Forms of appeal

Forms of appeal are rhetorical strategies that James Hamblin uses to inform readers and prove his point that Trump is a climax of America’s masculine culture. His article is constructed using a combination of logos (appeal to reason), ethos (appeal to trust and authority), and pathos (appeal to emotions). Logos and ethos are most prominent in the article, as the writer supports his ideas with facts and logical arguments and includes links to articles by other writers and other publications, as an appeal to their auth…

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Logos

The writer appeals to logos when he makes logical connections between ideas or when he mentions facts that support his views. Sometimes, the writer references facts and provides links to articles which give more details. In these cases, logos is mixed with ethos, as the writer also appeals to other writers’ or publications’ authority to support his ideas.

Logos is present at the beginning of the article, as we find two references to real events in the first paragraph. Here, the writer speaks about Trump’s awkward smile and gives …

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Ethos

Throughout the article, Hamblin includes links to other articles which describe facts or other writers’ similar opinions. At the same time, Hamblin is appealing to these writers’ authority, creating ethos.

For example, the writer includes links to articles by Alec MacGillis (l.48), a well-known reporter, and David Frum (l.58), a political commentator. Both of the articles appeared in The Atlantic – by referencing articles published in The Atlantic, Hamblin builds ethos b…

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Pathos

In his article, Hamblin does not appeal to emotions often. However, there are a few instances where a subtle form of pathos can be found.

One of these instances is when the writer mentions Trump’s refusal to apologize to the Khan family (l. 21), the family of a member of the US Armed Forces who was killed in Iraq. By bringing up this sensiti…