This document is a comprehensive guide for instructors on the interconnected topics of argumentation, identity, and description in relation to persuasive communication. It outlines key concepts, techniques for effective argumentation, strategies for rhetorical analysis, and encourages the use of creative narratives and detailed descriptions to enhance persuasive writing. Additionally, it provides activities for students to engage with these concepts and reflect on their own identities through various mediums.

1. Description, Identity, and
Rhetoric
Visualizing our Available Means of
Persuasion

2. Instructor Note
* This powerpoint consists of three intersecting topics: argumentation,
identity, and description, as they relate to persuasive effectiveness.
Covering the entire presentation will take at least two class periods
* This presentation is highly compatible with instructors using the textbooks:
Envision, 2nd Edition, Christine Alfano and Alyssa O'Brien
Remix, 2nd Edition ,Catherine Latterell
* Don't have the books or the time? Adapt this presentation for your own
purposes! Feel free to omit sections or add to it according to your needs.

3. Quotes to Contemplate
Rhetoric's classic definition as the art of persuasion suggests a power.
So much of what we receive from others—from family and friends to 30-
second blurbs on TV—is intended to persuade. Recognizing how this
is done gives greater power to choose.
-Victor Villanueva, Jr.
You are a god in language. You can create. Destroy. Rearrange.
Shove words around however you like. You can make up stories
about things that never happened to people who never existed. You
can push a camel through the eye of a needle. It's easy if “camel” and
“needle” are words” (Kenneally 652).
Pre-Writing Exercise: Which quote did you react to more strongly? Why?

4. Today's Underlying Assumption
● When we write, we make “claims to existence," or suggest that reality is
or should be perceived a certain way.
● Human beings interpretations of reality are constrained by time, memory,
and language: communication is never neutral, even if neutrality is the
persuasive aim.
● How people interpret “reality” is further affected by their identities, the way
they define community, and their general sense of the nature of their
relationship to their surroundings and other sentient beings
● What we acknowledge exists undergoes a process of contestation as we
classify and define what is valued in a society and what that society considers
to be 'truth'—who matters, what events are significant, what languages
dominate expression, etc.

5. Claims to Existence

6. Claims to Existence

7. Conflict and Cooperation
We reinforce our perception of reality through various
combinations of verbal and visual expressions: our
decision to wear certain clothes, listen to certain types of
music, pursue a career in a certain field, watch a particular
show on television, read certain books, play certain sports,
etc.
Can you think of a time in which your expression caused a
conflict? When it got you approval?

8. Argumentation
When we don't agree on:
● the existence of something
● the features of something that does exist
● the harms/goods it causes
● the similarities and differences between something and
other things
● how something should be changed
We argue!
However, argument is not a shouting match or an attempt
to see who wins and loses

9. Monty Python: Argument Clinic
An argument about argument:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQFKtI6gn9Y
Let's develop a criteria for argument. What's an
argument? What "seems" like an argument, but isn't?
Draw on the film clip for inspiration!

10. Additional Perspectives...
● Arguments are persuasive messages (Alfano
and O’Brien 2-3)
● They can be traditional (winning) or consensual
(agreement)
● Traditional: Public Debate, Courtroom argument,
Single-Perspective argument, One-on-One, Everyday
(Car Sales, Late paper negotiation)
● Consensual: Dialectic (participants are equals in an
argument, attempt to reach the best position), academic
inquiry (reading, writing, discussion, to create new
knowledge/truth about complex issues), negotiation and
mediation, internal argument

11. Arguments are Opportunities
● Rhetoric is “visualizing what strategies will work to convince your
audience to accept your message” (Alfano and O'Brien 5).
● Reflecting on those strategies creates an opportunity because the
degree to which you can connect to another person depends on our
ability to perceive others' needs, recognize our own, and negotiate. So
long as we do this genuinely and competently, we can change...
● One of the keys to understanding what strategies will work is the
ability to critically analyze your rhetorical situation

12. Perceiving Opportunity
● The key to understanding what strategies will work is
the ability to critically analyze your rhetorical situation
● Dynamic relationship between the text, audience,
and writer influence the arguments writers make.
● The shape the author's message takes will depend
on how they perceive the audiences' needs, their
awareness of how their message connects to other
messages by which the audience is familiar, etc.

13. Rhetorical Analysis
● Who is the author?
● Why did they write this?
● In what publication space can I find this writing?
● Who did they write this for?
● What is the author's main claim?
● What are the author's reasons?
● What evidence does the author provide?
● What was my first impression after reading the writing?
● What strategies does the author use to accomplish
their objective(s)?

14. Self Rhetorical Analysis
● Who am I? Why am I qualified to write this?
● Why did I write this?
● In what publication space might I find others writing about the
same thing ?
● Who should I write this for? Do they have the power to resolve the
problem?
● What is my main claim?
● What are my reasons?
● What evidence should I provide?
● What do I want the reader's first impression to be after they read
my writing?
● What strategies should I use to not only accomplish my objective,
but also to make myself stand out in a positive way? the author use to
accomplish their objective(s)?

15. Devilish Details...
● Details, Details, Details: Figure out why a piece of writing works
and practice techniques that stand out to you until you feel your writing
appear effortlessly precise
● Establish connections that may usually go overlooked (between
persons, places, subjects)
● Uncover assumptions: What does the author take for granted and
how might it diminish their persuasive power?
● Try to emphasize the common ground you share with your
audience instead of focusing on your differences

16. The Life of Persuasion
● Writing is dead without careful, creative arrangements of
details
The assignment for this unit gets you to practice description
●
and narration, which are building blocks of (persuasive)
communication
● Narration and Description best execute the five canons of
rhetoric: invention, memory, style, arrangement, delivery
●Stories form one crucial module in the operating system that
governs human expression and connection

17. What Makes a “Good”
Storyteller?
● Tone
● Hand gestures
● Humor
● Rhythms
● Suspenseful Pauses
Can we think of additional criteria? Let's give as many
examples as we can!

18. What Makes a Good Written Story?
● Narrative’s shape the audience’s senses!
● Sensory details
● Keep the story moving
● Convey the intensity of a particular emotion
What are several other features that must be present in a
good written story? Give as many examples as you can?
Also, don't just think of good storys as 'novels,' consider
various other places you see written stories (hint: film
performances are derived from written scripts).

19. Showing not Telling
● Visuals (i.e. colors)
● Smells
● Sounds
● Things that we feel (physically or
emotionally)
● Clichés
● Avoid passive verbs (e.g. to be, to have)
What are some examples of SNT words and
phrases?

20. Telling
●The weather took a turn for the worse
●The boy looked sick
●The instructor hadn’t prepared for class
●She was in love

21. Showing
● Clouds morphed from thin lazy stretches to
bulbous grey mounds hovering over the smoky
sky.
●We could hear his stomach bubbling over the
constant clinks of knives and forks. His lunch
had moved from his mouth the floor, looking
quite as it did when it was plopped on his plate
by the lunchlady.

22. Your turn!
● Try turning some of the following sentences
into shows, not tells (Individual or Group
Assignment):
● The instructor is ditzy.
● Traffic was a nightmare that morning.
● She was in love.
● I'm happy I'm going on vacation.
● My roommate is not pleasant to be around
● The flowers are gorgeous
● Fall is my favorite season
*Hint: Your descriptions will convey some kind of narrative! See...description
and narration are inseparable!

23. Play with Showing not Telling
Transform these vague sentences into shows not tells.
You will need to provide as much context as you can to show, rather than tell the
underlined word. (Individual or Group Assignment)
[describe activity] makes me happy
●
[describe person] is my arch nemesis
●
[describe song] is a classic
●
[describe person] is my hero
●
[describe X] relaxes me
●
[describe place] stresses me out
●
[describe building] is comforting
●
[describe X] unifies people
●

24. Playing with Representation
● I retrieved this description from the menu of a
local restaurant. Revise the entry to persuade
someone that they must order this dish or their
palatte will not be satisfied for the evening. Feel
free to add items to the dish that you feel would
make it reach its full $17 value (Group
Assignment)
Pacific Rim Salmon: Grilled fillet of salmon
with a ginger – orange glaze. 16.99

25. Identity Narratives: Avatars
● What is Dibbell's main argument?
● How does he defend his argument?
● How does including the word origin of the term “avatar” help
Dibbell make his claim?
● What strikes you most about the reasons these gamers provide for
creating their avatars?
● Why are avatars an example of rhetoric?
● How do their avatars compare to their real-life identities?
● What real-life/or in-game barriers do their avatars allow them to
overcome?
● What real-life and in/game prejudices do their avatars reveal?

26. Identity Narratives: Social
Networking Profiles
● What is the purpose of online profiles?
● What roles do they serve in people's lives?
● Why are fb profiles an example of rhetoric?
● To what extent does Sethi's essay support the assumption that “identity is
shaped by culture” (9)?
● What is Sethi's main argument?
● How does she defend it?
● Who is she writing for?
● How does Sethi's fb profile reflect who she is?
● Compare her essay about her profile with her profile. What sense of
identity comes across from each? What questions about her does each leave
you with?
● Consider how much Facebook has changed since Sethi wrote her article,
in what ways does the interface allow or restrict identity expression?
● Has Facebook ever served as a site of conflict for you? How so? In what
ways does the site create 'stories?'

27. Identity Narratives: Tattoos
●Tattoos can convey messages that make a statement
about a person's identity. Are tattoos or other forms of
body art effective ways to convey to others who we are?
Why or why not?
●Do you have a tattoo? If so, what prompted you to get
one?
● In what ways are tattoos, avatars, and social
networking sites similar expressions of identity?

28. How do I use these Ideas?
Step 1: Assess what you know and acknowledge the
constraints of you perception
Step 2: Develop a sense of purpose and determine how
you can convey your messages in such a way that your
audience will trust you
Step 3: Begin trying to identify the values, beliefs, and
attitudes of the academic community (begin with our class
syllabus for instance)

29. How do I use these ideas?
Step 4: Pay attention to the arguments you are surrounded by
in everyday life (including visuals)
Step 5: Think about what others are trying to persuade you to
do and how they are attempting to persuade you to do it
Step 6: Analyze the way arguments are constructed both
within and outside of the academic community
Step 7: Be able to determine whether or not an argument
succeeds in being persuasive and for whom. Don't hesitate to
play with those strategies!

30. How do I use these ideas?
Step 8: Recognize description and narration as foundations
you must master in order to be a compelling writer
Step 9: Train your mind to visualize and memorize details
Step 10: Train yourself to re-articulate tells into shows.
When you see something you like, go the extra step and be
prepared to state precisely why you like it.
Step 11: Train yourself to play with and re-create details.
She's not just a graceful woman, rather Jacqueline effortlessly
glides in four inch heels

31. Questions?
**Any useful links on narration/description such as http://owl.
english.purdue.edu should be included here!**