Before entering this course, I never knew what rhetoric was; let alone spelling the word (that "h" caught me of guard). Yet, I decided to take the course because I wanted to...
"Learn on how to write effectively so people are engaged with my work." - First discussion post titled: Our class
As journalist and aspiring media personality, I wanted to master all forms communication that aimed to connecting people through conversation and media. I consider writing my Achilles heel when it came to communications, because I have no one engage in dialogue with.
This being my first English composition course during my bachelors, I thought we were just going to read boring books, discuss a format that my major never uses (sorry MLA and APA), take boring quizzes, and write a final five-page paper reflecting my semester.
I am thankful that of my four assumptions this course, only the latter was true.
Instead of reading a boring book, each of my peers had the opportunity to tackle various topics of rhetorical theory that we found interesting. After seeing a student’s presentation, we as class discussed topic further in a digital roundtable to better understand the rhetorical concept in the student's presentation. .
For example, I tackled imitation in Rhetoric. Where I observed that we as humans "wish to copy what we approve in others and that imitation requires a subject to influence a text or induvial.
The responses of my classmates were most appreciated. Not only because they praised my presentation, but they were able to understand the grasp of what is imitation and provide common examples of imitation that they saw in the world around them. Demonstrating that I presented the subject effectively and made such an advanced topic entertaining and easy to understand.
Besides the ongoing discussions to understand Rhetorical theory, we had induvial and group assignments where we had to define what is rhetoric to the everyday person. Unlike previous English courses during my associates, where we were restricted to a particular format to explain a topic like an essay, my professor Vernon Dickson encouraged us to use creative means to explain the definition of rhetoric..
With each student having the creative freedom and liberty to explain what rhetoric was in their eyes. I decided to incorporate my broadcast writing into explaining rhetoric in an educational while entertaining manner. I did this by creating podcast where a radio personality is selling rhetoric as a life changing tool, portraying a television advertisement.
- Feel free to read along
For me, this was one of my huge accomplishments in my academic career. Due to the fact that I created my very own podcast, which was something I was afraid to do because I didn't know what to talk about. I also tackled a subject that is usually discussed in a university or postgraduate setting and made it accessible to anyone owning a smart device.
My assignment had so much success that some students and I created a satirical game show called "Are you smarter than an English Major?". Unlike my previous podcast, due to the pandemic we had to collaborate and work together virtually and only had 2-week time frame, due to busy schedules, to get the show together. thankfully with applications like zoom and google docs, we created and funny and engaging script that taught rhetorical theory in an innovative way.
This gave me hands on experience of how television producers work with their production team in real time and taught me the importance of collaboration and taking lead on specific aspects of a project.
To understand how rhetoric impacts important texts, each student also had to select an important text and analyze the various uses of rhetoric the writer is using to captivate their audience. For my analysis, I chose some excerpts from Letter from Birmingham Jail written by Dr. Martin Luther King. By understating Aristotle's rhetorical triangle, I broke the appeals of emotion (pathos), logic (logos), and credibility/morality (ethos) of the Civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King.
Now with me studying and exercising rhetoric with my peers. I professor gave the class a final assignment where we use our newly acquired knowledge to create a project that is "Rhetorically Engaging an Issue & Audience". Each student had to explore and research a topic and design a medium to inform and motivate a chosen audience towards a call to action. The topic I wanted to tackle was Media Literacy in the Digital Age.
It is my professional opinion that rhetorical theory and media literacy should be included in primary and secondary school so that future students will be able better to understand and interact with the world around them. Within my research I found that the average American consumes over eleven hours media every 24 hours (The Nielsen Company 2018), that almost half of a day. To top it off, some young students are not telling the difference between sponsored content and actual news (Stanford History Education Group 2016); so this means that when these youngsters enter university and soon the work force, they would consume misleading information that can impact both our local and global community.
So, I created a website called the Literate Consumer, a multi-media culture blog where journalists and content creators give tools to empower readers in the digital age. Media Literacy: Smelling the BS is a multimodal discussion which teaches importance of learning media literacy and how it empowers younger audiences when consuming digital media.
Overall, this course has not just taught me the fundamentals of rhetorical theory. It has also taught me in working collaboratively within a team setting, reflecting in my own practices as a user of rhetoric, and creating multimodal and multimedia projects that promote education and expanding the bounds of debate. I feel that I not only improved my writing this semester, but I became a better communicator and gained insight in my personal development in broadcast media and transformative leadership.
A Brazilian-American and Miami native, Elijah Pestana is pursuing his undergraduate degree in broadcast media and digital communication at Florida international University. He uses his experience within the performing arts, television, and higher education sectors to pursue his deep passion for storytelling and entertaining others. He aspires to become a late-night talk show host, combining his gift of comedy and love for journalism to promote media literacy for future generations.