WRD 103: Composition & Rhetoric I: Autumn Quarter 2014 Rotating Header Image

Rhetorical Précis Method: what you can do with them

Let’s expand our thinking and use of rhetorical précis:

  • What is the argument, claim, implication, or advocacy? Your choice of verbs is crucial, as it signals your ability to read and to analyze.
  • How is the piece structured and what forms of support/evidence are employed?
  • Why? Why now? What is the exigency
  • For whom? Can you identify any rhetorical devices — tone, word choices, ethos, pathos, logos — than seem particularly keyed to this audience? (St. Martin’s pp. 167-69)