Rhetorical Strategy Used by Mary Wollstonecraft

Running Head: RHETORICAL STRATEGY USED BY MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT
Rhetorical Strategy Used by Mary Wollstonecraft
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Author Note

RHETORICAL STRATEGIES USED BY MARY WOLSTONECRAFT1
Ethical strategies or as often called modes of persuasion are devices in the rhetoric that
categorize the speakers appeal to the audience (Balogun 175-201). The four rhetorical strategies
are ethos, pathos, logos and kairos (Edlund). A rhetoric strategy is the special approach that is
used by the writer to achieve a purpose or a goal. Ethos is the appeal to the credibility or the
authority of the reader. Pathos is the appeal to the emotion of the audience. Pathos can be in the
form of a metaphor or a simile. Logos is the appeal to the logical side of a person. And kairos is
the time and place that is used by the person while delivering a speech. In this essay, the letter
that Mary Wollstonecraft sends to the bishop of Tallyrand, Perigold, will used to analyze the
rhetorical strategies that have been used by her (Julien).
Mary Wollstonecraft in the letter speaks against the arguments that were given against
the suffrage for women and in favor of the status quo in the European and Western societies
(Coffee 116-135). She in the letter tries to appeal to the logics as well as the emotions in a human
being. She puts forward a set of opposing considerations which together presents a rejects the
outcome and the pseudo-rationalist game that was played by her opponents. Mary Wollstonecraft
questions the traditional role of women and the notions that are attached to being feminine
(Goldman 9-16). Wollstonecraft’s readers are both men and women. She tries to appeal to the
logic of the rationalists. She questions the fact the traditional role of the women need to change
and there are certain logics that she has provided in evidence. She says in order to teach the new
generations about the values and tradition, the women themselves needs to have knowledge
about the things that are happening, if they themselves are not educated then how can it expected
that impart knowledge to the future generations (Coffee 908-924). She wants to radically alter
the view that the society holds towards the women. She wants a society that has an equal share of
responsibility and duties between man and woman. To support this stance of equality the she