Desiree Sanchez Mrs. Everett English 1302 April 17, 2017 Luce Rhetorical Analysis American journalist and politician Clare Boothe Luce gave a speech at the Women’s National Press Club in 1960, criticizing the tendency of the American press to sacrifice journalistic integrity. Before giving her speech, she prepares the audience for her message with her introduction segment. Luce uses her introduction to prepare the audience for her message by repeating the fact that she was invited to give the speech, stating that she is in a difficult situation, and asking them to be open minded of her opinions. In the first paragraph, Luce opens with a paradox about her feelings from happy to feeling challenged. She does this by first stating that she is “flattered and honored to be a guest of honor” then contradicts herself when she says “I am less happy than you think and more challenged than you could know” (lines 3-4). The use of this paradox arrests the attention of the audience and gives signs that her speech isn’t going to be altogether a positive speech. The speaker then goes on to mention that it was the audience who invited her to be there. This is stated in lines 6-7 “You have asked me to tell you what’s wrong with you- …show more content…
Luce says her position which “criticizes the weaknesses and pretensions” (line 12) of her audience does not “evoke and enthusiastic- no less friendly- response” (line 14-15). What Luce means by saying this is that she is put in a situation where she no there won’t be a positive outcome to the difficult task she is given. She then adds some humor by stating that she isn’t as good of a candidate to “give an audience hell” (line 16) than “Billy Graham and the Bishop Sheen” (line 17). By using self-criticism and the effect of humor, Luce gains the sympathy of the audience and makes her listeners more likely to accept what she is going to