, with the prosody, including the stress on “is” so that it is not contracted, the emphasis on “dea::l.” and the apparent pitch reset with which the turn begins conveys, Debbie conveys heightened emotional involvement. Putting all this together we can hear in what Debbie says here something other than a simple request for information—this is an accusation. It seems clear that Debbie is upset and the implication is that Shelley is responsible for this. But how can we ground the analysis of the turn in question in the displayed orientations of the participants themselves? To do this we look to Shelley’s response.

That Shelley hears in this more than a simple question is evidenced first by her plea of innocence with “whadayou ↑mean.” and secondly by her excuse. All other-initiations of repair indicate that the speaker has encountered a trouble of hearing or understanding in the previous turn. Among these “What do you mean” appears specifically adapted to indicate a problem of understanding based on presuppositions about common ground (Hayashi, Raymond, & Sidnell, 2013 ). Here “what do you mean?,” which is produced with a noticeably higher pitch, suggests Shelley does not understand what Debbie means by the clearly allusive, in-the-know expression, “the deal.” More narrowly, it conveys that the expression “what is the deal” has asked Shelley to search for a possible problem that she is perhaps responsible for, and that no such problem can be identified. It is thus hearable as claiming “innocence.”

When Debbie redoes the question, in response to the initiation of repair by “What do you mean,” she does it with a yes-no (polar) question that strongly suggests she already knows the answer. “You’re not going to go” is what Pomerantz ( 1988 ) calls a candidate answer question that presents, in a declarative format, to Shelley what Debbie suspects is the answer, and requests confirmation of this. This then reveals the problem that Debbie had in mind and meant to refer to by “the deal.” And when Shelley responds to the repaired question she does so with what is recognizable as an excuse. This is a “type non-conforming” response (i.e., one that contains no “yes” or “no” token; see Raymond, 2003 ), in which Shelley pushes the responsibility for not going (which is implied, not stated) onto “her boss” (invoking the undeniable obligations of work in the district attorney’s office), and suggesting that the obstacle here is an inconvenience for her (as well as for Debbie) by characterizing the impediment to her participation as a “stupid trial-thing.”

Clearly, as the quote from Sacks et al. ( 1974 ) makes clear and as the foregoing discussion is meant to explicate, the most important data-internal evidence we have comes in subsequent talk . In the case we have considered, subsequent talk reveals how Shelley herself understood the talk that has been addressed to her because this understanding is embodied in the way she responds.

It is important to clarify what exactly is being claimed. Subsequent talk, and data internal evidence, allow us to ground the analysis of this question—“What is the deal”—as projecting an accusation of Shelley by Debbie. It does not , however, tell us what specific features of the talk cue, convey, or carry that complaint/accusation. As the pioneers of conversation analysis demonstrated, in order to address that question, the question as to which specific features or practices provide for an understanding of what a given turn is doing, we need to look across different cases. We need to isolate these practices in order to discern their generic, context-free, cohort independent character. So case-by-case analysis (single case analysis using data-internal evidence) inevitably leaves us with a question—specifically, what particular aspects of a turn convey (allow for an inference as to) what the speaker is doing (i.e., what action is being done)? What are the particular practices of speaking that result in that consequence? What are the generic features of the practice that are independent of this particular context, situation, group of participants, etc.?

In order to attempt an answer to these questions we have to move beyond the analysis of a single case to look at multiple instances. However, and this is the key point in the context of the present discussion, when we do this we inevitably find that each practice that is put together with others in some particular instance (to effect some particular action outcome) can be used in other ways, combined with other practices, to result in other outcomes . We can take any particular “practice” from the Debbie and Shelley case and work out from there. We can look for questions that, like Debbie’s “What is the deal?,” occur in this position, pre-empting what normatively happens in the opening turns of a telephone call. If we do this we find that some are like this one and seem to deliver or imply an accusation, but others do not. We can look at other cases in which a speaker refers to something as “the deal” or asks “what is the deal” and again find some cases in which an accusation is inferred but others in which it is not. And we can find other instances in which similar prosody is used in the formation of a question or instances in which a question is delivered with an initial pitch reset. The result is always the same: no single feature is associated with some particular outcome. The conclusion we must then draw is that “action” is an inference from a diverse set of pieces of evidence that a speaker puts together or orchestrates within a single TCU or utterance (see also Robinson, 2007 ).

Action Sequencing

As we have already seen, in conversation, actions are organized into sequences. The most basic form such sequences can take is as a set of two paired actions, a first and a second, known as an adjacency pair . For instance, production of a question establishes a next position within which an answer is relevant and expected next. In order to capture this aspect of organization, Schegloff ( 1968 , p. 1083) introduced the concept of conditional relevance :

By the conditional relevance of one item on another we mean: given the first, the second is expectable; upon its occurrence it can be seen to be a second item to the first; upon its nonoccurrence it can be seen to be officially absent—all this provided by the occurrence of the first item.

Although questions are not always followed by answers, the conditional relevance that a question activates ensures that participants will inspect any talk that responds to a question to see if and how it might be an answer, or might account for why an answer is not being produced. In response to questions the most common account for not answering is “I don’t know.” So, in the following, when Guy asks Jon if a mutual acquaintance might like to go golfing with them, Jon replies with “I don’t know,” and follows up by suggesting that he “go by and see,” thereby indicating a willingness to obtain the information that has been requested.

(7) NB 1.1 1:05

So even where second speakers do not (for whatever reason) actually produce the second pair part that is called for, they typically exhibit some orientation to its relevance and often account for its non-occurrence and even, in some cases, apologize for an inability to deliver it. The same example also provides evidence that questioners orient to the conditional relevance exerted by sequence initiating action such as Guy’s “Think he’d like to go?” in line 07. Thus when Jon does not answer the question posed Guy reissues it at line 12 thereby pursuing a response.

Schegloff and Sacks ( 1973 ) identifies four defining characteristics of the adjacency pair. It is composed of two utterances that are:

Produced by different speakers.

Ordered as a first pair part (FPP) and second pair part (SPP).

“Typed”?, so that a particular first pair part provides for the relevance of a particular second pair part (or some delimited range of seconds, e.g., a complaint can be relevantly responded to by a remedy, an excuse, a justification, a denial, and so on).

Adjacency pairs are sequences composed of only two turns—a first and second pair part. But talk-in-interaction and conversation in particular is not composed solely of paired actions, produced one after the other. Rather, an adjacency pair may be expanded so as to result in a much more complex sequence. An adjacency pair can be expanded prior to the occurrence of its first part, after the occurrence of its first part but before the occurrence of its second, or after its second pair part. These expansions are themselves often built out of paired actions and can themselves serve as the bases upon which further expansion takes place.

Pre-expansions involve an expansion of a base adjacency pair prior to the occurrence of the first pair part and are preparatory to the action the base pair part is meant to accomplish. So, for instance, a pre-invitation “hey, are you busy tonight?” checks on the availability of the recipient. A pre-request such as “You wouldn’t happen to be going my way would you?” checks on the degree of inconvenience a projected request is likely to impose, and so on. Such pre-expansions check on a condition for the successful accomplishment of the base first pair part. Consider the following phone call excerpt:

(8) HS:STI,1

Judy’s “why” at line 07 displays an orientation to the preceding turn as something more than an information-seeking question and John’s answer at lines 8–11 confirms this inference.

As just noted, an adjacency pair consists of two adjacent utterances, with the second selected from some range of possibilities defined by the first. However, on some occasions, the two utterances of an adjacency pair are not, in fact, adjacent. In some cases this is because another sequence has been inserted between the first and second pair part of an adjacency pair. Such insert expansions can be divided into post-firsts and pre-seconds (Schegloff, 2007 ) according to the kind of interactional relevancy they address.

Post-expansions are highly variable with respect to their complexity. Schegloff ( 2007 ) suggests that they can be divided into minimal and non-minimal types. Minimal post-expansions consist of one turn. “Oh” for instance can occur after the response to a question, thereby registering that the questioner has been informed by that response and minimally expanding the sequence with a single turn of post-expansion. Other forms of post expansion are more elaborate and addressed to a range of interactional contingencies.

This brief overview of conversation analysis has discussed four domains of organization: turn-taking, repair, action formation, and action sequencing. Research in each of these four domains has consequences for our understanding of language and language structure (see Couper-Kuhlen & Selting, in press ; Thompson, Fox, & Couper-Kuhlen, 2015 ). While work to date has drawn connections primarily between linguistics and turn-taking and repair, there are obvious ways in which the work on action and action sequencing bears on the concerns of linguistics. For instance, work on action formation intersects with research within linguistics on mood and with the analysis of speech acts. Work on action sequencing bears on problems of anaphora resolution and inter-sentential grammatical relations. In order to fully explore these and other themes, we will likely require a robustly cross-linguistic, comparative, and interdisciplinary program of research.

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Aristotle’s Rhetoric

Aristotle’s Rhetoric has had an unparalleled influence on the development of the art of rhetoric. In addition to Aristotle’s disciples and followers, the so-called Peripatetic philosophers (see Fortenbaugh/Mirhady 1994), famous Roman teachers of rhetoric, such as Cicero and Quintilian, frequently used elements stemming from Aristotle’s rhetorical theory. These latter authors, however, were not primarily interested in a meticulous interpretation of Aristotle’s writings, but were rather looking for a conceptual framework for their own manuals of rhetoric. This is one of the reasons why for two millennia the interpretation of Aristotelian rhetoric has been pursued by those concerned primarily with the history of rhetoric rather than philosophy. This association with the rhetorical rather than with the philosophical tradition is also mirrored in the fact that in the most influential manuscripts and editions, the text of Aristotle’s Rhetoric (for its transmission see Kassel 1971) was surrounded by rhetorical works and speeches written by other Greek and Latin authors, and was thus seldom interpreted in the context of Aristotle’s philosophical works. It was not until the last few decades that the philosophically salient features of the Aristotelian rhetoric have been acknowledged (e.g. in the collections Furley/Nehamas 1994 and Rorty 1996; for a more general survey of scholarship in the 20th century see Natali 1994). Most notably, scholars became aware of the fact that Aristotle’s rhetorical analysis of persuasion draws on many concepts and ideas that are also treated in his logical, ethical, political and psychological writings, so that the Rhetoric became increasingly perceived as well-integrated part of the Aristotelian oeuvre. For example, Aristotle’s Rhetoric is inextricably connected with the history of ancient logic (see Allen 2008 and, more generally, ancient logic ) and is often taken as an important inspiration for modern argumentation theory (see van Eemeren 2013 and, more generally, dialogical logic ). Some authors have stressed the Rhetoric ’s affinity to Aristotle’s ethical theory (see e.g. Woerner 1990), while others were attracted by Aristotle’s rhetorical account of metaphor (see e.g. Ricoeur 1996 and, more generally, metaphor ). Most significantly, philosophers and scholars began to turn their attention to the Rhetoric ’s account of the passions or emotions, which is not only richer than in any other Aristotelian treatise, but was also seen as manifesting an early example of cognitive, judgement-based accounts of emotions (see e.g. Nussbaum 1996, Konstan 2006 and, more generally, §5 of emotion ).

1. Aristotle’s Works on Rhetoric

2. the structure of the rhetoric, 3. rhetoric as a counterpart to dialectic, 4.1 the definition of rhetoric, 4.2 what rhetoric is useful for, 4.3 can aristotle’s rhetoric be misused, 4.4 is aristotle’s conception of rhetoric normative, 5.1 persuasion through the character of the speaker, 5.2 persuasion through the emotions of the hearer, 5.3 persuasion through the argument itself, 5.4 is there an inconsistency in aristotle’s rhetorical theory, 6.1 the concept of enthymeme, 6.2 formal requirements, 6.3 enthymemes as dialectical arguments, 6.4 the brevity of the enthymeme, 6.5 different types of enthymemes, 7.1 the (lacking) definition of ‘ topos ’, 7.2 the word ‘ topos ’ and the technique of places, 7.3 the ingredients and the function of topoi, 7.4 rhetorical topoi, 8.1 the virtue of style, 8.2 aristotelian metaphors, glossary of selected terms, translations, editions and commentaries, collections, monographs and articles, other internet resources, related entries.

Judgemental and Non-Judgemental Accounts of Aristotelian Emotions
The Thesis that Enthymemes are Relaxed Inferences
The Brevity of the Enthymeme
The Variety of Topoi in the Rhetoric

The work that has come down to us as Aristotle’s Rhetoric or Art of Rhetoric consists of three books, while the ancient catalogue of the Aristotelian works, reported e.g. by Diogenes Laertius, mentions only two books on rhetoric (probably our Rhetoric I & II), plus two further books on style (perhaps our Rhetoric III?). Whereas most modern authors agree that at least the core of Rhetoric I & II presents a coherent rhetorical theory, the two themes of Rhetoric III (style/diction and the partition of speeches) are not mentioned in the original agenda of Rhetoric I & II. The conceptual link between Rhetoric I & II and Rhetoric III is not given until the very last sentence of the second book, so the authenticity of this seeming ad hoc connection is slightly suspicious; we cannot rule out the possibility that these two parts of the Rhetoric were not put together until the first complete edition of Aristotle’s works was accomplished by Andronicus of Rhodes in the first century. In Aristotle’s Poetics (1456a33) we find a cross-reference to a work called ‘ Rhetoric ’ which obviously refers only to Rhetoric I & II, but does not seem to include the agenda of Rhetoric III, suggesting that Aristotle at this time regards Rhetoric I & II as the complete work. Regardless of such doubts, the systematic idea that links the two heterogeneous parts of the Rhetoric — Rhetoric I & II on the one hand and Rhetoric III on the other— does make good sense: it is not enough, or so the linking passage says, to have a supply of things to say (the so-called ‘thought’); one should also know how to express or formulate those things (the so-called ‘style’), so that the project of Rhetoric I & II concerning what we say (or the ‘thought’) needs to be complemented by the peculiar project of Rhetoric III (i.e. a treatise on ‘style’).

The chronological fixing of the Rhetoric has turned out to be a delicate and controversial matter. At least the core of Rhetoric I & II seems to be an early work (see e.g. Düring 1966, 118–125, Rist 1989, 85–86, Rapp 2002 I, 178–184), written during Aristotle’s first stay in Athens (it is unclear, however, which chapters belong to that core; regularly mentioned are the chapters I.4–15 and II.1–17). It is true that the Rhetoric also refers to historical events that fall in the time of Aristotle’s exile and his second stay in Athens (see § 1 of Aristotle ), but most of them can be found in just two chapters, namely chapters II.23–24, and moreover such examples could have been updated, which is especially plausible if we assume that the Rhetoric formed the basis of a lecture course held several times. However, what is most striking are its affinities to the early work Topics (for the idea that the Topics is early see e.g. Solmsen 1929, 191–195; for a discussion of Solmsen’s theses in English see Stocks 1933); if, as is widely agreed nowadays, the Topics represents a pre-syllogistic stage of Aristotelian logic, the same is likely to be true of the Rhetoric , as we actually find only few or even no hints to syllogistic inventory in it. (Indeed, the Rhetoric includes two short passages that explicitly refer to the Analytics , which presents Aristotle’s syllogistic theory: I.2, 1357a22–1358a2, II.25, 1402b13–1403a16. Some authors — e.g. Solmsen 1929, 13–31, Burnyeat 1994, 31, Allen 2001, 20–40 — take this as evidence that at least in these two passages the Rhetoric makes use of the syllogistic theory, while others — e.g. Rapp 2002, II 202–204 — object to this inference.)

It seems that Aristotle was the author not only of the Rhetoric as we know it today, but of several treatises dealing with rhetoric. According to ancient testimonies, Aristotle wrote an early dialogue on rhetoric entitled ‘ Grullos ’, in which he put forward arguments for why rhetoric cannot be an art ( technê ); and since this is precisely the position of Plato’s Gorgias (see §4 of Plato: rhetoric and poetry ), the lost dialogue Grullos has traditionally been regarded as a sign of Aristotle’s (alleged) early Platonism (see Solmsen 1929, 196–208). But the evidence for the position defended in this dialogue is too tenuous to support such strong conclusions: it also could have been a ‘dialectical’ dialogue, simply listing the pros and cons of the thesis that rhetoric is an art (see Lossau 1974). We are in a similar situation concerning another lost work on rhetoric, the so-called ‘ Technê Sunagogê ’, a collection of previous theories of rhetoric that is also ascribed to Aristotle. Cicero seems to use this collection, or at least a secondary source relying on it, as his main historical source when he gives a short survey of the history of pre-Aristotelian rhetoric in his Brutus 46–48. Finally, Aristotle once mentions a work called ‘ Theodecteia ’ which has also been supposed to be Aristotelian; but more probably he refers to the rhetorical handbook of his follower Theodectes, who was also a former pupil of Isocrates. From these lost works on rhetoric we only have a meagre collection of scattered fragments (frg. 68–69 R 3 , 114 R 3 , 125–141 R 3 : see Rose 1886).

The structure of Rhetoric I & II is determined by two tripartite divisions. The first division consists in the distinction between the three pisteis , i.e. ‘persuaders’ or ‘means of persuasion’, that are technical in the sense that they are based on the rhetorical method and are provided by the speech alone. And speech can produce persuasion either through the character ( êthos ) of the speaker, the emotional state ( pathos ) of the listener, or the argument ( logos ) itself (see below § 5 ). The second tripartite division concerns the three species or genres of public speech (see de Brauw 2008 and Pepe 2013). A speech that takes place in the assembly is defined as a deliberative speech . In this rhetorical genre, the speaker either advises the audience to do something or warns against doing something. Accordingly, the audience has to judge things that are going to happen in the future, and they have to decide whether these future events are good or bad for the city or city-state ( polis ), whether they will cause advantage or harm. A speech that takes place before a court is defined as a judicial speech . The speaker either accuses somebody or defends herself or someone else. Naturally, this kind of speech treats things that happened in the past. The audience, or rather the jury, has to judge whether a past event actually happened or not and whether it was just or unjust, i.e., whether it was in accordance with the law or contrary to the law. While the deliberative and judicial genres have their context in controversial situations in which the listener has to decide in favour of one of two opposing parties, the third genre does not aim at such a decision: an epideictic speech (e.g. funeral speeches, celebratory speeches) praises or blames somebody, and tries to describe the affairs or deeds of its subject as honourable or shameful.

The first book of the Rhetoric treats these three genres in succession. Rhetoric I.4–8 deals with the deliberative, I.9 with the epideictic, I.10–14 with the judicial genre. These chapters are understood as contributing to the argumentative mode of persuasion ( logos ) or — more precisely — to that part of argumentative persuasion that is specific to the respective genre of speech. The second part of the treatment of argumentative persuasion ( logos ) that is common to all three genres of rhetorical speech is treated in chapters II.19–26. The second means of persuasion, the one that works by evoking the emotions of the audience ( pathos ), is described in chapters II.2–11. Although the following chapters II.12–17 treat different types of character ( êthos ), these chapters do not, as one might infer, develop the first means of persuasion, i.e. the one that depends on the character of the speaker. The underlying theory of this means of persuasion is rather unfolded in a few lines of chapter II.1. The aforementioned chapters II.12–17 rather account for different types of character and their disposition to emotional response, which can be useful for speakers who want to arouse the emotions of the audience. Why the chapters on the specific (in the first book) and the common (in the second book) argumentative means of persuasion ( logos ) are separated by the treatment of emotions and character (in II.2–17) remains a riddle, especially since the chapter II.18 tries to give a link between the specific and the common aspects of argumentative persuasion — as though this chapter follows directly upon the end of Rhetoric I. Rhetoric III.1–12 discusses several questions of style (see below § 8.1 ) while Rhetoric III.13–19 is dedicated to the various parts of a speech and their arrangement.

Owing to ambiguities like these, the structuring of the Rhetoric has always been somewhat controversial, since different attempts to structure the work manifest different interpretative decisions. By and large, though, the following structure seems to capture its main topics and divisions:

Ch. 1: Rhetoric as a counterpart to dialectic — dialectically conceived rhetoric is centred on proofs — rhetorical proofs are ‘enthymemes’ — this is neglected by previous manuals of rhetoric that focus instead on emotions, slandering and on other techniques for speaking outside the subject — “speaking outside the subject” is forbidden in states with good legislation — the benefits of rhetoric.
Through the speaker: credibility of the speaker ( êthos )
Through the hearer: the emotional state of the audience ( pathos )
Through the argument: proving or seemingly proving what is true ( logos )
Judicial (or forensic) speech deals with accusation and defence about past events — aiming at the just/unjust.
Deliberative (or political) speech deals with exhortation and dissuasion about future events — aiming at the advantageous/harmful.
Epideictic speech deals with praise and blame primarily with regard to the present time — aiming at the honourable/shameful.
Ch. 4–8: Premises or topoi specific to the deliberative speech: Types of advantageous/harmful things the speaker should be familiar with (Ch. 4) — Happiness ( eudaimonia ) (Ch. 5) — what is good/advantageous (Ch. 6) — what is better/more advantageous (Ch. 7) — the various constitutions (Ch. 8).
Ch. 9: Premises or topoi specific to the epideictic speech: virtue and vice — the honourable and the blameworthy.
Ch. 10–14: Premises or topoi specific to the judicial speech: wrong-doing and motives for wrong-doing (Ch. 10) — pleasure (Ch. 11) — the state of mind of the wrong-doers and characteristics of their victims (Ch. 12) — kinds of just and unjust deeds, unwritten laws (Ch. 13) — degrees of wrong-doing (Ch. 14).
Ch. 15: Artless means of persuasion (i.e. means that cannot be invented by the art, but are just given — such as contracts, laws, witnesses, oaths, torture — and need to be used in one way or the other), mostly connected with judicial speech.

Rhetoric II

Ch. 1: Why persuasion through logos is insufficient — how persuasion through êthos and pathos is supposed to work.
Ch. 2–11: Particular types of emotions ( pathê ) and their counterparts: anger (Ch. 2) — mildness (Ch. 3) — loving/friendly affection ( philia ) and hating (Ch. 4) — fear and confidence (Ch. 5) — shame and lack of shame (Ch. 6) — gratefulness and lack of gratefulness (Ch. 7) — pity (Ch. 8) — indignation plus two nameless emotions (Ch. 9) — envy (Ch. 10) — emulation or ambition (Ch.11).
Ch. 12–17: Different types of character ( êthos ): the character of young people (Ch. 12), of elderly people (Ch. 13), of people in the prime of their life (Ch. 14), of people of noble birth (Ch. 15), of wealthy people (Ch. 16) and of powerful people (Ch. 18).
Ch. 18: Transition to generally applicable aspects of persuasion through logos :
Ch. 19–25: Generally applicable aspects of persuasion through logos : topoi about the possible/impossible, past and future facts, significance and insignificance (Ch. 19) — examples: factual (report) and fictitious (the parable and the fable) (Ch. 20) — maxims (Ch. 21) — the enthymeme (Ch. 22) — topoi for the construction of enthymemes (Ch. 23) — topoi for the construction of merely apparent (i.e. fallacious) enthymemes (Ch. 24) — refutation (Ch. 25).
Ch. 26: Amplification — transition to Rhetoric III.

Rhetoric III , Ch. 1–12: Style ( lexis ):

Ch. 1: Delivery of a speech and why style/diction should be considered.
Ch. 2–3: The virtue and the vices of prose style: the excellent prose style is neither too banal nor above the due dignity, but appropriate — the choice of words — the role of metaphors (Ch. 2) — Four deterrent factors (or vices) of style (Ch. 3).
Ch. 4–11: Particular ingredients of prose style: the simile (Ch. 4) — linguistic correctness (Ch. 5) — stylistic voluminousness and its contrary (Ch. 6) — appropriateness in style (Ch. 7) — periodic style (Ch. 8) — rhythm (Ch. 9) — urbanity, bringing before the eyes, metaphors (Ch. 10–11).
Ch. 12: Written and oral style.

Rhetoric III , Ch. 13–19: Arrangement ( taxis ):

Ch. 13: Only two parts of the speech are necessary, namely the statement and the proof of the main claim — contemporary authors of rhetorical manuals make futile subdivisions of the parts of speech — introduction of a quadripartite scheme of the speech: (1) proem, (2) statement of the main claim, (3) proof of the stated claim ( pistis ), (4) epilogue.
Ch. 14–19: Particular parts of the speech: the proem in the three genres of speech (Ch. 14) — topoi for slandering (Ch. 15) — narration (Ch. 16) — proof ( pistis ) (Ch. 17) — interrogation (Ch. 18) — epilogue/conclusion (Ch. 19).

Aristotle stresses right from the beginning of his Rhetoric that rhetoric is closely related to dialectic. He offers several formulations to describe the affinity between these two disciplines: in the first line of the book Rhetoric rhetoric is said to be a ‘counterpart’ ( antistrophos ) to dialectic ( Rhet. I.1, 1354a1); in the second chapter of the first book it is also called an ‘outgrowth’ or ‘offshoot’ ( paraphues ti ) of dialectic and the study of character ( Rhet. I.2, 1356a25f.); finally, Aristotle says that rhetoric is part of dialectic and resembles it ( Rhet. I.2, 1356a30f.).

In saying that rhetoric is a counterpart to dialectic, Aristotle obviously wants to allude to Plato’s Gorgias (464bff.), where rhetoric is ironically defined as a counterpart to cookery in the soul. Since, in this passage, Plato uses the word ‘ antistrophos ’ to indicate an analogy, it is likely that Aristotle wants to express a kind of analogy too: what dialectic is for the (private or academic) practice of attacking and maintaining an argument, rhetoric is for the (public) practice of defending oneself or accusing an opponent.

The notion of ‘dialectic’ is prominent in the work of Aristotle’s teacher, Plato; Plato often labels his philosophical method, or certain parts of it, as dialectic. In his dialogue Gorgias (see §4 of Plato: rhetoric and poetry ), dialectic seems to be strictly opposed to rhetoric, the former aiming at the disclosure of truth, the latter allegedly aiming at ‘persuasion without knowledge’. In his Phaedrus Plato pictures the relation between dialectic and rhetoric in a different way (see §5.1 of Plato: rhetoric and poetry ); here he entertains the idea of a new philosophical rhetoric, quite different from the then contemporary style of speech writing, which rests upon dialectic, the genuine philosophical method, for acquiring genuine knowledge both of the subject matter of a speech and of the soul of the audience. When Aristotle speaks of dialectic, he certainly has his book Topics in mind, where he develops at some length an argumentative method for attacking and defending theses of any content (see §8 of Aristotle: logic ). Clearly, Aristotle’s dialectical method was inspired by Plato and by the debates in Plato’s Academy; however, while Plato often presents dialectic as a method for discovering and conveying truth, Aristotelian dialectic is strictly confined to examining particular claims or testing the consistency of a set of propositions (which in his view is different from establishing or proving the truth of a proposition). This is, in a nutshell, the context that must be kept in mind, when Aristotle presents — quite allusively — a new art of rhetoric by stressing its affinity to dialectic; obviously he plays upon his readers’ expectations concerning the meaning of dialectic and the relation between dialectic and rhetoric, as described by Plato. Those students of Plato’s Academy who were still suspicious about any engagement with rhetoric and public speech possibly received the opening of Aristotle’s Rhetoric with its postulated affinity between rhetoric and dialectic either as a provoction or as some sort of joke.

This purported analogy between rhetoric and dialectic (as conceived by Aristotle) can be substantiated by several common features of both disciplines:

Both rhetoric and dialectic are concerned with things that do not belong to a definite genus or are not the object of a specific science.
Both rhetoric and dialectic are not dependent on the established principles of specific sciences.
Both rhetoric and dialectic have the function of providing arguments.
Both rhetorical and dialectical arguments rely on assumptions or premises that are not established as true, but are only reputable or accepted by one group or the other ( endoxa ).
Both rhetoric and dialectic are concerned with both sides of an opposition, dialectic by constructing arguments for and against any thesis, rhetoric by considering what is possibly persuasive in any given case.

This analogy to dialectic has extremely significant ramifications for the status of Aristotle’s supposedly new art of rhetoric. Plato argued in his Gorgias that rhetoric could not be an art ( technê ), since it is not related to a definite subject, while real arts are defined by their specific subjects, as e.g. medicine or shoemaking are defined by their products (health and shoes). By claiming that rhetoric and dialectic are similar or analogous, Aristotle suggests a quite different picture. The analogy is even meant to flesh out the thought that neither rhetoric nor dialectic are like ordinary arts ( technai ) or sciences with a limited, well-defined subject matter. However, this should not be seen as a drawback, or so the analogy suggests, since the alleged shortcoming, i.e. that they do not have such a definite subject matter, can be turned into a virtue, by entrusting to dialectic and rhetoric the practices that are common to all fields of rationality, namely the various practices of argumentation. For even though dialectic has no definite subject, it is easy to see that it nevertheless employs a consistent method (both in Plato’s and Aristotle’s understanding of dialectic), because dialectic has to grasp the ultimate reason why some arguments are valid and others are not. Now, if rhetoric is nothing but the counterpart to dialectic within the domain of public speech, it must be similarly grounded in an investigation of what is persuasive and what is not, and this, in turn, qualifies rhetoric as an art or, after all, as a discipline that is methodologically not inferior to dialectic.

As already indicated, it is crucial for both disciplines, dialectic and rhetoric, that they deal with arguments from accepted premises ( endoxa ). Dialecticians do not argue on the basis of established, scientific principles, but on the basis of only reputable assumptions, i.e. of what is accepted either by all or the many or the few experts. In a similar vein, rhetoricians or orators try to hit assumptions that are already accepted by their audience, because they want to persuade the addressees on the basis of their own convictions. Of course, owing to the different fields of application — philosophical–academic debates in the case of dialectic, mostly public speeches in the case of rhetoric — the situation is not quite the same. While e.g. the dialectician tries to test the consistency of a set of propositions, the rhetorician tries to achieve the persuasion of a given audience, and while dialectic proceeds by questioning and answering, rhetoric for the most part proceeds in continuous–monologic form. Still, and in spite of these differences, the method of both dialectic and rhetoric share the same core idea that they have to hit certain, accepted assumptions of their addressees — the dialectical disputant in order to get the explicit assent of the dialectical opponent, the rhetorician in order to base the rhetorical proofs on views the audience already finds convincing. Furthermore, just as the dialectician is interested in deductions and inductions for refuting the opponent’s claims, the rhetorician is interested in deductions and inductions that logically connect (or seem to connect) the audience’s existing convictions with certain other views that the rhetorician wishes to establish (see below § 6 ). For, indeed, Aristotle seems to think that arguments or proofs are central to any process of persuasion, for people are most or most easily persuaded, he says ( Rhet. I.1, 1355a3f.), when they suppose something to have been proven.

Hence the rhetorician who is willing to give a central place to arguments or (rhetorical) proofs — and this seems to be the peculiar approach to rhetoric that Aristotle suggests at the beginning of his Rhetoric — can base his or her method of persuasion to a significant extent on the method of dialectical argumentation, as expounded in Aristotle’s Topics (see Rapp 2016 and 2018). And since the notion of ‘dialectic’ is inextricably linked with a genuinely philosophical method, the implied message of this dialectical turn of rhetoric seems to be that philosophers, properly understood, have access to a method that is superior not only for internal academic discussions between philosophers, but also for the so-called ‘encounter with the many’ ( Rhet. I.1, 1355a29, Topics I.2, 101a35), i.e. for the purpose of addressing a mass audience with little or no education. As already indicated, Aristotle does not seem to have been the first to come up with the idea that ‘true’ rhetoric should become dialectical; however, while in Plato’s Phaedrus the dialectical turn of rhetoric remains a mere sketch, Aristotle’s Rhetoric does not hesitate to set this idea into operation, most notably by adapting most of the dialectical equipment developed elsewhere, especially in his Topics . In many particular instances he just imports technical vocabulary from his dialectic (e.g. protasis , sullogismos , topos , endoxon ); in many other instances he redefines traditional rhetorical notions by his dialectical inventory, e.g. the enthymeme is redefined as a deduction, the example is redefined as an induction, etc. Above all, the Rhetoric introduces the use of the so-called topoi (see below § 7 ) that is typical for the dialectical method and is otherwise only treated in Aristotle’s works on dialectic, i.e. in Topics and Sophistical Refutations .

4. The Nature and Purpose of Rhetoric

There are widely divergent views on the purpose of Aristotle’s Rhetoric . Ultimately, it is certainly meant to support those who are going to address a public audience in court, at assemblies of the people, or at certain festive events and who, to that end, have to compose speeches. But does this in itself render the Rhetoric a mere ‘manual’ or ‘handbook’ aiming at the persuasion of a given audience? Or does it rather aim at a specifically qualified type of persuasion (bringing about, e.g., conviction based on the best available grounds and without misunderstanding)? Influenced by the debate in the 20th century about ‘old and new rhetoric’ and by the work of authors such as I.A. Richards, Kenneth Burke and Wayne C. Booth on the one hand and Hans-Georg Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur on the other, Aristotle scholars began to wonder whether his Rhetoric is an instruction manual offering guidance about how to change other people’s minds or has, rather, a philosophically more ambitious scope, such as e.g. human communication and discourse in general. This second approach is reflected in the statements of those contending that the “object of Aristotle’s treatise on rhetoric is ultimately an analysis of the nature of human discourse in all areas of knowledge.” (Grimaldi 1972, 1) or of those suggesting that it can be read as “a piece of philosophic inquiry, and judged by philosophic standards” (Garver 1994, 3). Others have diagnosed a most notable ambivalence in the Rhetoric (see Oates 1963, 335), as between its role as a practical handbook on the one hand and Aristotle’s attempt to connect it to his logic, ethics and politics on the other. Likewise, interpreters are divided on the questions of whether Aristotle’s Rhetoric is meant to be used for good and bad purposes alike or whether it is specifically tailored to implementing the good and virtuous goals delineated in Aristotle’s ethical and political writings; and whether, to that latter end, the speaker is entitled to deploy the whole range of persuasive devices, even manipulative and deceptive ones. In many instances, the text of Aristotle’s Rhetoric is open to several interpretations; however, it seems possible to restrict the range of plausible readings, e.g. by considering Aristotle’s definition of rhetoric and what he says about the internal and external ends of rhetoric.

Assuming that Aristotle’s Poetics gives instructions for how to compose good tragedies, shouldn’t we expect, then, that Aristotle’s Rhetoric is similarly meant to give instructions for how to compose good speeches? And does this, by the same token, render the art of rhetoric a sort of productive knowledge aiming at the fabrication of a speech (similar to the way the art of shoemaking aims at the fabrication of shoes)? This sounds plausible, as far as it goes (for a discussion of this issue see Leff 1993), and in a few passages (especially in Rhet. III: e.g. 1415b35, 1417a2, 1417a34f. and 36, 1418a10 and 12 and 39, 1420b1) Aristotle actually seems to directly address and instruct a speechwriter in the second person. However, these are rather exceptions to a broader tendency and it is striking that Aristotle never defines the art of rhetoric through the supposed product, the speech, nor the full command of the art of rhetoric through the perfection of the product, i.e. the excellent speech. Instead, Aristotle defines the rhetorician as someone who is always able to see what is persuasive ( Topics VI.12, 149b25); correspondingly, rhetoric is defined as the ability to see what is possibly persuasive in every given case ( Rhet. I.2, 1355b26f.). Indeed there are passages ( Rhet. I.1, 1355b15–17) in which the persuasive plays the same role in rhetoric as the conclusive plays in dialectic or logic. This is not to say that it is the defining function ( ergon ) of rhetoric to persuade, for the rhetoricians (the ones who possess the art of rhetoric) will not be able to convince people under all circumstances ( Rhet. I.1, 1355b10–14). Rather they are in a situation similar to that of physicians: the latter have a complete grasp of their art if and only if they neglect nothing that might heal their patients, although they are not expected to heal each and every patient. Similarly, rhetoricians have a complete grasp of their method, if and only if they are capable of seeing the available means of persuasion, although they are certainly not able to convince each and every audience — owing to factors that the art of rhetoric cannot alter (e.g. biases, partisanship, stubbornness or corruption of the audience). In light of this definition, it seems that the art ( technê ) of rhetoric is primarily concerned with the nature and the ingredients of persuasiveness and that the book Rhetoric is primarily concerned with elaborating the various ingredients of this art. It goes without saying that possessing such an art is useful for the composition of speeches, but might also be useful for other purposes, e.g. for assessing other people’s speeches, for analysing the persuasive potential of competing cases, etc.

For Aristotle, who defines rhetoric in terms of considering what is persuasive (see above § 4.1 ) and sees it as a branch of dialectic (see above § 3 ), rhetoric is clearly not a matter of finding or conveying knowledge. For Plato (see §4 of Plato: rhetoric and poetry ), by contrast, this would have been reason enough to become suspicious about the intentions of those who use rhetorical techniques. Isn’t any technique of persuasion that is negligent of knowledge useful only for those who want to outwit their audience and conceal their real aims? For, after all, someone who just wants to communicate the naked truth could be straightforward and would not need to employ rhetorical gimmicks. This, however, is not Aristotle’s point of view: Even those who are simply trying to establish what is just and true need the help of rhetoric when they are faced with a public audience. Aristotle points out that it is impossible to teach such an audience, even if the speaker has the most exact knowledge of the subject ( Rhet. I.1, 1355a24–29). Perhaps he is thinking of ordinary people attending a public speech who are not able to follow the kind of argument that, according to Aristotle’s theory of knowledge (see §6 of Aristotle: logic ), is apt to establish genuine knowledge. Moreover, he seems to doubt that the controversial, sometimes partisan and hostile, setting of political or judicial speeches is suitable for teaching and learning at all, since whoever wishes to learn has to presuppose that he or she won’t be cheated or deceived by the teacher. But why should one trust the intentions of the opposing party? This is why rhetorical arguments addressing public audiences should be taken from premises that are likely to be accepted by the given audience, from assumptions the audience is already convinced of, and not from the kind of principles (accepted mostly or only by the experts) through which one conveys and establishes knowledge.

More than that, one might wonder whether the typical subject of public speeches really allows of genuine knowledge. In court for example, the judges have to form a reasoned view about whether the accused person is guilty or not and whether the crime committed is minor or major; in political speeches the parties might contend about whether it is advantageous or not to invade the neighbour’s territory or to build a border wall (Aristotle’s examples), but none of these questions allow of precise knowledge. Aristotle says that in some questions treated in public speeches there is only amphidoxein , i.e. room for doubt and only divided opinions ( Rhet. I.2, 1356a8). From this perspective, rhetoric seems useful especially for controversies about contingent matters that cannot be fixed by appealing to what we unmistakably know, but only by appealing to widely shared convictions, to what happens (not necessarily, but) only for the most part and to what is likely to be the case (but not necessarily so). For all those reasons, affecting the decisions of juries and assemblies is a matter of persuasiveness, not of knowledge. It is true that some people manage to be persuasive either at random or by habit, but it is rhetoric that gives us a method to systematically disclose all available means of persuasion on any topic whatsoever.

When Aristotle speaks about the benefits of the art of rhetoric he also mentions that it is not only disgraceful when one is unable to defend oneself physically, but also when one is unable to defend oneself through rational speech, for rationality and speech are more peculiar to human beings than physical strength ( Rhet. I.1, 1355a38–b2). A certain familiarity with rhetoric is therefore required for sheer self-defence — in general and, perhaps, especially under the conditions of the extreme Athenian form of democracy with its huge courts of lay assessors (one of which sentenced Socrates to death) and with demagogues who would abuse the democratic rules for a coup d’état. Perhaps Aristotle is addressing fellow philosophers who find it beneath their dignity to engage with rhetoric: it is not sublime but naive and embarrassing if they do not gear up for political and legal battles. For those who are defeated in court when they try to defend what is true and just (due to the failure to speak persuasively) are to be blamed ( Rhet. I.1, 1355a20–24).

Possessing the art of rhetoric is useful then even for those whose sole intent is to defend what they take to be true and just. Still, can’t the same art of rhetoric be misused, e.g. when practised by people with malicious intentions? The short answer is: Yes, of course. Rhetoric in general and even Aristotle’s dialectic-based rhetoric can be misused depending on what people use it for what purposes. (And Aristotle himself is actually aware of the fact that demagogues of his time use a certain style of rhetoric for overthrowing the democratic order: Politics V.5, 1304b21–1305a15). The more elaborate answer that he gives is this. The art of rhetoric (if based on dialectic: see above § 3 ) is useful partly because it facilitates persuasive argument for the opposites, i.e. on either side of a question. This is first of all seen as an advantage in competence, for people who have full command of this art won’t miss any persuasive aspect of a given question, and this is also seen as a practical advantage, for it helps to detect what goes wrong in the opponent’s arguments (1355a29–38), especially if those opponents use it for objectionable purposes. That this peculiar feature of dialectic-based rhetoric opens the door for misuse is true, but this cannot be held against the art of rhetoric, since the same ambivalence (that something can be used for the better or for the worse) applies to most goods (e.g. wealth, beauty — the only non-ambivalent good is, on Aristotle’s view, virtue). Also, Aristotle downplays the risk of misuse by stressing that it is easier to convince someone of the just and good than of their opposites (especially when using the Aristotelian style of rhetoric).

Still, for many interpreters of Aristotle, from the times of the great Roman rhetoricians on, it is hard to embrace the thought that Aristotle — the famous author of the Nicomachean Ethics and the Politics — who in his ethical work praises the life in accordance with human virtue, could ever endorse a rhetorical project that is not meant to promote virtue and happiness in the city-state ( polis ). Is it, in other words, possible or likely that Aristotle, whose name in the history of moral philosophy stands for an ethics based on the sustainable development of moral virtues, endorses a technique of rhetoric that does not serve the purpose of promoting virtuous goals? This is a legitimate worry. It can be addressed by distinguishing internal from external ends of rhetoric (which is, to be sure, not Aristotle’s distinction; however, he uses a similar distinction between a thing’s proper function, corresponding to the internal end, and the question what something is useful for, corresponding to the external end). The internal end, i.e. the function that defines the art of rhetoric, is to consider what is persuasive (see above § 4.1 ), and since there might be persuasive aspects on both sides of a question, the art of rhetoric as such — i.e. according to its internal end — is neutral with regard to true and false, just and unjust, noble and wicked points of view. It can be equally used for promoting good or bad positions (even though, as Aristotle says, it is easier to promote the good ones). All this follows from the dialectical character of Aristotle’s art of rhetoric (see above § 3 ). If we are interested, by contrast, in the external ends of rhetoric, i.e. the question of what it is useful for (see above § 4.2 ) or the question of how Aristotle himself wants this art to be used, then it is easy to contrive a plausible story either based on Aristotle’s ethico-political writings or on hints given in the Rhetoric itself (see e.g. Dow 2015, 64–75, for such an attempt) about the morally desirable uses of a style of rhetoric that is based on arguments (sanctioning convicted offenders, defending innocent culprits, averting political decisions that are likely to do harm to the city-state, voicing the point of view of the decent citizens, defending the rule of law, standing up to insurrectionists and demagogues, etc.).

Obviously, Aristotle’s rhetoric is not thought to be normative in the moral sense that it would only provide the means for persuading people of what is true, just and noble (but not of their opposites; see section § 4.3 above). There is however the widespread intuition that Aristotle’s rhetoric crucially differs from manuals of rhetoric that recommend doing whatever it takes to win a case. This becomes clear already in the beginning of Rhet. I.1, where Aristotle criticizes his predecessors among other things for presenting techniques that are not derived from any art ( technê ), such as slander and the arousal of pity and anger. He accuses them of dwelling on methods that instruct how to speak “outside the subject” and to distract the attention of the hearers from the subject, while good legislation, he says, requires not speaking outside the subject at all (indeed, “speaking outside the subject” was a legal term in Athenian law of Aristotle’s time). This immediately suggests two senses in which Aristotle’s rhetoric is normative and does not advocate an ‘anything goes’-approach to persuasion: first, the rhetorical devices are required to flow from the art or method of rhetoric and, second, they must not be “outside the subject”. As for the first criterion, Aristotle requires that art-based means of persuasion must be provided by the speech alone and must rely on the systematic analysis of what is persuasive in a given case (see the definition of rhetoric in § 4.1 above). As for the second criterion, it is striking that Aristotle refers to judges or jurors who just “surrender to one of the litigants without really judging” ( Rhet. I.1, 1354b34–1355a1), which might be taken to mean that those people cast their votes in favour of the party they side with, but that their votes are not based on a judgement that really considers the case at hand. This formulates a minimally normative criterion for what the rhetorical art aims at, namely the formation of a judgement in the audience that deserves to be called a ‘judgement’, i.e. that it judges something , namely what the judges or jurors are asked to judge. And it seems that in rhetorical persuasion the use of rhetorical devices that are based on the art and are related to the case at hand are more apt to bring about judgements in this genuine sense of the word.

By all appearances, it seems then that Aristotle’s rhetoric is not indifferent with regard to the persuasive means deployed. The effect that speakers using the Aristotelian style of rhetoric can bring about in the audience is thus qualified by the limited range of techniques (based on the art of rhetoric) they use, which means that they do not try to bring the audience over to their side at any cost, but only on the basis of an argumentation that actually addresses the point at issue. In this sense one might say that Aristotle’s rhetorical method aims at something like ‘persuasion based on arguments’, ‘reasonable persuasion’ or a ‘reasoned judgment’ on the audience’s part.

Even if this much is agreed upon, there remains a lot of room for scholarly disagreement on what exactly this normative approach to rhetoric is meant to imply. Is this normativity grounded in the requirements of the art ( technê ) alone, e.g. what can and what cannot be achieved in a methodical way, or does it hinge on an envisaged effect, e.g. the best possible judgement on the hearer’s part? And which methods are approved by this normative approach and which definitely excluded? Does Aristotle’s art of rhetoric require, above all, that persuasion be centred on arguments and proofs (that are related to the thing at issue and are, thus, pertinent), while other art-based means of persuasion (see below § 5 ) are mostly thought to offer support to get one’s arguments through (see e.g. Rapp 2012)? Or does the art aim at enhancing only “well-founded” judgements or judgements that are “formed on the basis of good grounds for conviction”, requiring that each particular means of persuasion provide such a good ground for conviction (see Dow 2014 and Dow 2015)?

5. The Three Means of Persuasion

The methodical core of Aristotle’s Rhetoric is the theorem that there are three ‘technical’ pisteis , i.e. ‘persuaders’ or ‘means of persuasion’. Persuasion comes about either through the character ( êthos ) of the speaker, the emotional state ( pathos ) of the hearer, or the argument ( logos ) itself. The structure of Rhetoric I & II & is determined by this tripartition (see § 2 above). The attribute ‘technical’ seems to imply several things: (i) Technical persuasion must rest on a method or art ( technê ), and this, in turn, is to say that we must know the reason why some things are persuasive and some are not. (ii) Further, technical persuasion must rest on a complete analysis of what is possibly persuasive (see above § 4.1 ), and not on the random use of scattered persuasive factors. (iii) Technical means of persuasion must be provided by the speakers themselves and through the speech, whereas pre-existing facts, such as oaths, witnesses, testimonies, etc. are non-technical, since they cannot be brought about by the speaker. (iv) Given that Aristotle criticizes his predecessors, because they deal with non-technical persuasive devices instructing how to speak “outside the subject” (see section § 4.4 above), one might speculate whether the technical means of persuasion are required, vice versa, to actually address the things at issue .

Why just these three? And why only these three? Aristotle does not give an elaborate defence of this tripartition. However, he says in a different context that a speech consists of three things: the speaker, the subject that is treated in the speech, and the listener to whom the speech is addressed ( Rhet. I.3, 1358a37ff.). Probably, he thinks that each of these three ingredients of a speech contributes to persuasion in a specific way, in that persuasion either flows from the person of speaker, namely that he or she comes across as credible, or from the condition of the hearer, i.e. whether they are in an emotional state and which emotional state they are in or from the subject that is treated in the speech, i.e. from the arguments or proofs that are meant to support a suggested point of view. Summarizing the account of the three pisteis in a later section of the book, Aristotle actually insists that there can be no other technical means of persuasion:

It has already been spoken about the means of persuasion ( pisteis ), from how many things they are, namely that they are from three things, and what kind of things these are, and why there are only these three; for all people who are casting judgements are persuaded either because they themselves are affected, or because they assume that the speakers are a certain kind of person or because something has been proven. ( Rhet. III.1, 1403b10–13)

With regard to the speaker, persuasion is accomplished whenever the speech is held in such a way as to render the speaker worthy of credence. How is it exactly that the credibility of the speaker contributes to persuasion? Aristotle is not overly explicit on this issue. However, he says that people follow the trustworthy speaker more easily and more quickly on almost all subjects and completely so in affairs in which there are not exact criteria (to decide the case), but only wavering opinions ( Rhet. I.2, 1356a6–8). This might be taken to mean that in the absence of other criteria to decide a case, the audience will form the second-order judgment that suggestions put forward by a credible speaker are themselves received as trustworthy and acceptable. Also, according to this remark, the impact of what seems to be the speaker’s character comes in degrees; it is most important, if the point of issue is such that it leaves room for doubt and cannot be decided by conclusive proofs.

But how does the speaker manage to appear a credible person? Even though Aristotle says that the speaker’s character can have the greatest impact on the hearers’ judgement (especially in deliberative speeches that are about future states of affairs), he dedicates only fifteen lines to this question. ( Rhet. II.1, 1378a6–20). Speakers, he says, must display (i) practical intelligence, prudence or competence ( phronêsis ), (ii) a virtuous character, and (iii) good will; for, if they displayed none of them, the audience would doubt that they are able to give good advice at all. Again, if they displayed (i) without (ii) and (iii), the audience could doubt whether their aims or intentions are good. Finally, if he displayed (i) and (ii) without (iii), the audience could still doubt whether they are giving the best suggestion or whether they keep the best available suggestion for themselves due to their lack of benevolence. However, if they display all of them, Aristotle concludes, it cannot rationally be doubted that their suggestions are trustworthy. It should be stressed that the speakers must accomplish these effects by what they say in the speech; it is not necessary that they are actually virtuous persons: on the contrary, a pre-existing good character cannot be part of the technical means of persuasion. Also, even a person with outstandingly virtuous character would have to present herself as virtuous by what she says in the speech.

With regard to the hearer, persuasion comes about whenever the hearers are led by the speech to feel a certain emotion or passion that, in turn, has an impact on the judgement they are going to make. The underlying assumption of this persuasive technique is that people’s emotional states broadly conceived — i.e. whether they actually undergo an episode of emotion or not and what kind of emotion they feel — makes a difference for the formation of the judgement they are about to pass. Indeed, Aristotle even introduces the emotions or passions ( pathê ) in an important passage ( Rhet. II.1, 1378a20–30) by saying that they are “those things due to which people, by undergoing a change, differ in their judgements ...”. He illustrates this general assumption by pointing out that we do not judge in the same way when we grieve and rejoice or when we are friendly and hostile. It therefore seems that the speaker has to arouse emotions exactly because emotions have the power to modify our judgments: e.g. to a juror or judge who is in a friendly mood, the person about whom he or she is going to judge seems not to do wrong or only in a small way; but to the juror or judge who is in an angry mood, the same person will seem to do the opposite (see Rhet. II.1, 1378a1ff.). Since rhetoric aims at steering the hearers’ judgement and since emotions, thus, have a significant impact on the formation of judgements (on the various ways how emotions, according to Aristotle, can alter our judgements see Leighton 1982), the rhetorical method requires to address the emotional states of the hearers, if only in order to calm down adverse feelings or emotions that are likely to prevent the jurors or judges from forming their judgement in accordance with the presented evidence and arguments.

Some scholars writing on the rhetorical use of emotions take it to be significant that emotions also play a crucial role in Aristotle’s moral philosophy, for Aristotle defines the virtuous person not only by performing the right actions, but also by having and by being motivated through the appropriate sort of emotions. Applying this to the rhetorical situation, one might wonder whether in Aristotle’s art of rhetoric the speaker tries to arouse emotions, in order (i) to motivate the audience (e.g. motivate them to act in accordance with the judgement they pass) or (ii) to turn them into better persons (e.g. by providing and making them familiar with the appropriate emotions that are definitory of the virtuous persons). However, both options are not backed by the evidence given in the text of the Rhetoric . With regard to (i), it seems crucial to note that the aim of rhetorical persuasion is a certain judgement ( krisis ), not an action or practical decision ( prohairesis ), which would intrinsically involve a specific sort of desire and motivation (see e.g. Kontos 2021, 20–31). While the practical decision that Aristotle discusses in his ethical writings is always about things the agents themselves are able to do, the judgements of the hearers of a public speech are often about things to be done by other agents or about actions that took place in the past. With regard to (ii), one might be reluctant to accept that moral education might be the direct purpose of the kind of public speeches Aristotle has in mind. At least, no such moral purpose is mentioned when Aristotle addresses the purpose and use of rhetoric (see above § 4 ). It is also significant that the appropriateness of the aroused emotions (in accordance with Aristotle’s doctrine of the mean) is nowhere discussed in the Rhetoric . More than that, Aristotle seems to think that moral education requires individual habituation and habituation is a matter of gradually adjusting a person’s attitudes and hedonic responses, while the uneducated ones are not really responsive to disciplinary allocutions. For all these reasons, he is not too optimistic with regard to the pedagogical effect of public speeches: “Now if speeches were in themselves enough to make men good, they would justly, as Theognis says, have won very great rewards, and such rewards should have been provided; but as things are … they are not able to encourage the many to nobility and goodness” ( EN X.9, 1179b4–10).

But how is it possible for the orator, in the first place, to lead the audience to feel a certain emotion? After all, the technical means of persuasion are restricted to what the speakers say in a speech. It is remarkable that Aristotle’s treatment of several types of emotions in Chapters 2–11 of Rhet. II is based on the definition of each type of emotion. Even though Aristotle mostly leaves it to the reader to infer how these definitions are useful for arousing a particular type of emotion, it seems safe to conclude that these definitions are meant to offer the key to the methodical arousal of emotions in the audience. Let, for example, anger be defined as “desire, accompanied with pain, for conspicuous revenge for a conspicuous slight that was directed against oneself or those near to one, when such a slight is undeserved.” ( Rhet . II.2 1378a31–33). According to such a definition, someone who takes it to be the case that he or she has suffered a slight from a person who is not entitled to do so, etc., will, all other things being equal, become angry. Obviously, this presupposes an account of emotions according to which emotions are closely related to what people think or take to be the case. Unfortunately and owing to the overall nature of Aristotle’s Rhetoric , this underlying account of emotion is nowhere explicitly unfolded and defended. What we can infer though is that Aristotle assumes at least a covariance between someone’s thought or opinion that she has been slighted undeservedly and her feeling of anger. If that much is granted and if the speakers have access to such definitions of each type of emotions, it is possible to deduce conditions under which a person is likely to feel this particular type of emotion. And if the speakers manage to make the hearers think — by what they say — that these conditions are given, it is likely, as far as this method goes, that the hearers will feel the corresponding emotion. Aristotle himself suggests the following example. If we take the above-mentioned definition of anger for granted, it is possible to deduce circumstances in which a person will become angry; most notably, we can deduce (i) in what state of mind people are angry and (ii) against whom they are angry and (iii) for what sorts of reason. If we want to make an audience angry, we have to address all three factors, making the hearers think (ii) that there are people who deserve their anger, (iii) that there is a reason for being angry (a slight, an insult, a belittlement, etc.) and (i) by bringing them into a state of mind in which they are prone to anger. Aristotle himself shows how to deduce these three factors for each particular type of emotion throughout chapters II.2–11. With this equipment, the speaker will be able, for example, to highlight such characteristics of a case as are likely to provoke anger in the audience. In comparison with the tricks of former rhetoricians (which, Aristotle thinks, are bound to speak “outside the subject”), this method of arousing emotions has a striking advantage: The speaker who wants to arouse emotions need not even speak “outside the subject” or distract from the thing at issue; it is sufficient to detect aspects of a given subject that are connected with the intended emotion and to make the addressee think that certain emotion-provoking aspects, in accordance with the three factors mentioned above, are given.

Supplement on Judgemental and Non-Judgemental Accounts of Aristotelian Emotions

With regard to the subject the speech is about, persuasion comes about through arguments, i.e. by proving (or seemingly proving) that something is the case. Most probably, this is meant to take up the idea mentioned above, i.e. that people are most or most easily persuaded, when they suppose something to have been proven ( Rhet. I.1, 1355a3f.). This third means of persuasion ( pistis ) is distinguished from the other two means of persuasion through being the only probative ( apodeiktikos ) device of persuasion; due to its argument-like structure, involving premises and a conclusion, it can directly argue for the point of view that the speaker wishes to establish. It does so by inferentially connecting the suggested conclusion with facts that are evident or with convictions already held by the audience. Probative persuasion is essential, since, at the end of the day, each speech necessarily involves a claim (i.e. the point of view the speaker suggests) plus the proofs that are given in support of this claim ( Rhet. III.13, 1414a30–36). For Aristotle, there are two species of arguments: inductions and deductions ( Posterior Analytics I.1, 71a5ff.). Induction ( epagôgê ) is defined as the proceeding from particulars up to a universal ( Topics I.12, 105a13ff.). A deduction ( sullogismos ) is an argument in which, certain things having been supposed, something different from the suppositions results of necessity through them ( Topics I.1, 100a25ff.) or because of their being true ( Prior Analytics I.2, 24b18–20). The inductive argument in rhetoric is the example ( paradeigma ); unlike other inductive arguments, it does not proceed from many particular cases to one universal case, but from one particular to a similar particular if both particulars fall under the same genus ( Rhet. I.2, 1357b25ff.). The deductive argument in rhetoric is the enthymeme (see below § 6 ). Indeed, most of Rhet. I & II is dedicated to the treatment of this third probative means of persuasion: After the second part of the long chapter Rhet. I.2 has introduced basic distinctions within the probative mode of persuasion, chapters Rhet. I.4–15 unfold argumentative devices that are specific to the three genres of speech, while chapters Rhet. II.4–26 discuss generally applicable aspects of proofs or arguments (see above § 2 ).

Aristotle repeatedly says that these rhetorical arguments persuade people either by proving or by (merely) seeming to prove ( Rhet. I.2, 1356a3–4 and I.2, 1356a19–20); accordingly, he lists topoi for real ( Rhet. II.23) and merely apparent enthymemes ( Rhet. II.24) (see below § 7 ). Obviously, Aristotle refers here to fallacious or deceptive arguments, for these arguments have a similar persuasive effect, if the fallacy or deception goes unnoticed by the audience (for people will think , i.e. take it to be the case, that something has been proven). One might wonder whether the inclusion of only seemingly probative arguments is compatible with Aristotle’s general tendency to base rhetorical persuasion on (real) proofs. However, the treatment of fallacious rhetorical arguments is strictly parallel to what happens in the case of dialectic. For dialectic too, includes a part dealing with sound or valid arguments (namely in Topics II–VII) and a part that analyses fallacious arguments (namely in the Sophistical Refutations ). It is part of the rhetorician’s competence also to know about fallacious arguments, if only in order to detect them, when they are used by opponents.

One of the most notorious debates about Aristotle’s Rhetoric concerns the second means of persuasion ( pistis ) that is said to proceed through the emotions of the hearer (see above § 5.2 ), for it seems to involve a major inconsistency in Aristotle’s approach to rhetorical persuasion: While in Rhetoric I.2 Aristotle is happy to accept emotions or the arousal of emotions as one of the three ‘technical’ pisteis , it seems that he has a much more reserved or even repudiating attitude to the rhetorical use of emotions in Rhetoric I.1. There, in the very first chapter of the book, Aristotle claims that the previous authors of rhetorical manuals have only covered a small part of the art of persuasion, for while only the proofs or means of persuasion ( pisteis ), such as the enthymeme, are a matter of technê , those authors mostly dealt with rhetorical devices that are merely supplementary and involve “speaking outside the subject”. Aristotle exemplifies this alleged tendency of his predecessors by adding that “slander, pity, anger and suchlike passions of the soul” are not about the things at issue, but are directed at the person of the juror or judge (1354a11–18). Briefly afterwards he adds that one “should not distort the juror or judge by arousing anger, fear or pity in him”, which, he says, would be like making the standard or yardstick crooked before using it (1354a24–26). Apart from the fact that Rhetoric I.2 endorses the rhetorical use of emotions, while Rhetoric I.1 seems to dismiss them, the remarks in Rhetoric I.1 seems to imply that the arousal of emotions is not or cannot be ‘technical’, while Rhetoric I.2 unequivocally introduces persuasion through the emotions of the hearer as one of three ‘technical’ means of persuasion.

Various strategies have been contrived to deal with this seeming inconsistency. In the early 20th century there was the tendency to think that the two chapters are simply incompatible and that either one of these two chapters was written by a different author (Marx 1900) or that the two chapters were put together by an inept editor (Kantelhardt 1911; in a similar vein, Barnes (1995, 262) argues that the two chapters are doublets, one of them originally written to supplant the other) or that the two chapters represent different stages in Aristotle’s philosophical development (Solmsen 1929). Even though Solmen’s developmental account has gone out of fashion, there are more recent authors who emphasize the alleged ‘Platonic’ character of Rhetoric I.1 (see e.g. Fortenbaugh 1986, 248 and Schuetrumpf 1994, 106f.), thus implying that Aristotle, when writing this chapter, was still under the influence of Plato, from which he gradually emancipated himself. However, one might wonder whether some of the strategies mentioned tend to exaggerate the alleged inconsistency of the two chapters, since, after all, it is obvious that the two chapters have different agendas (see above § 2 ) and that some of the differences might be due to these different agendas. Also, in the later chapter Aristotle is happy to refer back to the treatment of emotions in the previous chapter (1356a16–17), which indicates (provided that this back-reference is authentic) that he himself was not aware of any inconsistency. It has hence been suggested e.g. that the seeming inconsistency can be fixed just by identifying different meanings of the word pistis for the two chapters (Grimaldi 1957), which would solve the problem that in one chapter emotions are said to be a pistis in the ‘technical’ sense, while in the other chapter they are opposed to ‘technical’ pisteis . Sprute 1994 and, similarly, Schuetrumpf 1994 argue that the chapters are not inconsistent, but envisage different settings, in that Rhetoric I.1 considers the kind of rhetoric that is apt for a well-ordered city, while Rhetoric I.2 moves on to the style of rhetoric that is required and practiced under less ideal political circumstances. Rapp 2002 (I 364, II 32f., 109, 112) proposes that what Aristotle primarily criticizes in Rhetoric I.1 is not that those predecessors deal with emotions at all, but that they mostly deal with emotions and the like, which are merely supplementary, instead of dealing with the main point, i.e. the enthymeme, and that they use pre-fabricated formulae for the arousal of emotions, by which they are bound to speak outside the things at issue. Dow 2007 uses a similar idea of set-piece rhetorical devices, going however beyond the previous suggestion by saying that the critique of Rhetoric I.1 does not, as it may seem, refer to emotions strictly speaking, but only to such set-piece rhetorical devices aimed at manipulating emotions. On these accounts it is possible, at least, to reconcile the claims that there is a ‘technical’ and innocent (or, perhaps, even beneficial) use of emotions within the art-based process of persuasion, as maintained in Rhetoric I.2, and that there are non-‘technical’ uses of emotions in rhetoric with the potential to distort the judgement, as emphasized in Rhetoric I.1.

6. The Enthymeme

For Aristotle, an enthymeme is what has the function of a proof or demonstration in the domain of public speech. Since a demonstration is a kind of sullogismos , the enthymeme is said to be a sullogismos too (on the enthymeme and its relation to syllogistic theory see also Raphael 1974). The word ‘ enthymeme ’ (from ‘ enthumeisthai —to consider’) had already been coined by Aristotle’s predecessors and originally designated clever sayings, bon mots, and short arguments involving a paradox or contradiction. The concepts ‘proof’ ( apodeixis ) and ‘ sullogismos ’ play a crucial role in Aristotle’s logical-dialectical theory. In applying them to a term of conventional rhetoric, Aristotle appeals to a well-known rhetorical technique, but, at the same time, codifies and redefines the original meaning of ‘enthymeme’: properly understood, what people call ‘enthymeme’ should have the form of a sullogismos , i.e., a deductive argument.

A major scholarly debate concerns the question of whether the enthymeme is actually meant to be a genuine sullogismos , i.e. a deductive argument, or whether it is only a ‘ sullogismos of a kind’, i.e. a sullogismos in an attenuated sense, which would amount to saying that Aristotelian enthymemes, even though they are introduced as sullogismoi , are or include ‘relaxed inferences’, i.e. inferences that are not logically valid (see Burnyeat 1994, 1996). This suggestion has been widely accepted, presumably because it helps to solve the alleged paradox that, although Aristotle defines the enthymeme as a sullogismos , the logical form of the enthymemes that are actually given as examples in the Rhetoric does not seem to conform to that of the categorical syllogisms that we know from his Prior Analytics (a problem that, by the way, might also be addressed by assuming that the enthymeme corresponds to the form of deductive arguments we find in the Topics , not to the ones familiar from the Prior Analytics ). Others accepted this suggestion primarily in order to accommodate the non-necessary sign arguments from Rhetoric I.2 (see § 6.5 ), which are treated as a type of enthymeme (without being flagged as merely ‘seeming enthymeme’), but are said not to yield a sullogismos (see e.g. Allen 2001).

Supplement on the Thesis that Enthymemes are Relaxed Inferences

In general, Aristotle regards deductive arguments as a set of propositions in which some sentences are premises and one is the conclusion, and the inference from the premises to the conclusion is guaranteed by the premises alone. Since enthymemes in the proper sense are expected to be deductive arguments, the minimal requirement for the formulation of enthymemes is that they have to display the premise-conclusion structure of deductive arguments. This is why enthymemes have to include a statement as well as a kind of reason for the given statement. Typically this reason is given in a conditional ‘if’-clause or a causal ‘since’- or ‘for’-clause. Examples of the former, conditional type are: “If not even the gods know everything, human beings can hardly do so.” “If the war is the cause of present evils, things should be set right by making peace.” Examples of the latter, causal type are: “One should not be educated, for one ought not be envied (and educated people are usually envied).” “She has given birth, for she has milk.” Aristotle stresses that the proposition “There is no man among us who is free” taken by itself is a maxim, but becomes an enthymeme as soon as it is used together with a reason such as “for all are slaves of money or of chance (and no slave of money or chance is free).” Sometimes the required reason may even be implicit, as e.g. in the proposition “As a mortal, do not cherish immortal anger” the reason why one should not cherish mortal anger is implicitly given in the term “immortal,” which alludes to the rule that it is not appropriate for mortal beings to have such an attitude.

Aristotle calls the enthymeme the “body of persuasion”, implying that everything else is only an addition or accident to the core of the persuasive process. The reason why the enthymeme, as the rhetorical kind of proof or demonstration, should be regarded as central to the rhetorical process of persuasion is that we are most easily persuaded when we think that something has been demonstrated. Hence, the basic idea of a rhetorical demonstration seems to be this: In order to make a target group believe that q , the orator must first select a proposition p or some propositions p 1 … p n that are already accepted by the target group; secondly he has to show that q can be derived from p or p 1 … p n , using p or p 1 … p n as premises. Given that the target persons form their beliefs in accordance with rational standards, they will accept q as soon as they understand that q can be demonstrated on the basis of their own opinions.

Consequently, the construction of enthymemes is primarily a matter of deducing from accepted opinions ( endoxa ). Of course, it is also possible to use premises that are not commonly accepted by themselves, but can be derived from commonly accepted opinions; other premises are only accepted since the speaker is held to be credible; still other enthymemes are built from signs: see § 6.5 . That a deduction is made from accepted opinions—as opposed to deductions from first and true sentences or principles—is the defining feature of dialectical argumentation in the Aristotelian sense. Thus, the formulation of enthymemes is a matter of dialectic, and the dialectician has the competence that is needed for the construction of enthymemes. If enthymemes are a subclass of dialectical arguments, then it is natural to expect a specific difference by which one can tell enthymemes apart from all other kinds of dialectical arguments (traditionally, commentators regarded logical incompleteness as such a difference; for some objections against the traditional view, see § 6.4 ). Nevertheless, this expectation is somehow misguided: The enthymeme is different from other kinds of dialectical arguments insofar as it is used in the rhetorical context of public speech (and rhetorical arguments are called ‘enthymemes’); thus, no further formal or qualitative differences are needed.

However, in the rhetorical context there are two factors that the dialectician has to keep in mind if she wants to become a rhetorician too, and if the dialectical argument is to become a successful enthymeme. First, the typical subjects of public speech do not—like the subjects of dialectic and theoretical philosophy—belong to the things that are necessarily the case, but are among those things that are the goal of practical deliberation and can also be otherwise. Second, as opposed to well-trained dialecticians, the audience of a public speech is characterized by an intellectual insufficiency; above all, the members of a jury or assembly are not accustomed to following a longer chain of inferences. Therefore, enthymemes must not be as precise as a scientific demonstration and should be shorter than ordinary dialectical arguments. This, however, is not to say that the enthymeme is defined by incompleteness and brevity. Rather, it is a sign of a well-executed enthymeme that the content and the number of its premises are adjusted to the intellectual capacities of the public audience; but even an enthymeme that failed to incorporate these qualities would still be an enthymeme.

In a well-known passage ( Rhet. I.2, 1357a7–18; similar: Rhet. II.22, 1395b24–26), Aristotle says that the enthymeme often has few or even fewer premises than some other deductions ( sullogismoi) . Since most interpreters refer the word ‘ sullogismos ’ to the syllogistic theory (see the entry on Aristotle: logic ), according to which a proper deduction has exactly two premises, those lines have led to the widespread understanding that Aristotle defines the enthymeme as a sullogismos in which one of two premises has been suppressed, i.e., as an abbreviated, incomplete syllogism. But certainly the passages mentioned do not attempt to give a definition of the enthymeme, nor does the word ‘ sullogismos ’ necessarily refer to deductions with exactly two premises. Properly understood, both passages are about the selection of appropriate premises, not about logical incompleteness. The remark that enthymemes often have few or fewer premises concludes the discussion of two possible mistakes the orator could make ( Rhet . I.2, 1357a7–10): One can draw conclusions from things that have previously been deduced or from things that have not been deduced yet. The latter method is unpersuasive, for the premises are not accepted, nor have they been introduced. The former method is problematic, too: if the orator has to introduce the needed premises by another deduction, and the premises of this pre-deduction too, etc., one will end up with a long chain of deductions. Arguments with several deductive steps are common in dialectical practice, but one cannot expect the audience of a public speech to follow such long arguments. This is why Aristotle says that the enthymeme is and should be from fewer premises.

Supplement on The Brevity of the Enthymeme

Just as there is a difference between real and apparent or fallacious deductions in dialectic, we have to distinguish between real and apparent or fallacious enthymemes in rhetoric. The topoi for real enthymemes are given in chapter II.23, for fallacious enthymemes in chapter II.24. The fallacious enthymeme pretends to include a valid deduction, while it actually rests on a fallacious inference.

Further, Aristotle distinguishes between enthymemes taken from probable ( eikos ) premises and enthymemes taken from signs ( sêmeia ). ( Rhet . I.2, 1357a32–33). In a different context, he says that enthymemes are based on probabilities, examples, tekmêria (i.e., proofs, evidences), and signs ( Rhet . II.25, 1402b12–14). Since the so-called tekmêria are a subclass of signs and the examples are used to establish general premises, this is only an extension of the former classification. (Note that neither classification interferes with the idea that premises have to be accepted opinions: with respect to the signs, the audience must believe that they exist and accept that they indicate the existence of something else, and with respect to the probabilities, people must accept that something is likely to happen.) However, it is not clear whether this is meant to be an exhaustive typology. That most of the rhetorical arguments are taken from probable premises (“For the most part it is true that …” “It is likely that …”) is due to the typical subjects of public speech, which are rarely necessary. When using a sign-argument or sign-enthymeme we do not try to explain a given fact; we just indicate that something exists or is the case: “… anything such that when it is another thing is, or when it has come into being, the other has come into being before or after, is a sign of the other’s being or having come into being.” ( Prior Analytics II.27, 70a7ff.). But there are several types of sign-arguments too; Aristotle offers the following examples:

Sign-arguments of type (i) and (iii) can always be refuted, even if the premises are true; that is to say that they do not include a valid deduction ( sullogismos ); Aristotle calls them asullogistos (non-deductive). Sign-arguments of type (ii) can never be refuted if the premise is true, since, for example, it is not possible that someone has fever without being ill, or that someone has milk without having given birth, etc. This latter type of sign-enthymemes is necessary and is also called tekmêrion (proof, evidence). Now, if some sign-enthymemes are valid deductions and some are not, it is tempting to ask whether Aristotle regarded the non-necessary sign-enthymemes as apparent or fallacious arguments. However, there seems to be a more attractive reading: We accept a fallacious argument only if we are deceived about its logical form. But we could regard, for example, the inference “She is pregnant, since she is pale” as a good and informative argument, even if we know that it does not include a logically necessary inference. So it seems as if Aristotle didn’t regard all non-necessary sign-arguments as fallacious or deceptive; but even if this is true, it is difficult for Aristotle to determine the sense in which non-necessary sign-enthymemes are valid arguments, since he is bound to the alternatives of deduction and induction, and neither class seems appropriate for non-necessary sign-arguments.

7. The Topoi

Generally speaking, an Aristotelian topos (‘place’, ‘location’) is an argumentative scheme that enables a dialectician or rhetorician to construe an argument for a given conclusion. The first comprehensive and systematic collection of topoi is given in Aristotle’s treatise Topics . Still, the use of so-called topoi or ‘ loci communes ’ can be traced back to early rhetoricians such as Protagoras, Gorgias (cp. Cicero, Brutus , 46–48) and Isocrates. But while in earlier rhetoric a topos was mostly understood as a complete, pre-fabricated pattern or formula that can be mentioned at a certain stage of the speech to produce a certain effect, most of the Aristotelian topoi , in particular most of the dialectical topoi of the Topics , are general instructions saying that a conclusion of a certain form can be derived from premises of a certain form; and because of this ‘formal’, ‘semi-formal’ or, at least topic-neutral character of Aristotle’s dialectical topoi , one topos can be used to construe several different arguments or arguments about different contents. Aristotle’s treatise Topics lists some hundred topoi for the construction of dialectical arguments. These lists of topoi form the core of the method by which the dialectician should be able to formulate deductions on any problem that could be proposed. Most of the instructions that the Rhetoric gives for the composition of enthymemes are also organized as lists of topoi ; especially the first book of the Rhetoric essentially consists of topoi concerning the subjects of the three genres of public speech (See Rhet. I.5–14), while chapters 23–24 of the second book of the Rhetoric provide lists of generally applicable topoi .

It is striking that the work that is almost exclusively dedicated to the collection of topoi , the book Topics , does not even make an attempt to define the concept of topos . At any rate the Rhetoric gives a sort of defining characterization: “I call the same thing element and topos ; for an element or a topos is a heading under which many enthymemes fall” ( Rhet. 1403a18–19). By ‘element’ Aristotle does not mean a proper part of the enthymeme, but rather a general scheme under which many concrete enthymemes of the same type can be subsumed. According to this definition, the topos is a general argumentative scheme or pattern, and the concrete arguments are instantiations of the general topos . That the topos is a general instruction from which several arguments can be derived is crucial for Aristotle’s understanding of an artful method of argumentation; for a teacher of rhetoric who makes his pupils learn ready samples of arguments would not be imparting the art itself to them, but only the products of this art, just as if someone pretending to teach the art of shoe-making only gave samples of already made shoes to his pupils (see Sophistical Refutations 183b36ff.).

The word ‘ topos ’ (place, location) most probably is derived from an ancient method of memorizing a great number of items on a list by associating them with successive places one is acquainted with, say the houses along a street. By recalling the houses along the street we can also remember the associated items (on this mnemonic technique see Sorabji 2004, 22–34). Full descriptions of this technique from antiquity can be found in Cicero, De Oratore II 86–88, 351–360, Auctor ad Herennium III 16–24, 29–40 and in Quintilian, Institutio XI 2, 11–33. In Topics 163b28–32, Aristotle seems to allude to this technique: “For just as in the art of remembering, the mere mention of the places instantly makes us recall the things, so these will make us more apt at deductions through looking to these defined premises in order of enumeration.” Aristotle also alludes to this technique in On the soul 427b18–20, On Memory 452a12–16, and On Dreams 458b20–22.

But although the name ‘ topos ’ may be derived from this mnemotechnical context, Aristotle’s use of topoi does not rely on the technique of places. At least within the system of the book Topics , every given problem must be analyzed in terms of certain linguistic, semantic or logical criteria: Does the predicate of the sentence in question ascribe a genus or a definition or peculiar or accidental properties to the subject? Does the sentence express a sort of opposition, either contradiction or contrariety, etc.? Does the sentence express that something is more or less the case? Does it maintain identity or diversity? Are the words used linguistically derived from words that are part of an accepted premise? Depending on such criteria of the analyzed sentence one has to refer to a fitting topos . For this reason, the succession of topoi in the book Topics is organized in accordance with their salient linguistic, semantic or logical criteria; above all topoi presented in Books II–VII of this treatise are structured in accordance with the four so-called ‘predicables’, i.e. whether a predicate signifies the genus, an accident, a proprium (peculiar attribute) or the definition of the subject. This structure suggests that no additional mnemotechnique is essentially involved. Besides all this, there is at least one passage in which the use of the word ‘ topos ’ can be explained without referring to the previously mentioned mnemotechnique: In Topics VIII.1, 155b4–5 Aristotle says: “we must find the location ( topos ) from which to attack”, where the word ‘ topos ’ is obviously used to mean a starting point for attacking the theses of the opponents.

More or less the same might apply to the Rhetoric —except that most of its lists of topoi are structured by certain contents and not by linguistic, semantic or logical criteria; moreover, the system of the four ‘predicables’ that structured the topoi in the Topics is absent from the Rhetoric (see below § 7.4 ).

A typical topos in Aristotle’s dialectic runs as follows: “Again, if the accident of a thing has a contrary, see whether it belongs to the subject to which the accident in question has been declared to belong: for if the latter belongs, the former could not belong; for it is impossible that contrary predicates should belong at the same time to the same thing” ( Topics 113a20–24). Like most topoi , it includes (i) a sort of general instruction (“see, whether …”); further it mentions (ii) an argumentative scheme—in the given example, the scheme ‘if the accidental predicate p belongs to the subject s , then the opposed P * cannot belong to s too’. Finally, the topos refers to (iii) a general rule or principle (“for it is impossible, …”) which justifies the given scheme. Other topoi often include the discussion of (iv) examples; still other topoi suggest (v) how to apply the given schemes.—Though these are elements that regularly occur in Aristotelian topoi , there is nothing like a standard form with which all topoi conform. Often Aristotle is very brief and leaves it to the reader to add the missing elements.

In a nutshell, the function of a topos can be explained as follows. First of all, one has to select an apt topos for a given conclusion. The conclusion is either a thesis of the opponent that someone wishes to refute, or it is the assertion someone wishes to establish or defend. Accordingly, there are two uses of topoi : they can either prove or disprove a given sentence; some can be used for both purposes, others for only one of them. In Aristotle’s dialectic, most topoi are topic-neutral and need hence be selected by certain linguistic, semantic or logical features of the given conclusion; if, for example, the conclusion maintains a definition, one has to select a topos from a list of topoi pertaining to definitions, etc. Once the dialectician or rhetorician has selected a topos that is appropriate for a given conclusion, the topos can be used to construe a premise from which the given conclusion can be derived. If for example the argumentative scheme is ‘If a predicate is generally true of a genus, then the predicate is also true of any species of that genus’, we can derive the conclusion ‘the capacity of nutrition belongs to plants’ using the premise ‘the capacity of nutrition belongs to all living things’, since ‘living thing’ is the genus of the species ‘plants’. If the construed premise is accepted, either by the opponent in a dialectical debate or by the audience of a public speech, we can draw the intended conclusion. In the Rhetoric though the situation is slightly different (see below § 7.4 ), because here the topic-neutral type of topoi that was prevalent in the Topics seems to play a secondary role. Many topoi of the Rhetoric seem to be rather ‘material’ in the sense that they are only useful for establishing conclusions of a certain content; this is why the appropriate topos here cannot be selected by formal criteria, but must be chosen in accordance with the content of the envisaged conclusion—whether, for example, something is said to be useful or honourable or just, etc.

It has been disputed whether the topos (or, more precisely, the ‘if …, then …’ scheme that is included in a topos ) that we use to construe an argument must itself be regarded as a further premise of the argument. It could be either, as some say, the premise of a propositional scheme such as the modus ponens, or, as others assume, as the conditional premise of a hypothetical syllogism. Aristotle himself does not favour one of these interpretations explicitly. But even if he regarded the topoi as additional premises in a dialectical or rhetorical argument, it is beyond any doubt that he did not use them as premises that must be explicitly mentioned or even approved by the opponent or audience.

Even though there are good reasons for thinking that the nature and use of topoi in Aristotle’s Rhetoric are based on his elaborate account of dialectical topoi in the Topics (see above § 7.2 and § 7.3 ), commentators are faced with the difficulty that the use of the word ‘ topos ’ in Aristotle’s Rhetoric is much more heterogeneous than in the Topics . Beside topoi which do perfectly comply with the description given in the Topics , there is an important group of topoi in the Rhetoric that are not topic-neutral and hence do not contain instructions for arguments of a certain logical form, but rather with a certain predicate (for example, that something is good, or honourable, or just, or contributes to happiness, etc.). While those latter ‘material’ topoi so to speak are, after all, used to construe arguments, there are also mentions of so-called ‘ topoi ’ in the context of the non-argumentative means of persuasion, which might be taken as procedural instructions, but no longer seem to be concerned with the construction of arguments, which was the one and only function of dialectical topoi .

Supplement on the Variety of Topoi in the Rhetoric

In addition to the more heterogenous use of the word ‘ topos ’ in the Rhetoric (which might originate from Aristotle’s attempt to combine his own dialectical use of the term with more traditional rhetorical uses), there is the problem of the controversial distinction in Rhet. I.2, 1358a2–35 between topoi (which are understood to be general/common) on the one hand and certain specific devices ( idia ) on the other. While Aristotle seems inclined to call the general or common topoi simply ‘ topoi ’, he uses several names for the opposing, specific items (e.g. idiai protaseis , idia , eidê ). This distinction has a major impact on the structure of the Rhetoric as a whole (see above § 2 ), in that it is responsible for the occurence of ‘specific’ instructions, premises, ‘ topoi ’ or whatever in the bulk of the first book and the occurence of ‘common’ topoi in the second part of the second book. Traditionally, this distinction has been understood as a division between general/common topoi on the one hand and specific topoi on the other (the traditional view has been defended among others by Cope 1877 and Rapp 2002). However, it is unclear (i) what the opposition between general/common and specific refers to, (ii) where in the Rhetoric the common topoi can be found and (iii) whether the distinction is meant to be a distinction between topoi in the first place, since even though Aristotle distinguishes topoi that are common from specific ( idia ) rhetorical devices, he never explicitly uses the phrase ‘specific topoi ’, as one might expect on the traditional reading.

As for (i), Aristotle points out in Rhet. I.2 that some things are specific to physics, others to ethics, etc. This seems to suggest a distinction between topoi (or other building blocks of arguments) that are peculiar to the different sciences on the one hand and other topoi that are not, but are instead applicable to all sciences and fields of knowledge alike—just as (most of) the dialectical topoi of the Topics are. However, from Rhet. I.3 on, Aristotle makes the readers think, by contrast, that ‘specific’ refers to the different genres of rhetoric, so that some topoi are specific to deliberative, others to epideictic, and still others to juridical speech. Correspondingly, this would require a sense of being‘common’ that boils down to saying that they are not specific to one single species of speech, but that does not amount to the topic-neutrality of the dialectical topoi .

With regard to (ii), it is generally agreed that the specific topoi can be found in the first book of the Rhetoric and the common topoi in the second. Most commentators assume that all common topoi are listed in chapters II.23–24 (real enthymemes in II.23, fallacious enthymemes in II.24). However, it is less common to count the items listed in II.19 (about the possible/impossible, past and future facts, significance and insignificance) as common topoi , which might be due to the controversy mentioned in (i) about the required sense of being ‘common’, for the topoi in II.19 are applicable to all genres of speech, but are most probably not common in the way the dialectical topoi are. In addition, it is important to notice that even chapter II.23, which is undisputedly dedicated to common topoi , is a mixed bag, for it includes some topoi , especially in the first third of the chapter, that, being topic-neutral, thoroughly correspond to dialectical topoi and even might be generally applicable as the dialectical topoi are, while some other topoi mentioned in II.23 are quite different in style, as they are taken from extant historical speeches.

The most difficult debates are posed by (iii), as the traditional interpretation is based on some fragile assumptions. Not only does Aristotle never call the specific items ‘ topoi ’ by name, it is also significant that the specific items that are listed in Rhet. I.5-15 often have the form of mere propositions or premises rather than of topoi as we know them from the Topics (see above § 7.3 ). This is why several authors insist that the distinction between topoi , which are thought to be common, and idia is not a distinction between different types of topoi , but between topoi and something else, most notably premises, commonly accepted premises or premises established by the arts. This objection comes in several versions. (a) Several authors subscribed to the view of Solmsen 1929 that there are two types of enthymemes, respresenting different stages in the development of Aristotle’s logical thinking insofar as some are taken from topoi (deriving from Aristotle’s early- pre-syllogistic logic) and some are built from premises through the figures of the syllogism (thus presupposing syllogistic logic), not from topoi . According to this view, the specific topoi given in the first book of the Rhetoric are the premises of the latter type of enthymemes, and the enthymemes of the former type are taken only from common topoi . From this point of view, only common topoi would be topoi in the proper sense, while specific topoi would be, strictly speaking, nothing but premises. Accordingly, one would expect to find propositions of the form “All F are just/noble/good” in the first book of the Rhetoric ; with such propositions one could construe syllogisms like “All F are just/noble/good—This particular x is F —This particular x is just/noble/good.” Against Solmsen it has been objected that what one actually gets in the first book hardly fits Solmsen’s model. In some sense one finds more than the required premises in that Aristotle gives here not only isolated propositions, but also certain propositions together with a reason or a justification. Furthermore, chapters I.6–7 of the Rhetoric offer topoi which can also be found in the third book of Topics ; in the Topics they are clearly called ‘ topoi ’, so that there is less pressure to think that they are premises rather than topoi . (b) Grimaldi 1958 requires that in order to build a rhetorical argument one needs the logical form of an argument provided by the topoi plus the material (content) provided by the specific premises or idia . A more refined version of this ‘complementarity’-view has been suggested by Rubinelli 2009, who, however, also allows of the possibility that some enthymemes are taken only from the topoi , while others are only taken from the idia . Against Grimaldi’s view it is has been objected that many of the common topoi listed in chapters II.23–24 are not based on linguistic, semantic or logical categories as the topic-neutral topoi of the Topics are. Some of them only offer strategic advice, for example, to turn what has been said against oneself upon the one who said it. For this reason, it would be misleading to interpret the common topoi of the Rhetoric as providing logical schemes of inference. (c) Havrda 2019 has attacked the presuppositions of the traditional view, but does not settle for the alternatives suggested by Solmsen, Grimaldi or Rubinelli either. According to him, Aristotle never distinguishes between common and specific topoi . Rather, he distinguishes between two different sources of rhetorical deductions; one source, the dialectical one, uses topoi , while the other, which is based on definitions provided by arts and sciences, does not.

8. Style: How to Say Things with Words

Rhet. III.1–12 introduces the topic of lexis , usually translated as ‘style’. This topic was not announced until the final passage of Rhetoric II, so that most scholars have come to think of this section as a more or less self-contained treatise. The insertion of this treatise into the Rhetoric is motivated by the claim that, while Rhetoric I & II dealt with thought (dianoia), i.e., about what the orator should say, it remains to inquire into the various ways of saying or formulating one and the same thing. In the course of Rhetoric III.1–12 it turns out that Aristotle tackles this task by using some quite heterogeneous approaches. After an initial exploration of the field of delivery and style (III.1) Aristotle tries to determine what good prose style consists in; for this purpose he has to go into the differentiation and the selection of various kinds of nouns, one of which is defined as metaphor (III.2). The following chapters III.3–6 feature topics that are at best loosely connected with the theme of good prose style; among these topics is the opposite of good style, namely frigid or deterring style ( psuchron ) (III.3), the simile, which turns out to be connected with the metaphor (III.4), the issue of correct Greek (III.5), the appropriateness (III.7) and the means by which one’s style becomes long-winded and dignified (III.6). Chapters III.8–9 introduce two new approaches to the issue of style, which seem to be unrelated to everything that has been said so far: These are the topics of the rhythmical shaping of prose style and of periodic and non-periodic flow of speech. Chapters III.10–11 are dedicated to how the orator can ‘bring things before one’s eyes’, which amounts to something like making the style more vivid. Again metaphors are shown to play a crucial role for that purpose, so that the topic of metaphor is taken up again and deepened by extended lists of examples. Chapter III.12 seems to make a new start by distinguishing between oral and written style and assessing their suitability for the three genres of speech (see above §2 ). The philosophical core of Aristotle’s treatise on style in Rhetoric III.1–12 seems to be included in the discussion of the good prose style (see below §8.1 ), however it is the topic of metaphor (see below §8.2 ) that has attracted the most attention in the later reception up to the present day.

Originally the discussion of style belongs to the art of poetry rather than to rhetoric; the poets were the first, as Aristotle observes, to give an impulse for the study of style. Nevertheless he admits that questions of style or, more precisely, of different ways to formulate the same subject, may have an impact on the degree of clarity: “What concerns the topic of lexis , however, has some small necessary place in all teaching; for to speak in one way rather than another makes some difference in regard to clarity; although not a great difference…” ( Rhet. III.1, 1404a8–10). Clarity again matters for comprehension and comprehensibility contributes to persuasiveness. Indeed Aristotle even claims that the virtue or excellence ( aretê ) of prose style ultimately depends on clarity, because it is the genuine purpose of a speech is to make something clear. In prose speeches, the good formulation of a state of affairs must therefore be a clear one. However, saying this is not yet enough to account for the best or excellent prose style, since clear linguistic expressions tend to be banal or flat, while good style should avoid such banality. If the language becomes too banal it will not be able to attract the attention of the audience. The orator can avoid this tendency of banality by the use of dignified or elevated expressions and in general by all formulations that deviate from common usage. On the one hand, uncommon vocabulary has the advantage of evoking the curiosity of an audience. On the other hand the use of such elevated vocabulary bears a serious risk: Whenever the orator makes excessive use of it, the speech might become unclear, thus failing to meet the default requirement of prose speech, namely clarity. Moreover, if the vocabulary becomes too sublime or dignified in relation to prose’s subject matter (Aristotle assumes it is mostly everyday affairs), the audience will notice that the orator uses his words with a certain intention and will become suspicious about the orator and his intentions. Hitting upon the right wording is therefore a matter of being clear, but not too banal; In trying not to be too banal, one must use uncommon, dignified words and phrases, but one must be careful not to use them excessively or inappropriately in relation to prose style and the typical subject matter of prose speeches.

Bringing all these considerations together, Aristotle defines the good prose style, i.e. the virtue of prose style, as follows: “Let the virtue of linguistic form be defined as being clear, for since the logos is a (linguistic, sc.) sign, it would fail to bring about its proper function, whenever it does not make clear (whatever it is the sign of, sc.)—and neither banal/mean/flat ( tapeinên ) nor above the deserved dignity, but appropriate ( prepon )” ( Rhet. III.2, 1404b1–4; similar at III.12, 1414a22–26). According to this definition, the virtue of prose style has to avoid two opposed tendencies, both of which are excessive and therefore fallacious: The good style is clear in a way that is neither too banal nor too dignified, but appropriate (in proportion to the subject matter of prose speech). In this respect the definition of stylistic virtue follows the same scheme as the definition of ethical virtues in Aristotle’s ethical writings, insofar as both the stylistic virtue and the virtue of character are defined in terms of a mean that lies between two opposed excesses. If the virtue of style is defined as a mean between the banality involving form of clarity and overly dignified (and hence inappropriate) speech, it is with good reason that Aristotle speaks of only one virtue of prose style, and not of clarity, ornament (by dignified expressions) and appropriateness as three distinct virtues of style. However, from the times of Cicero and Quintilianus on, these three, along with the correctness of Greek or Latin, became the canonical four virtues of speech ( virtutes dicendi ). Reading Aristotle through the spectacles of the Roman art of rhetoric, scholars often try to identify two, three or four virtues of style in his Rhetoric .

Finally, if the virtue of style is about finding a balance between banal clarity, which is dull, and attractive dignity, which is inappropriate in public speeches, how can the orator manage to control the different degrees of clarity and dignity? For this purpose Aristotle equips the orator with a classification of words (more or less the same classification can also be found in Poetics chapter 21): First of all Aristotle distinguishes between the kuria onamata , the standard expressions, and the glôtta , the borrowed words, idioms or vernacular expressions. Most examples that Aristotle gives of this latter class are taken from the different Greek dialects, and most examples of this type are in turn taken from the language of the Homeric epos. Further classes are defined by metaphors and by several expressions that are somehow altered or modified, e.g., newly coined expressions ( pepoiêmena ), composite expressions (especially new or unusual compositions ( ta dipla )), and lengthened, shortened or otherwise altered expressions. Sometimes Aristotle also uses the term kosmos under which he collects all epithets and otherwise ornamental expressions. These different types of words differ in accordance with their familiarity. Most familiar are the usual or current words, the least familiar words are the glôtta or words that are newly coined. The metaphors are also unknown and unusual, because a usual, well-known word is used to designate something other than its usual designation (see below §8.2 ). The best established words, the kuria , make their subject clear, but do not excite the audience’s curiosity, whereas all other types of words are not established, and hence have the sort of attraction that alien or foreign things used to have. Since remote things are admirable ( thaumaston ) and the admirable is pleasant, Aristotle says, one should make the speech admirable and pleasant by the use of such unfamiliar words. However one has to be careful not to use inappropriately dignified or poetic words in prose speech. Thus the virtue of style is accomplished by the selection and balanced use of these various types of words: Fundamental for prose speech is the use of usual and therefore clear words. In order to make the speech pleasant and dignified and in order to avoid banality the orator must make moderate use of non-familiar elements. Metaphor plays an important role for prose style, since metaphors contribute, as Aristotle says, clarity as well as the unfamiliar, surprising effect that avoids banality and tediousness.

According to Aristotle Poetics 21, 1457b9–16 and 20–22, a metaphor is “the application of an alien name by transference either from genus to species, or from species to genus, or from species to species, or by analogy, that is, proportion”. These four types are exemplified as follows:

Most of the examples Aristotle offers for types (i) to (iii) would not be regarded as metaphors in the modern sense; rather they would fall under the headings of metonomy or synecdoche. The examples offered for type (iv) are more like modern metaphors. Aristotle himself regards the metaphors of group (iv), which are built from analogy, as the most important type of enthymemes. An analogy is given if the second term is to the first as the fourth to the third. Correspondingly, an analogous metaphor uses the fourth term for the second or the second for the fourth. This principle can be illustrated by the following Aristotelian examples:

Examples (a) and (b) obey the optional instruction that metaphors can be qualified by adding the term to which the proper word is relative (cp. “the shield of Ares ,” “the evening of life ”). In example (c), there is no proper name for the thing that the metaphor refers to. In example (d) the relation of analogy is not, as in the other cases, indicated by the domain to which an item is referred to, but by a certain negation (for example “without name”); the negations make clear that the term is not used in its usual sense.

Metaphors are closely related to similes; but as opposed to the later tradition, Aristotle does not define the metaphor as an abbreviated simile, but, the other way around, the simile as a metaphor. The simile differs from the metaphor in the form of expression: while in the metaphor something is identified or substituted, the simile compares two things with each other, using words as “like,” “as”, etc. For example, “He rushed as a lion” is, according to Aristotle, a simile, but “The lion rushed” is a metaphor.

While in the later tradition the use of metaphors has been seen as a matter of mere decoration, which has to delight the hearer, Aristotle stresses the cognitive function of metaphors. Metaphors, he says, bring about learning ( Rhet. III.10, 1410b14f.). In order to understand a metaphor, the hearer has to find something common between the metaphor and the thing the metaphor refers to. For example, if someone calls the old age “stubble”, we have to find a common genus to which old age and stubble belong; we do not grasp the very sense of the metaphor until we find that both, old age and stubble, have lost their bloom. Thus, a metaphor not only refers to a thing, but simultaneously describes the thing in a certain respect. This is why Aristotle says that the metaphor brings about learning: as soon as we understand why someone uses the metaphor “stubble” to refer to old age, we have learned at least one characteristic of old age.

Accepted opinions: endoxa
Argument: logos
Art: technê
Character: êthos
Counterpart: antistrophos
Credible: axiopistos
Decision (practical): prohairesis
Deduction: sullogismos
Emotions: pathê
Enthymeme: enthumêma
Example: paradeigma
For the most part: hôs epi to polu
Induction ( epagôgê )
Judgement: krisis
Location: topos (an argumentative scheme)
Maxim: gnômê
Means of persuasion: pistis (in pre-Aristotelian use this word also designates a certain part of the speech)
Metaphor: metaphora
Persuasive: pithanon
Place: topos (an argumentative scheme)
Practical intelligence: phronêsis
Premise: protasis (can also mean ‘sentence’, statement’)
Probable: eikos
Proof: apodeixis (in the sense of ‘demonstrative argument, demonstration’)
Proof: tekmêrion (i.e. a necessary sign or sign argument)
Sign: sêmeion (can also mean ‘sign argument’)
Style: lexis
Specific topoi : idioi topoi (Aristotle refers to them also by ‘ idiai protaseis ’ or ‘ eidê ’)
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–––, 2018. “Aristotle and the Dialectical Turn of Rhetoric,” in Demetra Sfendoni-Mentzou (ed.), Aristotle — Contemporary Perspectives on his Thought. On the 2400th Anniversary of Aristotle’s Birth , Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter 223–236.
Ricoeur, Paul, 1996. “Between Rhetoric and Poetics,” in Amelie O. Rorty (ed.), Essays on Aristotle’s Rhetoric , Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 324–384.
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Figure of Speech

Figure of Speech Definition

What is a figure of speech? Here’s a quick and simple definition:

A figure of speech is a literary device in which language is used in an unusual—or "figured"—way in order to produce a stylistic effect. Figures of speech can be broken into two main groups: figures of speech that play with the ordinary meaning of words (such as metaphor , simile , and hyperbole ), and figures of speech that play with the ordinary arrangement or pattern in which words are written (such as alliteration , ellipsis , and antithesis ).

Some additional key details about figures of speech:

The ancient Greeks and Romans exhaustively listed, defined, and categorized figures of speech in order to better understand how to effectively use language. The names of most figures of speech derive from the original Greek or Latin.
Figures of speech that play with the literal meaning of words are called tropes , while figures of speech that play with the order or pattern of words are called schemes .
Figures of speech can take many forms. A figure of speech can involve a single word, a phrase, an omission of a word or phrase, a repetition of words or sounds, or specific sentence structures.

Figure of Speech Pronunciation

Here's how to pronounce figure of speech: fig -yer of speech

Figures of Speech vs. Figurative Language

There's a lot of confusion about the difference between the terms "figures of speech" and " figurative language ." Most of the confusion stems from the fact that different people often use "figurative language" to mean slightly different things. The two most common (and most acceptable) definitions of figurative language are:

Figurative language refers to any language that contains figures of speech. According to this definition, figurative language and figures of speech are not quite the same thing, but it's pretty darn close. The only difference is that figures of speech refer to each specific type of a figure of speech, while figurative language refers more generally to any language that contains any kind of figures of speech.
Figurative language refers to words or expressions that have non-literal meanings : This definition associates figurative language only with the category of figures of speech called tropes (which are figures of speech that play with the literal meaning of words). So according to this definition, figurative language would be any language that contains tropes, but not language that contains the figures of speech called schemes.

You might encounter people using figurative speech to mean either of the above, and it's not really possible to say which is correct. But if you know about these two different ways of relating figurative language and figures of speech, you'll be in pretty good shape.

Figures of Speech, Tropes, and Schemes

The oldest and still most common way to organize figures of speech is to split them into two main groups: tropes and schemes.

Tropes are figures of speech that involve a deviation from the expected and literal meaning of words.
Schemes are figures of speech that involve a deviation from the typical mechanics of a sentence, such as the order, pattern, or arrangement of words.

The scheme/trope classification system is by no means the only way to organize figures of speech (if you're interested, you can find all sorts of different categorization methods for figures of speech here ). But it is the most common method, and is both simple and structured enough to help you understand figures of speech.

Generally, a trope uses comparison, association, or wordplay to play with the literal meaning of words or to layer another meaning on top of a word's literal meaning. Some of the most commonly used tropes are explained briefly below, though you can get even more detail on each from its specific LitCharts entry.

Metaphor : A metaphor is a figure of speech that makes a comparison between two unrelated things by stating that one thing is another thing, even though this isn't literally true. For example, if someone says "it's raining cats and dogs," this obviously doesn't literally mean what it says—it's a metaphor that makes a comparison between the weight of "cats and dogs" and heavy rain. Metaphors are tropes because their effect relies not on the mechanics of the sentence, but rather on the association created by the use of the phrase "cats and dogs" in a non-literal manner.
Simile : A simile, like a metaphor, makes a comparison between two unrelated things. However, instead of stating that one thing is another thing (as in metaphor), a simile states that one thing is like another thing. To stick with cats and dogs, an example of a simile would be to say "they fought like cats and dogs."
Oxymoron : An oxymoron pairs contradictory words in order to express new or complex meanings. In the phrase "parting is such sweet sorrow" from Romeo and Juliet , "sweet sorrow" is an oxymoron that captures the complex and simultaneous feelings of pain and pleasure associated with passionate love. Oxymorons are tropes because their effect comes from a combination of the two words that goes beyond the literal meanings of those words.
Hyperbole : A hyperbole is an intentional exaggeration of the truth, used to emphasize the importance of something or to create a comic effect. An example of a hyperbole is to say that a backpack "weighs a ton." No backpack literally weighs a ton, but to say "my backpack weighs ten pounds" doesn't effectively communicate how burdensome a heavy backpack feels. Once again, this is a trope because its effect comes from understanding that the words mean something different from what they literally say.

Other Common Tropes

Antanaclasis
Onomatopoeia
Personification
Periphrasis
Rhetorical Question

Schemes are mechanical—they're figures of speech that tinker with words, sounds, and structures (as opposed to meanings) in order to achieve an effect. Schemes can themselves be broken down in helpful ways that define the sort of tinkering they employ.

Repetition: Repeating words, phrases, or even sounds in a particular way.
Omission: Leaving out certain words or punctuation that would normally be expected.
Changes of word order: Shifting around words or phrases in atypical ways.
Balance: Creating sentences or phrases with equal parts, often through the use of identical grammatical structures.

Some of the most commonly used schemes are explained briefly below, though you can get even more detail on each from its specific LitCharts entry.

Alliteration : In alliteration, the same sound repeats in a group of words, such as the “b” sound in: “ B ob b rought the b ox of b ricks to the b asement.” Alliteration uses repetition to create a musical effect that helps phrases to stand out from the language around them.
Assonance : A scheme in which vowel sounds repeat in nearby words, such as the "ee" sound in the proverb: "the squ ea ky wh ee l gets the gr ea se." Like alliteration, assonance uses repeated sounds to create a musical effect in which words echo one another—it's a scheme because this effect is achieved through repetition of words with certain sounds, not by playing with the meaning of words.
Ellipsis : The deliberate omission of one or more words from a sentence because their meaning is already implied. In the example, "Should I call you, or you me?" the second clause uses ellipsis. While its implication is "or should you call me," the context of the sentence allows for the omission of "should" and "call." Ellipsis is a scheme because it involves an uncommon usage of language.
Parallelism : The repetition of sentence structure for emphasis and balance. This can occur in a single sentence, such as "a penny saved is a penny earned," and it can also occur over the course of a speech, poem, or other text. Parallelism is a scheme because it creates emphasis through the mechanics of sentence structure, rather than by playing with the actual meanings of words.

Other Common Schemes

Anadiplosis
Antimetabole
Brachylogia
Epanalepsis
Parenthesis
Polysyndeton

Figure of Speech Examples

Figures of speech can make language more inventive, more beautiful, more rhythmic, more memorable, and more meaningful. It shouldn't be a surprise, then, that figures of speech are plentiful in all sorts of written language. The examples below show a variety of different types of figures of speech. You can see many more examples of each type at their own specific LitChart entries.

Figures of Speech Examples in Literature

Literature is riddled with figures of speech because figures of speech make language colorful and complex.

Metaphor in Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca

On and on, now east now west, wound the poor thread that once had been our drive. Sometimes I thought it lost, but it appeared again, beneath a fallen tree perhaps, or struggling on the other side of a muddied ditch created by the winter rains.

In this quote from Rebecca , Daphne du Maurier refers to a washed-out road as "the poor thread." This is a metaphor —and a trope—because the writer indirectly compares the thread to the road and expects that readers will understand that "thread" is not used literally.

Parallelism in Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way.

In the famous opening line of A Tale of Two Cities , Dickens uses parallelism —a scheme in which parts of a sentence repeat—in order to emphasize the contradictions of the time in which the book is set. Dickens has manipulated his sentence structure so that the parallel clauses emphasize the oppositional nature of his words ("it was the best of times, it was the worst of times"). The figure of speech doesn't play with the meaning of words, it emphasizes them through structure and repetition, which is why it is a scheme.

Alliteration in Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Birthmark"

In this manner, s electing it as the s ymbol of his wife's liability to s in, s orrow, d ecay, and d eath, Aylmer's s ombre imagination was not long in rendering the birthmark a frightful object, causing him more trouble and horror than ever Georgiana's beauty, whether of s oul or s ense, had given him delight.

This passage from " The Birthmark " uses alliteration to tie together all of the things that Georgiana's birthmark is supposed to symbolize. By using words that alliterate—"sin and sorrow" and "decay and death," for example—Hawthorne is making the reader feel that these ideas are connected, rather than simply stating that they are connected. Alliteration is a figure of speech—a scheme—because it uses the mechanics of language to emphasize meaning.

Verbal Irony in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar

For Brutus is an honorable man; So are they all, all honorable men,

This quote from Julius Caesar comes from Marc Antony's speech at Caesar's funeral. Antony needs to hold Brutus and his conspirators accountable for Caesar's death without contradicting the crowd's positive impression of Brutus, so Antony uses verbal irony to simultaneously please and trouble the crowd. On the surface, Antony says what the audience wants to hear (that Brutus is honorable), but it becomes clear over the course of his speech that he means the opposite of what he says (and over time he convinces the audience to believe this opposite meaning as well). This is a figure of speech (a trope) because it's based on a play on the meaning of Antony's words.

Figures of Speech Examples in Music

Figures of speech are also common in music. Schemes fit naturally with songs because both schemes and songs manipulate sound and rhythm to enhance the meanings of words. Music also uses many tropes, because using words that have meanings beyond their literal ones makes language more interesting, and it allows songwriters to create music that uses just a few words to imply a complex meaning.

Assonance and Metaphor in Rihanna's "Diamonds"

So sh ine br igh t ton igh t, you and I We're beautiful l i ke d i amonds in the sk y Eye to eye , so al i ve We're beautiful l i ke d i amonds in the sk y

Rihanna uses assonance when she repeats the " eye " sound throughout the chorus of "Diamonds." This make the words echo one another, which emphasizes the similarity between the singer, the person she's talking about, and the "diamonds in the sky" to which she's comparing them both. Assonance is a scheme because it's using the sound of words—not their meaning—to draw a parallel between different things.

Rihanna also uses the phrase "Diamonds in the sky" as a metaphor for stars. This is a trope—a phrase that means something other than what it literally says—as Rihanna obviously doesn't think that there are actually diamonds in the sky. This verse is a good example of how figures of speech can often work together and overlap. In this case, the metaphor that allows her to use "diamonds" instead of "stars" also fits into her use of assonance (because "stars" lacks the "eye" sound).

Personification in Green Day's "Good Riddance"

Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go

While the first line of this song uses "a fork stuck in the road" as a metaphor for a choice, the more arresting figure of speech at work here is the personification of time in the second line. By giving "time" human characteristics—the ability to grab a person and tell them where to go—Green Day is helping listeners to make sense of the power that time has over people. This is a trope because the line doesn't mean what it literally says; instead, it's asking listeners to make a comparison between the characteristics of time and the characteristics of a person.

Anastrophe in Public Enemy's "Fight the Power"

Straight up racist that sucker was Simple and plain

In the line "Straight up racist that sucker was," Public Enemy uses anastrophe (which is the inversion of typical word order) to preserve the rhythm of the verse. Instead of saying "That sucker was straight up racist," Public Enemy chooses an odd phrasing that has one stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables— " ra cist that su cker was/ Sim ple and plain ." This way, the beat falls more regularly across those two lines, which allows the rapper to make his point (that Elvis was racist) without the flow sounding awkward. Since anastrophe manipulates the order of words in order to achieve a rhythmic effect, it's a scheme.

Why Do Writers Use Figures of Speech?

Figures of speech is a category that encompasses a broad variety of literary terms, so it's difficult to give one answer to this question. Writers use different figures of speech to achieve different effects.

Schemes (figures of speech that manipulate sound, syntax, and word order) can make language more beautiful, persuasive, or memorable. Writers can use schemes to draw attention to an important passage, to create a sound that mirrors (or contrasts with) the meaning of words, or to give language a rhythm that draws the reader in. As schemes tend to work through sound and rhythm, they generally produce a visceral effect, or an effect felt in the body—broadly speaking, schemes are more sensory than intellectual.

In contrast, writers use tropes to grab the reader intellectually by adding complexity or ambiguity to an otherwise simple word or phrase. Tropes can ask the reader to make a comparison between two unlike things, they can impose human qualities on nonhumans, and they can mean the opposite of what they say. Tropes engage the intellect because the reader has to be alert to the fact that tropes do not use language at face value—a trope never means what it literally says.

All figures of speech help a writer to communicate ideas that are difficult to say in words or that are more effectively communicated non-verbally. This could be by repeating harsh consonants to create a scary atmosphere, or by using a metaphor to impose the qualities of something concrete (say, a rose) onto something more difficult to define (say, love). In general, figures of speech attempt to bring out a reader's emotion and to capture their attention by making language more colorful, surprising, and complex.

Other Helpful Figure of Speech Resources

Silva Rhetoricae on Figures of Speech : An excellent reference from BYU that explains the various ways that figures of speech have been categorized over history, including into schemes and tropes.
Silva Rhetoricae on schemes and tropes :
The Oxford Reference Page for Figure of Speech : A helpful definition of figures of speech in the context of the ancient study of rhetoric (did you know that the Roman rhetorician Quintillian defined "figure of speech" in 95 AD?)
What Are Tropes in Language? Skip to the "Distinction Between Figures and Tropes" section and read to the end—full of informative and thought-provoking discussion about tropes.
A YouTube video about tropes and schemes with pop culture examples.

The printed PDF version of the LitCharts literary term guide on Figure of Speech

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Alliteration
Climax (Figure of Speech)
Figurative Language
Parallelism
Verbal Irony
Climax (Plot)
Slant Rhyme
Bildungsroman
End-Stopped Line
Anachronism
Internal Rhyme
Flat Character
Understatement

Speech Act Theory

FranksValli/Wikimedia Commons

An Introduction to Punctuation
Ph.D., Rhetoric and English, University of Georgia
M.A., Modern English and American Literature, University of Leicester
B.A., English, State University of New York

Speech act theory is a subfield of pragmatics that studies how words are used not only to present information but also to carry out actions.

The speech act theory was introduced by Oxford philosopher J.L. Austin in How to Do Things With Words and further developed by American philosopher J.R. Searle. It considers the degree to which utterances are said to perform locutionary acts , illocutionary acts , and/or perlocutionary acts .

Many philosophers and linguists study speech act theory as a way to better understand human communication. "Part of the joy of doing speech act theory, from my strictly first-person point of view, is becoming more and more remindful of how many surprisingly different things we do when we talk to each other," (Kemmerling 2002).

Searle's Five Illocutionary Points

Philosopher J.R. Searle is responsible for devising a system of speech act categorization.

"In the past three decades, speech act theory has become an important branch of the contemporary theory of language thanks mainly to the influence of [J.R.] Searle (1969, 1979) and [H.P.] Grice (1975) whose ideas on meaning and communication have stimulated research in philosophy and in human and cognitive sciences...

From Searle's view, there are only five illocutionary points that speakers can achieve on propositions in an utterance, namely: the assertive, commissive, directive, declaratory and expressive illocutionary points. Speakers achieve the assertive point when they represent how things are in the world, the commissive point when they commit themselves to doing something, the directive point when they make an attempt to get hearers to do something, the declaratory point when they do things in the world at the moment of the utterance solely by virtue of saying that they do and the expressive point when they express their attitudes about objects and facts of the world (Vanderkeven and Kubo 2002).

Speech Act Theory and Literary Criticism

"Since 1970 speech act theory has influenced...the practice of literary criticism. When applied to the analysis of direct discourse by a character within a literary work, it provides a systematic...framework for identifying the unspoken presuppositions, implications, and effects of speech acts [that] competent readers and critics have always taken into account, subtly though unsystematically.

Speech act theory has also been used in a more radical way, however, as a model on which to recast the theory of literature...and especially...prose narratives. What the author of a fictional work—or else what the author's invented narrator—narrates is held to constitute a 'pretended' set of assertions, which are intended by the author, and understood by the competent reader, to be free from a speaker's ordinary commitment to the truth of what he or she asserts.

Within the frame of the fictional world that the narrative thus sets up, however, the utterances of the fictional characters—whether these are assertions or promises or marital vows—are held to be responsible to ordinary illocutionary commitments," (Abrams and Galt Harpham 2005).

Criticisms of Speech Act Theory

Although Searle's theory of speech acts has had a tremendous influence on functional aspects of pragmatics, it has also received very strong criticism.

The Function of Sentences

Some argue that Austin and Searle based their work principally on their intuitions, focusing exclusively on sentences isolated from the context where they might be used. In this sense, one of the main contradictions to Searle's suggested typology is the fact that the illocutionary force of a concrete speech act cannot take the form of a sentence as Searle considered it.

"Rather, researchers suggest that a sentence is a grammatical unit within the formal system of language, whereas the speech act involves a communicative function separate from this."

Interactional Aspects of Conversation

"In speech act theory, the hearer is seen as playing a passive role. The illocutionary force of a particular utterance is determined with regard to the linguistic form of the utterance and also introspection as to whether the necessary felicity conditions —not least in relation to the speaker's beliefs and feelings—are fulfilled. Interactional aspects are, thus, neglected.

However, [a] conversation is not just a mere chain of independent illocutionary forces—rather, speech acts are related to other speech acts with a wider discourse context. Speech act theory, in that it does not consider the function played by utterances in driving conversation is, therefore, insufficient in accounting for what actually happens in conversation," (Barron 2003).

Abrams, Meyer Howard, and Geoffrey Galt Harpham. A Glossary of Literary Terms . 8th ed., Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2005.
Austin, J.l. “How To Do Things With Words.” 1975.
Barron, Anne. Acquisition in Interlanguage Pragmatics Learning How to Do Things with Words in a Study Abroad Context . J. Benjamins Pub. Co., 2003..
Kemmerling, Andreas. “Speech Acts, Minds, and Social Reality: Discussions with John r. Searle. Expressing an Intentional State.” Studies in Linguistics and Philosophy , vol. 79, 2002, pp. 83. Kluwer Academic Publishers .
Vanderveken, Daniel, and Susumu Kubo. “Introduction.” Essays in Speech Act Theory , John Benjamins, 2001, pp. 1–21.
Speech Acts in Linguistics
Locutionary Act Definition in Speech-Act Theory
Illocutionary Force in Speech Theory
Illocutionary Act
Performative Verbs
Perlocutionary Act Speech
Felicity Conditions: Definition and Examples
Explicature (Speech Acts)
What Is Relevance Theory in Terms of Communication?
The Power of Indirectness in Speaking and Writing
Meaning Semantics
Reported Speech
Mental-State Verbs
Information Content (Language)
Examples of Indexicality (Language)
Pragmatics Gives Context to Language

Figure of Speech

Definition of figure of speech.

A figure of speech is a word or phrase that is used in a non-literal way to create an effect. This effect may be rhetorical as in the deliberate arrangement of words to achieve something poetic, or imagery as in the use of language to suggest a visual picture or make an idea more vivid. Overall, figures of speech function as literary devices because of their expressive use of language. Words are used in other ways than their literal meanings or typical manner of application.

For example, Margaret Atwood utilizes figures of speech in her poem “ you fit into me ” as a means of achieving poetic meaning and creating a vivid picture for the reader.

you fit into me like a hook into an eye a fish hook an open eye

The simile in the first two lines sets forth a comparison between the way “you” fits into the poet like a hook and eye closure for perhaps a garment. This is an example of rhetorical effect in that the wording carefully achieves the idea of two things meant to connect to each other. In the second two lines, the wording is clarified by adding “fish” to “hook” and “open” to “eye,” which calls forth an unpleasant and even violent image. The poet’s descriptions of hooks and eyes are not meant literally in the poem. Yet the use of figurative language allows the poet to express two very different meanings and images that enhance the interpretation of the poem through contrast .

Types of Figures of Speech

The term figure of speech covers a wide range of literary devices, techniques, and other forms of figurative language, a few of which include:

Personification

Understatement.

Alliteration
Onomatopoeia
Circumlocution

Common Examples of Figures of Speech Used in Conversation

Many people use figures of speech in conversation as a way of clarifying or emphasizing what they mean. Here are some common examples of conversational figures of speech:

Hyperbole is a figure of speech that utilizes extreme exaggeration to emphasize a certain quality or feature.

I have a million things to do.
This suitcase weighs a ton.
This room is an ice-box.
I’ll die if he doesn’t ask me on a date.
I’m too poor to pay attention.

Understatement is a figure of speech that invokes less emotion than would be expected in reaction to something. This downplaying of reaction is a surprise for the reader and generally has the effect of showing irony .

I heard she has cancer, but it’s not a big deal.
Joe got his dream job, so that’s not too bad.
Sue won the lottery, so she’s a bit excited.
That condemned house just needs a coat of paint.
The hurricane brought a couple of rain showers with it.

A paradox is a figure of speech that appears to be self-contradictory but actually reveals something truthful.

You have to spend money to save it.
What I’ve learned is that I know nothing.
You have to be cruel to be kind.
Things get worse before they get better.
The only rule is to ignore all rules.

A pun is a figure of speech that contains a “ play ” on words, such as using words that mean one thing to mean something else or words that sound alike in as a means of changing meaning.

A sleeping bull is called a bull-dozer.
Baseball players eat on home plates.
Polar bears vote at the North Poll.
Fish are smart because they travel in schools.
One bear told another that life without them would be grizzly.

An oxymoron is a figure of speech that connects two opposing ideas, usually in two-word phrases, to create a contradictory effect.

open secret
Alone together
controlled chaos
pretty ugly

Common Examples of Figure of Speech in Writing

Writers also use figures of speech in their work as a means of description or developing meaning. Here are some common examples of figures of speech used in writing:

Simile is a figure of speech in which two dissimilar things are compared to each other using the terms “like” or “as.”

She’s as pretty as a picture.
I’m pleased as punch.
He’s strong like an ox.
You are sly like a fox.
I’m happy as a clam.

A metaphor is a figure of speech that compares two different things without the use of the terms “like” or “as.”

He is a fish out of water.
She is a star in the sky.
My grandchildren are the flowers of my garden.
That story is music to my ears.
Your words are a broken record.

Euphemism is a figure of speech that refers to figurative language designed to replace words or phrases that would otherwise be considered harsh, impolite, or unpleasant.

Last night , Joe’s grandfather passed away (died).
She was starting to feel over the hill (old).
Young adults are curious about the birds and bees (sex).
I need to powder my nose (go to the bathroom).
Our company has decided to let you go (fire you).

Personification is a figure of speech that attributes human characteristics to something that is not human.

I heard the wind whistling.
The water danced across my window.
My dog is telling me to start dinner.
The moon is smiling at me.
Her alarm hummed in the background.

Writing Figure of Speech

As a literary device, figures of speech enhance the meaning of written and spoken words. In oral communication, figures of speech can clarify, enhance description, and create interesting use of language. In writing, when figures of speech are used effectively, these devices enhance the writer’s ability for description and expression so that readers have a better understanding of what is being conveyed.

It’s important that writers construct effective figures of speech so that the meaning is not lost for the reader. In other words, simple rearrangement or juxtaposition of words is not effective in the way that deliberate wording and phrasing are. For example, the hyperbole “I could eat a horse” is effective in showing great hunger by using figurative language. If a writer tried the hyperbole “I could eat a barn made of licorice,” the figurative language is ineffective and the meaning would be lost for most readers.

Here are some ways that writers benefit from incorporating figures of speech into their work:

Figure of Speech as Artistic Use of Language

Effective use of figures of speech is one of the greatest demonstrations of artistic use of language. Being able to create poetic meaning, comparisons, and expressions with these literary devices is how writers form art with words.

Figure of Speech as Entertainment for Reader

Effective figures of speech often elevate the entertainment value of a literary work for the reader. Many figures of speech invoke humor or provide a sense of irony in ways that literal expressions do not. This can create a greater sense of engagement for the reader when it comes to a literary work.

Figure of Speech as Memorable Experience for Reader

By using effective figures of speech to enhance description and meaning, writers make their works more memorable for readers as an experience. Writers can often share a difficult truth or convey a particular concept through figurative language so that the reader has a greater understanding of the material and one that lasts in memory.

Examples of Figure of Speech in Literature

Works of literature feature innumerable figures of speech that are used as literary devices. These figures of speech add meaning to literature and showcase the power and beauty of figurative language. Here are some examples of figures of speech in well-known literary works:

Example 1: The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald)

In his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars.

Fitzgerald makes use of simile here as a figure of speech to compare Gatsby’s party guests to moths. The imagery used by Fitzgerald is one of delicacy and beauty, and creates an ephemeral atmosphere . However, the likening of Gatsby’s guests to moths also reinforces the idea that they are only attracted to the sensation of the parties and that they will depart without having made any true impact or connection. This simile, as a figure of speech, underscores the themes of superficiality and transience in the novel .

Example 2: One Hundred Years of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)

Both described at the same time how it was always March there and always Monday, and then they understood that José Arcadio Buendía was not as crazy as the family said, but that he was the only one who had enough lucidity to sense the truth of the fact that time also stumbled and had accidents and could therefore splinter and leave an eternalized fragment in a room.

In this passage, Garcia Marquez utilizes personification as a figure of speech. Time is personified as an entity that “stumbled” and “had accidents.” This is an effective use of figurative language in that this personification of time indicates a level of human frailty that is rarely associated with something so measured. In addition, this is effective in the novel as a figure of speech because time has a great deal of influence on the plot and characters of the story. Personified in this way, the meaning of time in the novel is enhanced to the point that it is a character in and of itself.

Example 3: Fahrenheit 451 (Ray Bradbury)

A book is a loaded gun in the house next door…Who knows who might be the target of the well-read man?

In this passage, Bradbury utilizes metaphor as a figure of speech to compare a book to a loaded gun. This is an effective literary device for this novel because, in the story, books are considered weapons of free thought and possession of them is illegal. Of course, Bradbury is only stating that a book is a loaded gun as a means of figurative, not literal meaning. This metaphor is particularly powerful because the comparison is so unlikely; books are generally not considered to be dangerous weapons. However, the comparison does have a level of logic in the context of the story in which the pursuit of knowledge is weaponized and criminalized.

Speech: “Is this a dagger which I see before me
Speech: Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

Analysis Since the Voice to Parliament referendum, our national discourse has failed to reflect on where we should go next

In 1968, anthropologist W E H Stanner spoke in his Boyer lecture about the "cult of forgetfulness".

He called it " the Great Australian Silence " — where Australians do not just fail to acknowledge the violence and legacy of the past towards Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, but choose to not think about this past at all.

Has that Great Australian Silence been extended into perpetuity since the defeat of the Voice to Parliament?

Not all, but many Indigenous Australians saw the failure of the October referendum as a repudiation of their desire to be seen and heard.

As we embark on the beginning of Reconciliation Week, the first since the defeat of the Voice, the pain of the last chapter for many has been rendered invisible.

There has been an inability of our national discourse to pause and reflect on what that means and where we should go next.

It is, again, First Nations people who have quietly been doing the heavy lifting on what this national vote meant and what should come next. The absence of non-Indigenous leaders in this debate in recent months has been stunning.

The No vote has been used to further alienate Indigenous Australians

Reconciliation is designed to be a two-way street. You cannot reconcile if you are not prepared to do your part.

What should the part of the dominant non-Indigenous group of Australians look like?

Politicians have avoided talking about the recent referendum unless doing so for political advantage .

But even the victors who successfully argued their No case have failed to articulate a path forward.

The questions many are asking now are how do we reckon with the fact that Aboriginal Australians wanted something different? And how do we forge a path forward that narrows conflict rather than further alienating a people who have been discriminated against and disadvantaged?

Some have used the No result to interpret a greater range of messages.

Is this linked to the referendum? The push to roll back existing practices that acknowledge Indigenous Australians has accelerated since the Voice defeat.

The Age reported just this weekend that grassroots Victorian Nationals members have called for a ban on public funds being spent on Welcome to Country ceremonies .

At the party's state conference on Saturday, members also passed a motion calling on a future state government to give farmers the same "respect and consideration" as First Nations people regarding the use of their land, amid a growing debate about the state's cultural heritage laws .

After the Voice, what's next for reconciliation?

There are some Indigenous people who are now starting to frame their thoughts after what many have experienced as a bruising and deflating period of their lives.

Thomas Mayo — one of the most prominent figures behind the Yes campaign — has written a book to be published in September investigating what's next for reconciliation and justice in Australia.

In the book, titled Always Was, Always Will Be , Mayo contends that since the referendum, some have used the outcome to argue against any recognition of Indigenous Australia at all, claiming the No vote was a "clear rejection of the Uluru Statement".

He believes this is a purposeful misrepresentation of the outcome and says there has been a "greater reluctance" to demonstrate leadership and vision in Indigenous affairs since the referendum.

"Conservatives in Queensland and Victoria, for example, have announced they will repeal treaty legislation if they are elected . And in some local government areas, councils have removed the traditional Welcome and Acknowledgement of Country from their meetings and events," Mayo says.

The 2022 budget provided $5.8 million to start work on setting up the Makarrata Commission and oversee processes for making agreements and truth-telling on top of $27 million pledged during the election to establish the body.

The federal budget that was just handed down this month included no extra money for the truth-telling process.

The government says it is still consulting about what truth-telling will look like.

Since the referendum the Albanese government has introduced some practical policy advances in areas such as Indigenous housing, employment and education.

But Mayo says "we cannot lose sight of the need for structural and systemic reforms — to address the core of the problem, the torment of our powerlessness".

"The Uluru Statement from the Heart is no less true because of the referendum result. The need for a Voice no less logical; no less important. It remains the best way to design policies and laws, giving a Voice to the people who they affect most," he writes.

And on National Sorry Day, held yesterday to acknowledge the experiences and strength of Stolen Generations survivors, healing workshops, on-country camps and the documentation of the experiences of survivors were boosted by a $3.5 million funding announcement.

The federal funding, announced ahead of Sorry Day, was aimed to prop up community-led services through the Healing Foundation across the next two years.

This is our great moral burden

Yet is it enough? If we continue on the current trajectory, the inequality in outcomes will endure.

First Nations Australians are unlikely to receive again in our lifetime the scale of national focus and attention the Voice debate delivered from our political leaders and national media.

Yet nations that fail to grapple with their histories are doomed to a perpetual cycle of grievance.

The National Reconciliation Week theme for this year calls on Australians to "tackle the unfinished business of reconciliation" and a great moral burden falls on the shoulders of Australians who want to reject Stanner's cult of forgetfulness.

"There have been many moments in Australia's reconciliation journey that make us want to turn away. But when things are divisive, the worst thing we can do is disengage or disconnect," Reconciliation Australia says in its statement on this year's theme.

On the night of the referendum defeat, prominent Indigenous leader and academic Marcia Langton declared reconciliation as we know it dead.

Months later, however, her work on Indigenous justice has not ended.

How does she see it now?

"The lies about our simple proposal for reform, for a Voice, so that we can be heard by governments to close the gap, will become obvious to future generations," she believes.

"[Australians who stood] with us know the truth. Whether Australians allow the lies to stand, whether the nation they imagine is founded on these lies remains their responsibility."

Assistant Minister for Indigenous Australians Malarndirri McCarthy, who represents the Northern Territory, says there remains a deep hurt and disappointment in the community over the outcome of the referendum.

"People are still devastated by the defeat. It is hard to accept, but we have to accept it and keep going — 6.2 million Australians voted for a better future. And while we may not have won the referendum, we did not lose our courage and determination and resilience."

Minister for Indigenous Australians Linda Burney says Indigenous people "can't afford to throw up our hands in despair".

"Sometimes change happens fast. But more often than not, change happens slowly. Progress is not a straight line. I'm still hopeful that we can achieve a more just and more reconciled future."

Patricia Karvelas is the presenter of Q+A, which returns tonight at 9.35pm on ABC TV, RN Breakfast and co-host of the Party Room podcast.

X (formerly Twitter)

Something disturbing is going on in Australian communities — and it's sparking many conversations in Canberra

Supporters hold signs and flags at a pro-Palestine rally outside Parliament House in Canberra.

Politicians in two states have changed their stance on treaties since the Voice

A group of protestors hold up signs saying 'always was always will be Aboriginal land', coloured in as Aboriginal flags.

Federal Parliament
Indigenous (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander)
Indigenous Policy
Race Relations

COMMENTS

Speech Analysis
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As in all papers, the analysis must include an introduction, body, and conclusion. Start your introduction paragraph with an attention-getter or hook. Make sure your introduction includes a thesis sentence or purpose and previews the main points covered in the body. State the type of speech being analyzed and where it took place.
Rhetorical Analysis Definition and Examples
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