Greek rhetoric is the art of persuasive speech, developed by ancient Greek thinkers and considered essential for civic engagement. Aristotle’s “Rhetoric” breaks it down into ethos, pathos, and logos. Quintilian’s five canons of rhetoric influenced modern training methods.
Greek rhetoric is the art of persuasive speech, practiced and written about by ancient Greek thinkers. In ancient Greek society, the ability to influence an audience through language was considered an essential component of civic engagement. Consequently, it became a standard part of Western education that continued into the early 20th century. Greek rhetoric is most closely associated with the Greek philosopher Aristotle, whose text “Rhetoric,” written in the 4th century BC, presents a detailed analysis of how language and persuasion are tied together.
Aristotle breaks down rhetoric into three means of persuasion: ethos, pathos and logos. Ethos refers to an appeal to the speaker’s character. A practitioner of Greek rhetoric should seek to establish credibility with his audience by displaying practical intelligence, virtuous character, and goodwill. In a modern context, an example of the use of ethos would be a public speaker mentioning his affiliation with a prestigious university or citing his philanthropy.
Pathos refers to an appeal to the emotions of the audience. Greek rhetoric encourages the use of rhetorical devices and poetic language to elicit sympathy. This can take the form of devices such as metaphors, alliteration and anaphora, which is the repetition of words to start successive sentences. For example, Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream Speech” contains multiple sentences in a row that are with “One Hundred Years Later.” Anaphoric repetition emphasizes the lack of progress in civil rights by making the audience experience a lack of progress in language.
Logos is the third method of persuasion in Greek rhetoric and refers to the use of reasoning to establish an argument. This can take the form of inductive logic, where a speaker uses specific examples to draw general conclusions. An example of this would be a politician who shows his opponent’s support for a controversial issue and uses this to conclude that the opponent is generally unfit for public office. The speaker can also use deductive reasoning, where he uses a general proposition to draw specific conclusions.
While Greek rhetoric is firmly rooted in the Aristotelian tradition, its modern methods of training were also influenced by Quintilian, a first-century Roman who created five canons of rhetoric for educational purposes. Quintilian’s method of learning rhetorical speech begins with inventing an argument and arranging its parts into a coherent presentation. These first two steps of Greek rhetoric are followed by stylistic use of language, memorization of the entirety of the speech, and a delivery that presents the message effectively.
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