This document discusses the three rhetorical tools of pathos, logos, and ethos that can help get an audience to agree with a persuasive argument. Pathos appeals to emotion, logos uses logic and facts, and ethos relies on the credibility and trustworthiness of the speaker. These tools have been used since ancient Greece to influence audiences. When used together effectively in writing and speaking, pathos, logos, and ethos can help convince an audience to say yes to an argument or proposal.

1. The Top 3 Tools that Will Get
Your Audience to Say YES!
By Erin Faherty
ENG 102 at ECTC

2. Why do YOU do what you do?

3. Why do you THINK one way vs.
another way?

4. Why do you TRY one product instead
of a different one?

5. What makes you support one CAUSE
over another?

6. What CONVINCES youto take action?

7. words,
a good story,
facts, statistics,
strong emotion,
trust, credibility . . .

8. RHETORIC

9. Rhetoric is the ART of speaking and
writing persuasively.

10. People use RHETORIC all the time.

11. And they’ve been doing it for
thousands of years. In fact, as far back
as 344 BC, a Greek philosopher and
teacher named Aristotle identified
these tools in spoken and written
arguments that could be used to win
agreement.

12. In other words . . .
It’s the art of getting people to say
YES!

13. Why should I care about
rhetorical tools?

15. What are these rhetorical tools?

16. Logos
Pathos
Ethos

17. Say What ?!/?

18. Pathos, Logos and Ethos are the key
components of argumentative
writing . . . the type of writing in
which you will primarily engage
while in college and beyond.

19. Pathos

20. Using only pathos may turn off some
of your readers. They may feel that
you are trying to influence their
emotions by ignoring factual evidence.

21. Can You Guess which rhetorical Tool is
used in the following Examples?

22. If you said LOGOS, you’re right.

23. Logos
Facts and statistics
Quotes and anecdotal evidence
Deductive reasoning
Inductive reasoning

24. Using only logos may leave your
audience feeling cold or disconnected
from your stance. It can even
sometimes leave them feeling . . .
BORED.

25. Ethos

26. If Michael Jordan spoke to U of L’s
basketball team, would he have instant
credibility?
Why?

27. . . . Because he’s one of the most
famous basketball players of all time.

28. STREET CRED.

30. Now what if he spoke to E-town’s
Philharmonic about playing a flute . . .?

31. Not so much . . .

32. Ethos

33. Ethos
CREDIBILITY

34. Experience
Background
Education
Being thorough in your research

35. Use them altogether . . .
PATHOS: Emotion
ETHOS: Credibility
LOGOS: logic and facts

36. . . . for an effective argument.

37. Let’s review . . .

38. PATHOS

39. Appeals to the EMOTION of your audience.

40. LOGOS

41. Use LOGIC to appeal to your audience’s
need for facts, proof and evidence.

42. ETHOS

43. Use your CREDIBILITY to get your audience
to TRUST your word and by extension be
swayed by your argument.

44. Using these tools effectively will
make you a better writer and
speaker. Understanding and using
pathos, logos and ethos will give you
the ability to convince your
audience to say YES!

45. The END
Photos from FLKR, Creative Commons license