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A Rhetorical Analysis Of George Saunders Graduating From College

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Rhetorical Analysis Essay
Graduating from college is the time to begin a new chapter and change your life for the better. Commencement speeches are supposed to inspire and make graduating college students want to make that change. George Saunders gave a commencement speech at Syracuse University graduation in 2013. He carries out his speech in the traditional way but added a new twist on what is really important in life and in everyone’s career. George Saunders posits the notion that, in life, it is necessary to be kind to others and diminish selfish needs in order to elucidate that while it is okay to strive for success, the final product of a life well-lived is always a collaborative effort of you and those you encountered along the way. …show more content…

Saunders accomplishes this warmth in his speech by making the graduates feel as if they were casually conversing with “some old fart.” The informal tone that Saunders utilizes while speaking to his audience establishes a comfortably relatable position of ethos. This rhetorical move takes away from his prestige so as to not belittle the graduates’ achievements. His use of humor in the introduction, for example, when he says, “Now, one useful thing you can do with and old person, in addition to borrowing money from them…” is also aimed at gauging the audience’s attention (Saunders 1). Saunders is well aware that younger people respond to humor. He also conveys his eagerness to share his advice with the graduates through his tone, which is a very important rhetorical move in drawing the audience’s attention. For example, when speaking about how it can be difficult to achieve kindness, he states that “kindness, it turns out, is hard – it starts out all rainbows and puppy dogs, and expands to include…well, everything” (5). In other instances throughout the speech his use of the word “like”, and phrases such as “old farts”, “old folks”, and “we get our butts kicked”, lends to the feeling of casual conversation between Saunders and his audience. This use of seemingly unpremeditated diction allows the audience to relax a little upon realizing that the speaker addressing them is not trying to patronize them. Rather, he may be heard as a peer offering up helpful

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