One must also take into account how the text employs the rhetorical appeals (ethos, pathos, and logos) in order
to make its argument.
For this assignment, you may choose from any of the texts that we will have read up to the point the essay is due.
These might include any of the critical essays we’ve read, such as “Monster Culture (Seven These)” by Jeffrey Jerome
Cohen,” “Frankenstein, Feminism, and Literary Theory” by Diane Hoeveler, “The Workshop of Filthy Creation:
A Marxist Reading of Frankenstein” by Warren Montag; additional supplementary readings such as “Excerpts
from A Vindication of the Rights of Woman” by Mary Wollstonecraft or Charles E. Robinson’s “How to Read
Frankenstein; book reviews from Walter Scott or John Wilson Croker; certain monologues from Frankenstein like
those delivered by Elizabeth Lavenza or The Creature, etc.
Whichever text you choose, you should comment on each of the elements listed above: the exigence, audience,
Constraints, and rhetorical appeals. Here are some helpful questions to get you started:
What is the rhetorical situation?
-What occasion or exigence is the text responding to?
Who is the author/speaker and what are their goals/ their intentions?
-Do they intend to inform or entertain their audience?
-Are they making an argument ? If so, what is it?
Who is the intended audience for the text?
-Is the audience one person? Many?
-Is the author familiar with their audience? Do they have anything in common?
What is the content of the message?
-What is the main point of the text? Can you summarize it?
-How is that content limited by certain constraints, such as its genre or delivery method?
Does the text abide by the conventions of its genre?
-If it’s a critical article, does it put forth a thesis and support it with evidence?
-Does it deviate from expectation by not abiding by its genre conventions?
Does the author effectively/ineffectively use rhetorical appeals to make their argument?
-Does it appeal to pathos (emotion)? Logos (logic)? Ethos (credibility)