Ethos, Pathos, Logos

Rhetorical Devices

What are Ethos, Pathos and Logos?

Ethos - The credibility of the person delivering the message.

Pathos - Gaining an emotional connection with your audience.

Logos - Using logical facts for your argument.

Ethos

If you want to convince your audience of something, they have to see you as a credible source.

Respect Good Character Trustworthy Authority on topic

Ethos

“Keep in mind that it isn’t enough for you to know that you are a credible source. Your audience must know this. Ethos is your level of credibility as perceived by your audience.”

Pathos

In order to grasp the attention of your audience, you have to appeal to their emotions. Evoke feeling in your audience using

words and visuals. Love, fear, sympathy, etc.

Evoke negative feelings when talking about the competition.

Hate, envy, pain, etc.

Pathos

“Emotional connection can be created in many ways by a speaker, perhaps most notably by stories. The goal of a story, anecdote, analogy, simile, and metaphor is often to link an aspect of our primary message with a triggered emotional response from the audience.”

Logos

Backing up your point using facts and a logical argument. Do you make sense? Have you used evidence?

Facts, statistics, etc.

The 5 Canons of Rhetoric

Invention Arrangement Style Memory Delivery

Works Cited Dlugan, Andrew. “Ethos, Pathos, Logos: 3 Pillars of Public

Speaking.” Six Minutes: Speaking and Presentation Skills. Six Minutes Mag., 24 Jan. 2010. Web. 25 Jan 2011.

The College Board. The AP Vertical Teams Guide for English. 2002. Print.