Persuasive Personae: The Appeal to Religion and the Construction of Ethos in Political Discourse | ||
| CDELT Occasional Papers in the Development of English Education | ||
| Article 14, Volume 64, Issue 1, June 2018, Pages 389-406 PDF (422.22 K) | ||
| Document Type: Original Article | ||
| DOI: 10.21608/opde.2018.95982 | ||
| Author | ||
| Fayrouz Fouad Ibrahim Hassan Hassan | ||
| Abstract | ||
| Politicians have often managed to influence an audience and win their support through appealing to religion and creating a positive self image that exhibits personal wisdom, virtue, and integrity. Building on Aristotle's modes of persuasion, appeals to ethos, logos, and pathos, explicated in van Eemeren, et al. (1996), the present study investigated the appeal to religion as a rhetorical strategy pertinent to the construction of ethos. Within the theoretical framework of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) (van Dijk 1993; 1998; 2000; Fairclough 1992; 1995; 1997), the paper analyzed Sadat’s Speech to the Israeli Knesset (1977), as a remarkable example of persuasive discourse. The study revealed that the appeal to religion was the most dominant rhetorical strategy of building ethos in Sadat’s speech. This ideology was manifested in three main parameters: firstly, establishing virtuousness and integrity; secondly, the appeal to universal humanistic values and the call for peace; and thirdly, drawing attention to the common grounds shared with the audience. | ||
| Keywords | ||
| political discourse; Critical Discourse Analysis -appeal to religion - ethos - persuasive discourse- emotive language | ||
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