2. a) The author starts the essay with an illustration a short story to be specific she talks about how Lorenzo Norwood is mentally challenged, unstable and irresponsible. The writer makes you picture the scenario of how he went into a convenience store and ended up getting beat because he was a few cents short when trying to buy a bottle …show more content…
The first method of proof I have noticed she uses very much is reference to authority. The author uses this in multiple paragraphs such as the death penalty information center, Bureau of justice statistics, sister Prejean author of the book “dead man walking”, supreme court justice Thurgood Marshall and a couple of others. This helps to make the essay seem more legitimate and people of authority agree so why aren’t we? The second method of proof she uses is statistics she uses a lot of research and cites many things mostly numerical like percentages for example “the south carried out 80% of the total executions”, “98 % of prosecutors responsible for death penalty…”, etc. This particular method supports her opinion because she is proving that pricier doesn’t always mean better. Heather is speaking of how the south carried out more executions but there was a bigger rate of murder down in the south. Finally, the last method of proof the author uses is use of comparison or contrast for example, she wrote, “if he had lived in Canada, western Europe, or most south American countries Lorenzo Norwood would have received a prison term” or “In Texas, a death penalty case costs an average of $2.3 million, about three times the cost of imprisoning a high-risk offender for forty years.” Using this methods of proof the author is brainwashing the readers into agreeing that the death penalty is costly and …show more content…
The first Persuasive technique Heather has used is definitely fright she includes many scary facts, and stories to keep us, the readers, interested and on side with her argument. For example, she talks about a man being executed via lethal injection and during the process the needle pooped out of his vein and they had to do it multiple times until he was finally out. This gruesome story convinces the readers that death penalty is sadistic. Second persuasive technique I believe would be figures of speech and rhetorical devices, she uses situational irony writing, “in the almost thirty years since Marshall made this pronouncement support for the death penalty has increased to an all-time high”. This makes it seem like the death penalty is just too much work and it would be a lot easier to just prison criminals. Another example could be allusion “television series like law and order” and there’s imagery as well “hunter coughed, gasped, and convulsed in adverse reaction to the lethal drugs”. The last persuasive technique I have noticed she uses is diction she sets a tone and mood of loss of faith in America, it’s a very pessimistic and negative tone. This makes the essay very biased only revealing one side of the story. She makes us the readers feel resentful, angry, irritated, abandoned, outrages and sympathetic throughout the