{"id":14716,"date":"2018-12-22T01:08:37","date_gmt":"2018-12-22T01:08:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=14716"},"modified":"2018-12-23T01:10:06","modified_gmt":"2018-12-23T01:10:06","slug":"what-aristotle-can-teach-us-about-trumps-rhetoric","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/what-aristotle-can-teach-us-about-trumps-rhetoric\/","title":{"rendered":"What Aristotle can teach us about Trump’s rhetoric"},"content":{"rendered":"

Anthony F. Arrigo<\/a>, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

From Franklin D. Roosevelt\u2019s fireside chats<\/a> to Ronald Reagan\u2019s reputation as the \u201cgreat communicator<\/a>\u201d to Barack Obama\u2019s soaring oratory<\/a> to Donald Trump\u2019s Twitter use<\/a>, styles of presidential communication have varied over time<\/a>. <\/p>\n

But what is similar across all presidents is their ability to create persuasive messages that resonate with large segments of the U.S. population. <\/p>\n

Whatever your opinion about Donald Trump, he is highly effective at doing this. The question is why, and how does he do it?<\/p>\n

As someone who teaches rhetoric and communication<\/a>, I am interested in how people connect with an audience and why a message resonates with one audience but falls flat with another. Whether intentional or not, Trump is using rhetorical strategies that have been around for more than 2,000 years.<\/p>\n

What makes something persuasive?<\/h2>\n

There have been many definitions<\/a> of rhetoric over the past two millennia, but at its most basic level it is the practice and study of persuasive communication. It was first developed in ancient Greece, and arose from the need for people to defend themselves in law courts \u2013 a brand new invention at the time.<\/p>\n

One of the world\u2019s most influential thinkers in this regard was the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle<\/a>, who lived from 384 to 322 B.C. <\/p>\n

Aristotle was a student of Plato<\/a> and the teacher of Alexander the Great<\/a>. He wrote about philosophy, poetry, music, biology, zoology, economics and other topics. He also famously wrote about rhetoric<\/a> and came up with an elaborate and detailed system for understanding both what is persuasive and how to create persuasive messages.<\/p>\n

To Aristotle, there were three main elements<\/a> that all work together to create a persuasive message: a person\u2019s use of logic and reasoning, their credibility and their use of emotional appeals.<\/p>\n

Aristotle wished that everyone could be persuaded with detailed logical arguments \u2013 what he called \u201clogos<\/a>.\u201d However, that approach is often tedious, and, frankly, Aristotle felt most people weren\u2019t smart enough to understand them anyway. Facts, documents, reasoning, data and so forth are all important, but those alone won\u2019t win the day. So, he claimed, we need two other things \u2013 and this is where Trump excels: credibility and emotion.<\/p>\n

Trump: The credible leader<\/h2>\n

Aristotle argues that someone\u2019s credibility \u2013 or \u201cethos<\/a>\u201d \u2013 is one of the elements that people find most persuasive. <\/p>\n

However, he also said credibility is not a universal trait or feature. For example, a degree from Princeton gives you credibility only to someone else who has heard of Princeton, understands its cultural cachet and respects what it represents. The Princeton degree itself doesn\u2019t give you credibility; it\u2019s the perception of the degree by someone else that\u2019s important.<\/p>\n

\n \"\"<\/a>
\n Statue of Aristotle.<\/span>
\n Shutterstock<\/a><\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Aristotle also said that an important feature of credibility is to appear to have the audience\u2019s best interest in mind by sharing and affirming their desires and prejudices, and understanding and amplifying their cultural values. In politics, the person who does the best job of this will get your vote.<\/p>\n

So when Trump states that climate change is a hoax<\/a> or that the \u201cnews media is the enemy of the American people,\u201d<\/a> what makes that effective for certain audiences has nothing to do with the truthfulness of those statements. <\/p>\n

Instead, it\u2019s because he\u2019s channeling and then reflecting the values and grievances of his audience back to them. The closer he gets to hitting the sweet spot of that specific audience, the more they like him and find him credible.<\/p>\n

Very often, politicians \u201cevolve\u201d or \u201cpivot<\/a>\u201d from a position that has earned them intense loyalty from a small group to a position they think will resonate with a larger group in order to get more supporters. This works for some people. But that\u2019s not Trump\u2019s strategy. <\/p>\n

Instead, he goes all-in with his core supporters, establishing stronger bonds and identifying more closely with that group than someone with a more moderate message would. This also creates extremes on both sides: passionate supporters and intense detractors.<\/p>\n

President Trump the communicator, then, has a laser focus on one particular segment of the population. He doesn\u2019t mind if you don\u2019t agree with him because he\u2019s not talking to you anyway. His strategy is to continue nurturing his credibility with core supporters.<\/p>\n

Trump: The emotional leader<\/h2>\n

Peppering your credibility with emotional appeals \u2013 what Aristotle calls \u201cpathos<\/a>\u201d \u2013 is particularly effective. As Aristotle once wrote<\/a>, \u201cThe hearer always sympathizes with one who speaks emotionally, even though he really says nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Anger, for example, is an emotion that a speaker can provoke in an audience by using real or perceived slights. In Book 2<\/a> of his \u201cOn Rhetoric,\u201d Aristotle writes that anger is an \u201cimpulse, accompanied by pain, to a conspicuous revenge for a conspicuous slight.\u201d He details how an audience will channel their \u201cgreat resentment\u201d and revel in the \u201cpleasure\u201d of their expectation of \u201crevenge\u201d against those who have wronged them. <\/p>\n

In another passage, he writes, \u201cpeople who are afflicted by sickness or poverty or love or thirst or any other unsatisfied desires are prone to anger and easily roused: especially against those who slight their present distress.\u201d <\/p>\n

Using slights to channel and rouse anger is a near daily strategy that Trump has used against the FBI<\/a>, the news media<\/a>, the Mueller investigation<\/a> and other perceived enemies. <\/p>\n

Anger over the slighting of one\u2019s \u201cpresent distress\u201d also helps explain why, for example, Hillary Clinton\u2019s \u201cbasket of deplorables\u201d comment was such a rallying cry<\/a> for Republicans. They didn\u2019t like being dissed.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s language style<\/h2>\n

A speaker\u2019s style<\/a> of language is also important. Trump is very effective with this, too. <\/p>\n

Aristotle recommended that a speaker should first identify feelings that their audience already holds, and then use vivid language that resonates with that specific audience to intensify those emotions. Trump has repeatedly put this tactic to work, particularly at his rallies<\/a>. <\/p>\n

For example, Trump regularly invokes a familiar adversary, Hillary Clinton, at his rallies. By drawing on his audience\u2019s known animosity toward her and encouraging them<\/a> in the \u201clock her up\u201d chant, calling for her to be jailed<\/a> and describing her election night loss as \u201cher funeral<\/a>,\u201d he is using an aggressive style<\/a> of language that reflects and heightens the preexisting emotions of his audience.<\/p>\n

The downside is that the more he uses language that is strongly incompatible with other groups, the more they dislike him. But that seems to be something Trump embraces, which only gives him even more credibility with his supporters.<\/p>\n

Whether this approach is a smart electoral strategy in the future remains to be seen.\"The<\/p>\n

Anthony F. Arrigo<\/a>, Associate Professor, Writing Rhetoric and Communication, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Anthony F. Arrigo, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth From Franklin D. Roosevelt\u2019s fireside chats to Ronald Reagan\u2019s reputation as the \u201cgreat communicator\u201d to Barack Obama\u2019s soaring oratory to Donald Trump\u2019s Twitter use, styles of presidential communication have varied over time. But what is similar across all presidents is their ability to create persuasive messages that resonate […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":14712,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[3350,479,5635,5636,714],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14716"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14716"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14716\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14717,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14716\/revisions\/14717"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14712"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}