For my rhetorical analysis this week I went engagement ring shopping with my rooommate's boyfriend. We went to Zales in the University mall.
1. The argument was to buy a certain engagement ring.
2. The audience was my roommate's boyfriend Lane, a poor, love-struck college student.
3. The saleswoman targeted her audience in a number of different ways. She tried to use a lot of logos, by telling him the practical reasons for buying a certain kind of ring. She talked about the clarity and the number of imperfections relative to the size. When he didn't really respond to logic she moved on to ethos. She brought out her favorite ring and talked about how she wished she could buy it, but she first had to find someone who wanted to marry her. She was trying to make him feel lucky that he had found someone he wanted to marry. Then she started talking about where he was from and found out that she used to date his cousin. She talked about his family for about 15 minutes. By doing this she was trying to establish a kind of friendship so he would feel obligated to to buy this ring. I don't think her argument was sufficient. She didn't really have too much evidence to support the ring. I felt like I knew more about diamonds than she did, and I don't even know that much. Her argument seemed pretty typical, though. She didn't really use any crazy reasons. Her argument was relatively accurate. She just seemed to leave out a lot of information. I really don't think her argument was relevant. She tried to sell him by getting to know him and establishing a friendship within twenty minutes. She didn't really read her audience in that way. He is obviously a very straightforward and upfront guy who just wanted information. He didn't want to talk about his family when he was trying to buy an engagement ring.
4. I really don't think her argument was effective. Well, I know it's not, because he's not going to buy the ring that she suggested. I really think she talked about herself too much and didn't really read her audience as well as she could have, which is so important. Research is also really important and she didn't do as much as could have, especially for having a job at a jewelry store.
1 comment:
It sounds more like this girl's arguement was ineffective for her audience rather than ineffective overall. Many who go shopping for rings are comforted by the friendliness and amiability of the salespeople, especially when making such a large monetary investment.
I think your evaluation would have made more sense to me, as a reader, had you clarified your friend was upfront and merely wanted information from the get go. Otherwise the ineffectiveness of the saleswoman just doesn't come across.
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