Classical Principles of Argument

“Reminders of Poverty, Soon Forgotten”

Felicia Davis

ENG/215

July 15, 2013

Ms. Danielle King

                      CLASSICAL PRINCIPLES OF ARGUMENTATION

       In writing an argumentative essay, the author’s main aim is to persuade the target audience to what the essay stands for.  In order to have the audience convinced to the writers’ way of reasoning or thinking must utilize certain tools when writing. Synthesis can be defined as a way of bringing two or more different ideas together in order to allow the reader to compare or contrast (Lamm & Everett, 2012). Authors also uses there three elements of a successful argument and each plays a vital role in relaying the intended message; namely, the ethos, that appeals to ethics, pathos to emotion and logos to reason. These three terminologies were coined by Aristotle, a Greek philosopher, who claimed that the main aim of argumentative writing is to convince the target addressees that the written ideas are justifiable. These three tools are what constitute the classical principles of argument (Lamm & Everett, 2012).

       In the article titled, “What the Waters Revealed” by Jim Wallis, Wallis makes use of all the three appeals to bring forward his argument.  Hurricane Katrina was an historic catastrophic natural disaster that everyone will never forget. Hurricane Katrina destroyed homes, cities, businesses leaving thousands homeless. This is because the leaves in New Orleans could not withstand the gallons of water that gushed from the historic hurricane causing them to break. This leads to question, what was the cause of the damage, was it Katrina or the weak lives in New Orleans? This essay brings to light what many Americans were unaware of or what most of them chose to ignore and what the reporters failed to cover. The essay reveals the percentage of Americans lavishing in poverty, and the denial of Americans to admit the persistence of the relationship between poverty and race.

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