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Rhetorical Analysis Of Eric Thomas Persuasive Speech

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Running To Survive

Imagine running for your life, everyday, from the moment you wake up. Wild animals must do this in order to survive. Some animals run away from others to not be killed. Others run to hunt so they can eat and live another day. Eric Thomas, a motivational speaker, passionately relates the lifestyle of certain animals in South Africa in order to help us understand the importance of always striving for success. Sitting around and doing nothing will not get us anywhere in life. Eric Thomas says, “everyday in South Africa a gazelle wakes up and it knows that if it is to survive, it must outrun the lion that is chasing it ”. If it chooses not to run, it will surely die. The same goes for life. Our dreams and aspirations to be …show more content…

Using humor, excitement, anger and his unique ability to pick the right tones helps his audience feel what he is empowering them with. An example of his pathos is when he says, “even if the gazelle outruns the lion, it doesn’t mean two days later, the lion is gonna say, “okay, I’m gonna give you a pass today because you outran me yesterday, good job” the lion is always hungry and it doesn’t matter if the gazelle outruns it one day, because when the sun gets up, when the gazelle gets up, and when the lion gets up, they’re gonna be running”. His message is to let his audience know that, just because you do something great it doesn’t mean you get a pass the next day. He wants them to understand that as the lion, you must always be running. He emphasizes on the word “always”. Using facts to support his logic. Eric uses the story of the lion and the gazelle because it is a true story in South Africa. For example: “after the lion catches the gazelle, the lion kills it and it does one of two things, it looks back at its family and they look back waiting for his signal for them to come eat, or he picks up the gazelle and brings it back to the family”. He uses this to explain that the lion isn’t out hunting to feed itself, but to feed its

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