Lloyd Bitzer The Rhetorical Situation Analysis

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In his landmark essay, "The Rhetorical Situation," rhetorical scholar Lloyd Bitzer laid out some of the basic components of the rhetorical situation. Bitzer views rhetoric as a action and not just hot air and fancy words. He defines rhetoric as “A mode of altering reality, not by the direct application of energy to objects, but by the creation of discourse which changes reality through the mediation of thought and action.” He sees rhetoric as a way to learn how to get things done. Rhetoric can be applied to practical things. It isn’t a primarily concerned with simply sounding pretty, but getting the job done. But he also makes a point to say that rhetoric has context; it’s meaningless outside of the circumstances that created it. The rhetoric