This document provides guidance for students completing a rhetorical analysis assignment on one of several written works about psychological experiments on obedience and conformity. It defines rhetorical analysis and outlines the key components students should examine, including the author, original audience, purpose, rhetorical strategies, and rhetorical situation. Students are instructed to analyze what response the author aims to evoke, how language and techniques are used to achieve this, and how successful the author is. Example questions are provided for students to consider for each work. The document aims to help students understand rhetorical techniques and complete a strong, effective analysis.

1. Unit 1
*
To Write a Rhetorical Analysis of an Written Work, Determine
Who Was the Original Audience of the Work:Determine when
and where the work was originally published. Using a general
knowledge source—like an encyclopedia—develop some
knowledge about what was occurring at that date/time.If the
work is an article or an essay, determine the name of the
original publication in which the work appeared.At the top or
bottom of the publication’s home page (not its subscription
advertising) locate a section titled “About Us” or “Mission
Statement.” This section should tell you something about the
publication’s focus, its audience and its goals.
*
Solomon Asch, “Opinions and Social PressureOriginal
Publication: Scientific American, 1955 Primary Focus:
Psychological Experiment—Influence of Majority on the
IndividualUse of straight lines emphasized through illustration
of cards.Asch begins paragraphs with questions to readers and
with helpful transition phrases.Essay mimics:
Variations (Partner/Confederate;
Degree of accuracy)Concluding paragraphs?Style?
*

2. Question to Ask Ourselves
What does Solomon Asch want his reader to think or conclude?
*
Stanley Milgram’s
“The Perils of Obedience”Our version is abridged & adapted
from Obedience to Authority by Stanley MilgramOriginally
published in Harper’s Magazine, Dec., 1973
Selection and arrangement/organization of material:
Gretchen Brandt—Description? Response?
Fred Prozi (subheading: “An Unexpected Outcome”)—
Description? Response?
Morris Braverman (subheading: “Peculiar Reactions”)—
Description? Response?
Bruno Batta (subheading: “Duty Without Conflict”)—
description? Response?
*
Question to Ask OurselvesWhat does Stanley Milgram want his
original audience to think/conclude?
*
Jerry Burger, “Replicating Milgram: Would People Still Obey
Today?” (abridged)
1st publication: American Psychologist Special Issue:
Obedience—Then and Now, Jan. 2009

3. Primary Focus: Would Milgram experiment still yield same
results? Was Milgram experiment about human character or
about situation? [Ross & Nisbett’s “attribution error”]
“150-Volt
Solution
”
“Modeled Refusal Condition”
Multiple reassurances subjects could leave
*
Jerry Burger, “Replicating Milgram: Would People Still Obey
Today?” (abridged)TablesStatisticsHeadings and
SubheadingsNames of Participants?Vocabulary?
*
Question to Ask OurselvesWhat does Jerry Burger want his
original audience to think/conclude?
*

4. An Opportunity to See How Audience Expectations Affect
Author’s Style
Stanley Milgram and Jerry Burger essentially write about the
same experiment, but their styles are very different. Their styles
are very different because each other has adopted a writing style
to suit his particular audience.
*
*Milgram’s Article Burger’s ArticleWhere & when
published?Where & when published?Type of Audience?Type of
Audience?Outside Sources? Type?Outside Sources?
Type?Headings & Subheadings?Headings &
Subheadings?Graphics? Graphics?Method of referring to
subjects? Method of referring to subjects?
Point-of-view?
Language?
Organization?
Point-of-view?
Language?
Organization?

5. *
Philip Zimbardo, “The Stanford Prison Experiment”: Substance
Original publication: The New York Times Magazine, 1973
Primary Focus: “We wanted to see what the psychological
effects were of becoming a prisoner or prison guard” (2).
Guards and Prisoners: Dehumanized on both sides
Everyone, including scientists, lost sight that this was
experiment.
*
Philip Zimbardo, “The Stanford Prison Experiment”: Style &

6. SubstanceIn terms of the reader (now and originally), what are
functions of the following?Quoted Passages Preceding
Essay?Narrative Style of Introductory Section (paragraphs 1—
7), including:Sentence Structure?Language?Organization?
*
Philip Zimbardo, “The Stanford Prison Experiment”: Style and
SubstanceInclusion of details to appeal to reader’s sense of
logic (logos)? To establish Zimbardo’s credibility (ethos)?
Logos: Researching TopicEstablishing Reason for Not
Conducting in “Real” PrisonEstablishing & Constructing Prison
EnvironmentEthos:Selecting SubjectsDetermining
Guards/Prisoners
*
Philip Zimbardo, “The Stanford Prison Experiment”: Style and
SubstanceInclusion of:Direct Quotation of Subjects’ Words
during ExperimentExcerpts from Transcriptions of Guards’
Reflections on the Experiment Excerpts from Guard A’s
DiaryUse of “I” and “We” to Points of View?Quotation Marks
around Certain Words?Concluding Paragraph?

7. *
Question to Ask OurselvesWhat does Philip Zimbardo want his
original audience to think/conclude?
*
Sidebar 20.6
Can vulgar language, even if it is not specifically
directed at an individual, be actionable as sexual
harassment under Title VII? Yes—according to the
11th Circuit Court of Appeals. The plaintiff, Ingrid
Reeves, worked at a sales company, C.H. Robinson.
Reeves alleged that she was subjected to hearing her
male co-workers call other women names such as
“b***h,” “wh**e” and “c**t” on a daily basis. She also
claimed that there were repeated vulgar discussions
about female body parts and a pornographic image
of a woman in the office. Reeves complained to her
co-workers, her supervisor, and top company executives,
but the offensive conduct was “accepted and
tolerated.”
According to the 11th Circuit, “if Reeves’s account

8. is to be believed, C.H. Robinson’s workplace was more
than a rough environment—indiscriminately vulgar,
profane, and sexual. Instead, a just reasonably could
find that it was a workplace that exposed Reeves to
disadvantageous terms or conditions of employment
to which members of the other sex were not exposed.”
Moreover, the court stated that it was no defense to
assert “that the workplace may have been vulgar and
sexually degrading before Reeves arrived.”
For more information, see, Reeves v. C.H. Robinson
Worldwide, Inc.,
07-10270 (11th Cir. Jan. 20, 2010), available at
www.ca11.uscourts.gov/
opinions/ops/200710270op2.pdf.
>> sidebar 20.6
Rhetorical Analysis
Length:
4-5 pages, paper formatted using MLA style
Audience:
First-year college students majoring in sociology, psychology,
communications, or English

9. In this assignment, you will build on your analytical skills (both
in reading and in writing) by rhetorically analyzing one of the
works listed below. Your rhetorical analysis should help you: 1)
understand more fully the challenges and decisions facing those
who endeavor to persuade a particular audience through their
writing; 2) read the written works of others more carefully and
critically.
In order to be strong and effective, your analysis will need to
accomplish at least three objectives: 1) to analyze what your
chosen writer is trying to achieve—that is, how/what he wants
his readers to think/feel; 2) to analyze how your chosen writer
uses various rhetorical elements to persuade his or her audience
to think or feel a certain way; 2) to evaluate the degree of
rhetorical success the writer has in achieving his goals.
Rhetorically analyze one of the following:
· Solomon Asch's "Opinions and Social Pressure"
· Stanley Milgram's "The Perils of Obedience"
· Jerry Burger’s “Replicating Milgram: Would People Still Obey
Today?
· Philip Zimbardo’s “Stanford Prison Experiment”
· NOTE: Zimbardo has reshaped his original article for The

10. New York Times Magazine into the essay that runs for eight
pages on the Stanford Prison Experiment website. If you choose
to write about Zimbardo’s report, focus only on the essay—do
not include graphic or video/audio components.
You may use Ian Parker’s “Obedience” essay also, but only as
supplementary material in support or elaboration of your
rhetorical analysis of one of the four essays bulleted above.
(Parker’s “Obedience” essay was first published in the online
magazine Granta, issue 71, 2000, pages 99-126.)
To assist you in completing the assignment, keep in mind
elements like the following*:
· Your author's background and credentials
· The context of the text's original publication: date, place,
publisher (to recover information about a publication’s purpose,
intended audience and perspective, Google its title and, on the
publication’s home page, look for an “about us” section and/or
“mission statement” for the publication, both of which are
usually listed at the top or bottom of the home page
· The nature of the audience to whom the work was originally
addressed
· Support for position: logic, evidence or examples, statistics or
other facts (in considering this element, also take into account

11. for whom the author was originally writing)
· Appeals to the audience’s emotions, reason, and/or ethics
· Language: level and type of vocabulary, choice of words,
subjective or objective language
· Organization of the essay
· What the writer chooses to include/elaborate on and what the
writer seems to ignore or pay little attention to
· Sentence structure and length
*By no means is the preceding a complete list of the kinds of
rhetorical elements writers use. At the same time, by no means
must your paper cover all of these elements or every rhetorical
device in your chosen essay. Choose what strikes you as most
relevant to your thesis. Regardless, however, this paper—by its
very nature—requires you to quote from your chosen essay
rather extensively—on average, you should include at least one
direct quotation from your chosen essay per page.
Try to find a thesis that has relevance for you. The following
are examples only:
· Stanley Milgram’s gift for story-telling, as evidenced in his
account of his obedience experiments for Harper’s,
demonstrates his ability to persuade readers of the shocking and

12. important nature of his discoveries.
· In the account of his experiment, Phillip Zimbardo writes to
persuade readers and viewers of his website The Stanford Prison
Experiment to believe certain roles we are assigned are so
strong that even experimenters can lose sight of what is real and
what is not.
· You might also think about comparing and contrasting the
style, context and purpose of Burger’s article—the only
scholarly article in the unit—with the style, context, and
purpose of one of the three other essays in our unit recounting
obedience experiments.
Rhetorical Analysis:
Less What? More How?
Rhetorical Analysis of a Written Text
Definition (in the case of this assignment for ENG 200):
An examination, in writing, of how an author uses language to
evoke a particular response from his or her audience.

13. Rhetorical Analysis
Answers 3 big questions:
What response is the author trying to evoke from his or her
readers*?
How does the author use language to help evoke that response*?
How well does the author succeed in evoking that response*?
* (In our case, we need to think about two sets of readers: the
original readers of the text and readers today.)
Rhetorical Analysis
Requires you to complete 4 big tasks:
Identify the essay’s original rhetorical situation.
Identify the essay’s key rhetorical strategies.
Evaluate the essay in terms of its rhetorical strategies as related
to its original rhetorical situation and its rhetorical situation
today.
Write an effective rhetorical analysis that derives from &
includes parts of #1, #2, and #3.

14. What Is a Rhetorical Situation?
Definition: The situation in and for which an essay is written,
published and read.
5 General Elements Make the Rhetorical Situation
Author
Topic
Audience
Purpose/Aim
Context
Rhetorical Situation: Author
What are the author’s:
Relevant biographical details?
Area of expertise?
Qualifications?
Biases?
Perspective on the topic?
Rhetorical Situation: Topic

15. Does the author:
Focus on a particular aspect of the topic or on the topic in
general?
Devote more attention to some aspects of topic more than
others? If so, why might that be?
Clarify his position on the topic?
Take into consideration others’ positions on the topic?
Rhetorical Situation: Audience
To know something about the original readership of the past, we
need to know something about the original publication in which
the essay appeared.
Name/Kind of Original Publication?*
What characteristics (i.e., age, income level, level of education,
areas of expertise) are most of the publication’s readers likely
to possess?
What is publication’s mission/what are its goals?
How long has the publication been in existence?
What expectations are readers of the publication likely to have
about what they will find in the publication?
Is publication scholarly, peer-reviewed, or popular?
*NOTE: to find out about a publication and its readership,

16. search the top or bottom of its website’s home page (NOT the
subscription page) for a section titled “About Us” or “Mission
Statement.”
Rhetorical Situation: Purpose/Aim
Is the author’s purpose/aim:
To inform, entertain, persuade, educate, provoke to action,
shock….what?
Explicitly stated or is it implied?
Does the author have more than one purpose? If so:
Does one purpose seem more dominate than others?
Does one purpose seem more explicit and/or overt, while
another seems more implied and/or covert?
Rhetorical Situation: Context
When was the essay originally published?
What was happening at that time that might have influenced the
author or motivated the author to write?
Is the author’s essay one that is joining an ongoing conversation
or debate?

17. What in the author’s own background might have bearing on
what was happening at the time of the essay’s publication?
3 Types of Rhetorical Strategies
Strategies of Content
Strategies of Structure
Strategies of Style
Rhetorical Strategies*
Strategies of Content:
Arguments/Assertions
Evidence/Examples
Reasoning
Persuasive Appeals to Readers’:
Reason
Emotion
Sense of ethics/fairness (How does the author establish his/her
credibility? How does the author persuade his/her readers to
trust him/her?)
Rhetorical Strategies*

18. Strategies of Structure:
Order in which claims are presented
Line of reasoning
Connections among ideas
Essay openings and conclusions
Use of headings and subheadings
Rhetorical Strategies*
Strategies of Style:
Sentence length and type
Level and type of vocabulary
Figurative language (similes, metaphors, analogies)
Allusions
Level and type of diction
All of the above strategies can contribute to the tone of the
essay.
Now, to the Assignment: Rhetorical Analysis Paper—Some (but
Certainly not All) Pertinent Questions
Solomon Asch’s “Opinions and Social Pressure”
First published in Scientific American, 1955
How does Asch:
Refer to the people who volunteered in his experiment?

19. Organize his essay?
Open and close his essay?
Why does Asch:
Give us one pertinent piece of information in parentheses in the
13th paragraph?
Tell us volunteers said they valued independent thinking over
conformity?
Why does Asch write the way he does? What does he want us to
believe?
How can we tell he is writing for a popular—but also educated
and interested—audience?
Finally, Rhetorical Analysis
Seeks to answer the question What? But, more importantly,
seeks to answer the questions,
How?
Why?
And so looks at authors’ aims, motives, and agendas…in other
words, rhetorical analysis seeks to read the lines. But also seeks
to
Read Between the Lines
Read Between the Lines

20. Now, to the Assignment: Rhetorical Analysis Paper—Some (but
Certainly not All) Pertinent Questions
Stanley Milgram’s “The Perils of Obedience”
First published (in a form longer than what we have read) in
Harper’s Magazine in 1974
How does Milgram:
Refer to the people who volunteered in his experiment?
Describe the people who volunteered in his experiment?
Organize his essay? (For example, why does he present his
volunteers in the order that he does?)
Use subheadings?
Use allusions?
Why does Milgram write the way he does? What does he want
us to believe?
How can we tell he is writing for a popular—but also educated
and interested—audience?
Now, to the Assignment: Rhetorical Analysis Paper—Some (but
Certainly not All) Pertinent Questions
Jerry Burger’s “Replicating Milgram...”
First published in American Psychologist Special Issue:

21. Obedience—Then and Now 2009
How does Burger:
Use vocabulary and diction?
Organize his essay?
Use subheadings?
Explain to readers the ways he tried to avoid ethical dilemmas
perceived in Milgram’s obedience experiment?
Why does Burger write the way he does? What does he want us
to believe?
How can we tell he is writing for an audience of his
peers/writing for a peer-reviewed journal (which many also
refer to as a “scholarly” journal)?
Now, to the Assignment: Rhetorical Analysis Paper—Some (but
Certainly not All) Pertinent Questions
Philip Zimbardo’s “Stanford Prison Experiment”
First published as an essay in The New York Times Magazine
1973 (The narrative in the Stanford Prison Experiment website
is almost identical to the original essay.)
How does Zimbardo:
Open and close his essay?
Organize his essay?
Use his explanation of why and how he constructed a mock

22. prison to establish his credibility?
Use allusions to historical and fiction characters?
Why does Zimbardo write the way he does? What does he want
us to believe?
How can we tell he is writing for a popular—but also educated
and interested—audience?