Essay On Aristotle's Ethos

Although over 2000 years old, the use of Greek Philosopher Aristotle’s Modes of Artistic Proofs have proved relevant still in todays society and are recognised as key elements in the art of persuasion. The three techniques comprise of Ethos – the ability to display the “persuasive potential of the speaker’s character or credibility” (Herrick, 1997), Pathos – the emotional appeals to put the audience in the correct frame of mind and Logos, which tends to appeal to the audience’s sense of logical reasoning through the use of factual evidence (Herrick, 1997). All, if used in the correct manner, can have enormous impacts on the overall success of an argument, potentially swaying an audience to be synonymous with the speaker’s ideas.

When asked to discuss an effective use of Aristotle’s techniques in modern life, my experience while viewing Emma Watson’s United Nations speech on the issue of gender equality was one that came immediately to mind. Not only is each technique clearly communicated throughout, she was able to resonate directly with her professional audience, myself; an 18 year old scholar at the time and most unexpectedly my 21 year old brother; a male witness on a deemed feminist topic. Her speech left my brother and I regarding
the topic as a more urgent issue and even convinced us to join her movement.

In her speech, Watson effectively manipulated Ethos to verify her credibility to the audience.
Being known as the “Harry Potter girl”, I questioned what substance she could bring to such an important issue. However, Emma acknowledged this cliché and served to confront her given opportunity to cause awareness. In this sense Watson slowly sealed the holes in our doubt in her (Hill, 2014) and we were left accepting her speech as trustworthy. Also, through mentioning her own experiences of discrimination using words like “I have seen”, and describing how she aims to combat the inequities feeling “it’s [her] responsibility to say something” (United Nations, 2014), her ethos grew in our eyes knowing she cared on a more personal
level.

Repeatedly sharing touching, personal experiences throughout her speech succeeded in tugging at our heartstrings, therefore appealing directly to our pathos. “Personifying the issues allowed us to intensify the sympathy and compassion felt for” (Hill, 2014) her, permitting a further emotional connection. Additionally, her use of emotive words and inclusive language like “we” or “I invite you” effectively appealed to our pathos.

Lastly, she carefully included relevant studies and statistics throughout, which achieved the logos technique. Quoting credible people like Hilary Clinton and citing shocking real world statistics about both men and women’s unfortunate effects from the issue, appealed directly to our logical reasoning. This, in turn effectively complemented the pathos and ethos already detected in her speech as the statistics had an overwhelming effect and her research confirmed her credibility.

Aristotle’s three Modes of Artistic Proofs are clearly successful in speech form and Emma Watson demonstrated this with great effect. I hope to utilize these same techniques if in the future I am put in the same situation. Currently, I know that I will appeal to these proofs in my resume to communicate myself effectively. Furthermore, they can be used in job interviews or pitching ideas to clients and companies to hopefully persuade that I am the right candidate for the position.