Professor Paisley Mann
English 110B
19 October 2012
A Rhetorical Analysis of “For the Love of Joe: The Language of Starbucks”
In the journal article “For the Love of Joe: The Language of Starbucks” (2008), Constance M. Ruzich analyzes the success and rise to popularity of The Starbucks Coffee Company around the globe. The article is written and structured for the general public to read and understand. It is meant to be an informative article and as such, Ruzich makes use of a lot of data and includes citations from a variety of other academic sources. She also uses different ways to measure the popularity of Starbucks, not just the financial aspect, but also in terms of its economic status in a global coffee market, just to give us different points of view in relation to her thesis. Her choice in the title is also very appropriate for the topic, which will be discussed later on in this paper.
Ruzich begins her article by giving the readers a brief background on coffee. She is informing us, the readers, on how coffee came about and touches on the “The history of coffee production, consumption and advertising...” (428). Through this, those who are unfamiliar with the origins of coffee will also be captured, as they will get a sense of understanding about where her arguments will lead to later on in the article. It also gives the readers a chance to compare on how coffee was perceived by global consumers, before and after Starbucks was established. She explains, “The nineteenth century saw the rise of coffee as an international commodity and the accompanying development of coffee-based economies in South America and other developing nations...” (430).
Upon capturing the audience, she starts to state a lot of facts and she extensively uses quotations from other studies throughout the entire article. The facts become the structure of the article; they lead the readers to have a certain understanding of previous views and studies of the situation. The
Cited: Ruzich, Constance M. "The Journal of Popular Culture." Journal of Popular Culture. 41.3 (2008): 428–442. Print.