Rhetorical Analysis Of Language And Literature From A Pueblo Indian Perspective

Within “Language and Literature from a Pueblo Indian Perspective,” Leslie Marmon Silko invites the audience to perceive language from another cultural perspective, a perspective that is quite dissimilar in respect to white American culture. Clearly, Silko has a multitude of tricks up her sleeve, for the utilization of innumerable and purposeful rhetorical strategies is evident within the text. Her rhetorical strategies not only assist the audience in understanding the significance of storytelling in the Pueblo culture, but they also draw a stark contrast between how white American culture views the theory of language and how the Pueblo citizenry view it. Silko renders her audience with a glimpse into another way of viewing language and literature,

As members of cultures disparate from that of the speaker, they will have to grapple with concepts that are almost alien to them. However, Silko anticipated that this would happen and planned accordingly when preparing for the deliverance of this oral presentation. She devised the introduction of her speech with several rhetorical strategies to assist with easing the audience into unfamiliar territory. For illustration, Silko declares, “For those of you accustomed to a structure that moves from point A to point B to point C, this presentation may be somewhat difficult to follow because the structure of Pueblo expression resembles something like a spider’s web – with many little threads radiating from a center, criss-crossing each other.” Clearly, Silko utilizes foreshadowing here to alert people in the audience who value coherency that her speech may run contrary to their forms of expression. Therefore, these specified audience members will know what to expect from Silko beforehand and will not be left in an absolute state of bewilderment during her oral presentation. In addition, Silko employs direct address in the same area that she applied foreshadowing. As a result, the audience members for which the foreshadowing was intended are clearly identified. The fact that Silko did not read from a prepared paper is also quite significant. Albeit Silko rendered her presentation in this fashion throughout the entire duration of her speech, her unrehearsed introduction instantaneously exposes her audience to the nonlinear structure of oral tradition and assists them in preparing for the rest of Silko’s seemingly atypical presentation. The beginnings of persuasion are also evident in Silko’s opening lines. Silko proclaims, “I suppose the task that I have today is a formidable one because basically I come here to ask you, at least for a while, to set aside a number of basic approaches that you have